Forty years. From a student shack in my 20s to working here for the last 20 years. Surry Hills, this wicked and wonderful ’hood has wowed and wooed me. A few kilometres from the CBD up the big incline from Central train station, it paints a broad-brush stroke. Low life, high life, underclass, upper class. Eccentrics and degenerates.
For as long as I’ve been here, people have been saying the place has been gentrified. Licks of paints, fancy panes of glass, fine providores. The advertising agency my partners and I started occupies the smartly restored old Crown Street Women’s Hospital, once the largest maternity hospital in Australia. Sometimes a client leans in, smiles and says, “I was born here you know?” The floors have ears.
The pubs here define this place more than most.
“The Shakey” (Shakespeare Hotel) was a journo haunt for years. “The Crix” (The Cricketer’s Arms) which is sports-day headquarters because of its proximity to the SCG. And a great French bistro upstairs. The Hollywood, an art deco gem where now departed and Hollywood showgirl Doris Goddard was one of the first in the 1960s to let women drink in front bars. “The Carro” (The Carrington) once flaunted a transvestite bar out back but now it’s got a flashy dog-friendly menu. You can also have a beer outside at The Forrester’s and play “spotto” – watching the punters walking through the subtle red-light door at Australia’s most famous brothel, A Touch More Class.
We also have the special tiny arthouse cinema The Golden Age; the Belvoir St Theatre where Cate Blanchett once plied her trade; and the recently renovated Brett Whiteley Studio where the artist once lived and worked.
Indeed, Surry Hills has discarded her old frock – working class, a band in every pub, every night – and shaken off that heroin and street hooker look. She plays to a different beat for sure, but with plenty of bass notes of old.
The most explosive gig of my life was in the early 80s when a young Nick Cave and his band The Birthday Party played the legendary Sydney Trade Union Club – “the People’s Palace” – in Foveaux Street. A night so wild I feared for my life. In those days, “the Tradies” stayed open until 5am proffering acts such as INXS and Violent Femmes. It’s now wannabe New York-style loft apartments spruiked by travel influencers.
I’ve watched the grumpy old kebab man get replaced by a pricey (and delicious) ice cream store. Joe the Grocer went too, subbed for a communal space with digital nomads ordering $9 iced matchas. Speaking of subs, the S&M bondage store is now a Korean instafamous destination cafe. And spot Taylor Swift dining at Pellegrino 2000 when she comes to town.
But roots run deep in postcode 2010, despite the seeds of change.
Ruth Park’s book Harp in the South, written in the 1940s tells of life as an Irish Catholic immigrant raising a family in Surry Hills – then an inner-city slum – complete with her drunken husband Hughie and the minutiae of hard lives.
Outlines of that raw portrait remain to this day. The old hobos still thread the streets, the pub habitues still glower or bawl, a domestic or two spills into the streets from clusters of run-down terraces.
Along Surry Hills’ main artery, Crown Street, the Salvation Army’s Oasis centre takes in kids who can no longer live at home or are displaced too young by life’s other misfortunes. Generous pockets of public housing thread the area and poke through the eye-pleasing distractions of the street.
For the local housos, the street is their living room and playground. Like recently departed Chris. who sat near the Clock Hotel with his boom box and his trusty hat-wearing dog Sauvignon Blanc (Sav for short). He would cheerfully greet passers-by dispensing genuine happiness. I was sad when his spot went vacant. He brightened everyone’s day. (I hear Sav is ok).
Then there’s Peter, “the Bird Man of Surry Hills”. He struts around with Caesar on his shoulder, a brazen bright-green parrot who dares you with his cocky pebble eyes. When Queen Camilla came to tour community food hub OzHarvest, one of her entourage asked him: “Would Caesar like to meet the Queen?” Peter said, “Why not?” Footage of the parrot and the Queen snared front-page news.
There’s also the old guy who regularly responds to the irresistible call of a vacant outside table at upmarket eatery bills to suck up his VB longneck elixir out of a brown paper bag. The ever so polite wait staff move him along with something like an, “Excuse me sir, are you intending to dine?”
There’s no shortage of creatives. It’s always been a place where ambitious chefs have kick-started their destination offerings. Kylie Kwong and Bill Granger at Billy Kwong, Jeremy Strode at Bistrode, Mark Best at Marque, Lennox Hastie at Firedoor. And the list goes on.
Being a former reviewer for the Good Food Guide the only prerequisite to my business partners when scouting locations was we must be in Surry Hills.
At last count today I have 14 hatted restaurants within a kilometre of each other, including Bar Copains, Bessie’s, Jane and Bastardo. Alternatively, I can go happily downmarket to Cleveland Street, where early Lebanese immigrants introduced hummus to Anglo-Celtics at Fatima’s, Emad’s (since 1964) or The Prophet. BYO of course.
The more I know Surry Hills, the closer she holds.
Hugh Fitzhardinge is a creative director and founding partner, The Ward Marketing Group.