In 1874,
a large gathering of Ballarat dignitaries and townsfolk,
watched the ceremonial laying of the foundation stone
on a parcel of land in Lydiard street.
The owners of the land,
the wealthy Clarke family had instructed their architect
George "Diamond" Brown to build a theatre worthy
of the successful gold mining town.
Just nine months later,
the Academy of Music held its successful opening night.
The show, the French
comedic opera, La Fille de Madame Angot
The building is now known as Her Majesty's Theatre, Ballrat.
Arguably Australia's longest continually operating theatre
with a famed rake stage and unmatched architectural beauty.
Her Majesty's Theatre is the beating heart
as far as I'm concerned,
culturally within a region anywhere.
So a theatre plays a critical role.
Ballarat is a historic place,
and the theatre in whichever form, be it
another building or this current building,
has played a critical role in the formation of a city.
Theatres have a long history of change.
There are very few theatres that you walk into
that haven't actually had
one, or two, or three iterations in their interiors.
And this theatre started as a flat floored hall.
It was a music venue, was a music hall. It had one circle.
It was transformed in the 1890's by William Pitt
the architect, a very famous theatre architect
the architect for the Princess Theatre.
And so it was then turned into a lyric theatre.
And it was when it was first called Her Majesty's.
This theatre is a Victorian era theatre
with all the flourishes.
It's got all the filigree you can imagine
and beautiful styling and touches.
And it was built with a theatre in mind.
A specialist in theatres
and industrial buildings, architect William Pitt
increased the theatres capacity
by elevating the old single balcony,
closer to the ceiling and then adding a second balcony,
the dress circle below it.
Thus, creating the double horseshoe balconies
that still stand today.
The stage was also enlarged and a magnificent dome added
in the ceiling.
Over the decades there were more changes, new fashions,
new owners, new content.
In 1965, the renowned Royal South Street society
purchased the theatre, using it as the home
of their prestigious Eisteddfod competition.
In 1987, the ownership and management of Her Majesty's
was handed over to the city of Ballarat,
who said about finding the right people to deliver
the much needed TLC for the grand old building.
We, began our involvement with Her Majesty's in about 2016.
When we were approached by council to look
at a report that had been produced
on where to go next with Her Majesty's.
Our role essentially was to come
on board as the principal architects for the project,
and to initially sift through what was a
an amount of work that probably was
of a value of $20-$25 million dollars and say,
well we need a First Stage that council can afford,
and what are the priorities?
And it's not really until you actually
peel back some of the surfaces,
particularly with any historic piece of architecture,
particularly that as complex and
as brilliant and as amazing as this venue,
that you truly find some of those elements
that you sometimes wish you didn't.
The theatre for a long time had structural issues,
both with its stage and with its flying system
and the fly tower.
And what we found as the engineers began to look at this
that there were major structural problems with the trusses
above the stage and with the stage itself.
So that part of this first phase in fact
was to look at completely rehabilitating the stage house.
The nature of the restoration was all the problems
were yet to be found.
For example, we removed all the lead paint.
We had to try to deal with the rising damp.
I think as everyone will be aware,
the props and scenery on a theatre, a traditional theatre
are hung from a ropes and cords that hang down from battens
in the ceiling from what's called the grid.
And so the grid relies on a very solid structure in,
in the stage house.
And so what happened was the engineer's designed
new steel trusses that have been inserted
three massive steel trusses.
The stage floor was not structurally sound to
build a scaffold on for the roof.
So part of the project was to pull out the stage floor,
rebuild it to where we could get it
to a strength rating so that we could then build a scaffold
on top of the stage all the way up to the roof.
And then the remediation in the roof up there
was to build three steel trusses
alongside the timber trusses inside the buildings.
So I got to see the the bones of this building
that hadn't been exposed, since it was built.
It's the beautiful elements that we found though
were hand hewn timbers.
This stage was rebuilt, and through that process,
we got to see those timbers exposed for the first time
that were holding up the stage.
Hand forged nails, you know these spectacular nails
that you just think about how somebody had to
manually drive in into these, you know, hardwood timbers.
This is not the first restoration project that our company
and the local trades have undertaken.
Because it does take a collaborative approach.
Otherwise you can't do these builds,
very hard to know what the scope is.
Specifically, we had to find a ceramicist.
With the heritage toilets downstairs,
the ceramic drains had been pulled out and replaced.
So we had to get a new ceramic drains
handmade by a ceramicist.
We had a local tradesman here
as a sheet metal to fabricate the copper gutters
which is probably a bit of an art.
Plasterer's. The plastering here is another
probably one that's a specialist trade
because it involves what we call hydraulic lime,
not hydrated lime.
So there's no cement products in any of the work
that we've done here.
The pleasure in this project,
for me in a sense as with all of these projects,
is about the future.
It is about undertaking work.
That is about ensuring that heritage has a relevance now,
and will have a relevance and viability in the future.
I think when you do a restoration project,
you always like to tell people that love this theatre,
and so many people in Ballarat have a connection to it.
Doesn't matter where I go, whether I'm talking
with young people or I'm talking with friends
and I tell them about the project.
They always say to me, "Oh, what have you done?"
Well, the secret is you can't tell what we've done.
What I'm most happiest with,
is that it actually represents the same,
that it feels like it did beforehand.
However, knowing that it's structurally sound
that you can now knock on that wall and not feel
like the paint will give way and the plaster will fall out.
We've got a building that's been built
on multiple straight frontages, by hand,
with hand hewn timbers,
with heritage, just oozing out of it.
And an absolutely supportive owner who is
in a position to ensure
that it lasts for this community forever.
The theatre is a place for building connections.
It's about relationships. It's about experiences.
The joy of this project in a sense,
is ensuring that we're part of a journey for this building.
That ensures its relevance. That ensures its functionality.
It's a place for everybody.
And at some point in time, there's somebody
that's been on this stage, who will remember
that experience more than many other things in their life.