The Strand Arcade

The Strand Arcade features a Victorian-style gallery with three levels of dark timber balconies and a glass roof that floods the interior with daylight. It opened in eighteen ninety-two as a luxury shopping destination designed by architect John Spencer Bird. During the construction, workers discovered a tunnel beneath the site that had been used by convicts in the early days of the colony. The arcade suffered a major fire in nineteen seventy-six that destroyed much of the interior, but crews rebuilt it exactly as before.