Plans are approved for this new Surry Hills Hotel, designed by Fox Johnston Architects.

The new 121- room Hotel is conceived as an urban travellers rest, set in the heart of the cultural precinct around Paramount House, on the south-east fringe of the Sydney CBD.

Fox Johnston are the project architects and interior designers. Their plan adapts a former warehouse building straddling Goulburn Lane, Brisbane Street and Commonwealth Street.

Its original two-storey brick facade and interior mushroom columns will be retained, and a sculptural new 7-storey building inserted, with hospitality and retail at ground level and 121 rooms above.

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Source: Fox Johnston Architects 

WILLIAMS MEDIA spoke to Fox Johnston Director, Conrad Johnston about the project.

Have your own travel experiences and hotel stays influenced the design?

"Definitely - the hotel becomes a vital part of the experience. I always try and avoid the generic hotels with the sort of 'international style’. I would much prefer to stay in a hotel which relates to the character of the place." 

"This is particularly important for this hotel as it is located in such a special part of Sydney. We have been working in this part of Surry Hills for 15 years, on the Paramount Building and other nearby projects."

"It is definitely one of my favourite urban environments, and we are trying to capture the quality of the place, including the rich heritage of the site in the design of the hotel." 

"In the end our aim is to make this hotel anything but generic!"

What outcome in the design are you most excited about?

"We are very excited by our clients brief of creating a new style ‘inn’. A hotel which travellers and guest stay for the location and character, rather than the traditional impersonal hotel." 

"We have looked to create the building's own environment, with rich internal garden courtyards with abundant planting. These courtyards create a type of quiet sanctuary in the dense urban environment of this part of Surry Hills." 

"The rooms will be compact but have everything you need with built in desks and beds, opening windows to the park and gardens and a sense of calm and privacy."

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Source: Fox Johnston Architects

Signalling the building’s rebirth will be the hotel lobby on Brisbane Street end, opposite Harmony Park, where the brick facade will be peeled back dramatically revealing the double-height lobby.

From here, group-floor retail spaces will open along Goulburn Lane, to Commonwealth Street where the original building entry will be retained.

Two large courtyard spaces will be carved out from the building and given a considered landscape treatment, to provide a calming green space in the urban jungle.

“This is a very densely built up part of the city, so our idea was essentially to create a series of courtyard buildings within the site envelope. We carved out two interior courtyards through the one building that act as light-wells to give most rooms a restful outlook and natural light,” Conrad explained.

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Source: Fox Johnston Architects

Design will be contemporary while materially referencing the robust buildings of this former industrial district. The site sits between the imposing Mark Foys Building and Art Deco Motor Trades Association building.

This once bustling mercantile district is now a vibrant cultural designation with a string of high profile architectural/hospitality projects completing over the past decade.

Fox Johnston has been part of this transformation from the outset with its master plan and design for the public areas and entry gallery of Paramount House, that includes the Golden Age Cinema and restaurant Poly (by Anthony Gil Architects).

Chin Chin restaurant is around the corner at the base of the former Griffith’s Teas building, recently adapted by Popov Bass into residential apartments.

Surry Hills Hotel will commence construction in early 2022