Painting Mungo Scott Flour Mills, Summer Hill Part 2

Today's painting on the easel of my deck gallery is from 2009 and is of the last flour truck to depart the Mungo Scott Flour Mills in Summer Hill.

SU9 Summer Hill, Mungo Scott Flour Mills Last Flour truck .
2009 oil on canvas 28 x 36cm
Available for sale
This vast behemoth was the last operational flour mill in Sydney.
Mungo Scott Ltd acquired the land for £3000 in 1916 and built the flour mill with an estimated £10,000 budget in 1921-22.

SU3 Summer Hill Mungo Scott Flour Mills Late Afternoon
2009 oil on canvas 30 x 30cm
Available for sale
It exploited the newly built Metropolitan goods line between Wardell Road and Darling Harbour.
The Summer Hill freight line, alongside Hawthorne Canal, was used twice a week to service the Mills. This branch line was the last operational section of the once mighty Metropolitan goods line before it was redeveloped as light rail/cycling track.

SU2 Summer Hill Mungo Scott Flour Mills Evening
2009 oil on canvas 30 x 30cm
Available for sale
A huge fire in the mill in 1927 was believed to have been caused by sparks caused by passing trains igniting stored flour.
The landmark silos appeared in the early 1950s, as Goodman Fielder grew the Mill’s capacity. Allied Mills took control of the buildings in the 1950s and they were used as a key processing facility for wheat grown in New South Wales until 2009.
The last train ran to the Mungo Scott flour mill on 1 December 2008.

SU1 Summer Hill Mungo Scott Flour Mills by Night
2009 oil on canvas 30 x 30cm
Available for sale
As the Mungo Scott Flour Mills were conveniently close to the Taylor galleries in Smith street where I held regular exhibitions, I was well placed to be able to paint canvases of some of its last operations, including some of the last flour trucks to leave the Mills. 

Allied Mills finally vacated the site forever in about 2010 and moved their operations to a huge site in Picton, in Sydney's south-west, which I drive past whenever I exhibit my paintings at the Thirlmere Festival of Steam.

SU6 Summer Hill Mungo Scott Flour Mills Last Flour truck
2009 oil on canvas 41 x 61cm
PRIVATE COLLECTION : SYDNEY
Enquiries about other Summer Hill paintings

The precinct is now redeveloped and is home to offices and more than 400 apartments.

Related Posts

Painting from the silos of the Mungo Scott Flour Mills

The empty mask - Edwin Davey Flour Mills

Monet and Streeton meet Windsor Bridge

Windsor is one of the 'Macquarie towns' on the Hawkesbury River created in the early 19th century by Governor Lachlan Macquarie as the foodbowl of Sydney.

 TSWB1 Windsor Bridge from western side
2013 acrylic on canvas 46 x 61cm

Available

Thompson Square, established in 1795 at the centre of Windsor, is thought to be the oldest public square in Australia.

The old Windsor Bridge was a beam bridge built in 1874 for horse-drawn vehicles.

This canvas was painted in 2013 before NSW Roads and Maritime Services (RMS) department had started work on the replacement bridge, 35 metres (115 ft) downstream from the existing bridge.

The bank on the Freeman's Reach side of the Hawkesbury, where I painted this idyllic view marks exactly where the new bridge is now situated.

I painted these scenes in jacaranda flowering season as the bluish mauves offset the bright greens of the foreground.

TSWB3 Windsor Bridge early morning from western side
2013 acrylic on canvas 46 x 61cm
Available

The old bridge is an austere construction with modestly proportioned piers and the engineering of the cross bracing  consistent with the challenges of its location.

TSWB12 View from Windsor Bridge in jacaranda season
2015 oil on canvas 25 x 51cm
Available

As you can see from the painting above, the real charm of Windsor Bridge is revealled in its river vistas.

Monet would have loved this spot. And my gallerist, on seeing these works, did ask if I'd painted them in France.

This area certainly inspired Arthur Streeton, one of the Australian Impressionists, who painted his masterpiece "The Purple Noon's Transparent Might" not far from here.

TSWB16 'Construction of the new Windsor Bridge' 2019
oil on canvas 91 x 183cm
Available

But now the timeless harmony of the sleepy river and the Georgian, Victorian and Federation architecture of Thompson Square has been surrounded by a maelstrom of excavation and construction.

Most of the old trees have now been felled.

The new bridge opened to traffic on 18th May 2020.

The new approach road rises up on a large visually intrusive embankment as it cuts a swathe  through the square.

There is now a bitter battle to save the 140 year old bridge from demolition. The RMS has stated that it will start removal in the coming months, but many would prefer the old bridge to be restored and left in situ. 

Related posts

My page of Windsor Paintings

Painting Thompson Square, Windsor

The Boiling Frog

Fish and chips

The Phantom Toll House

Hotel Palisade redux

There's just so much history in the walls of the Palisade.
It was the scene of the last drinks for many Anzacs before they left Australia during the First World War, and the 'local' for the engineers and navvies working on the construction of the Sydney Harbour Bridge. Desperate wharfies seeking work at the Hungry Mile during the Great Depression would either drown their sorrows or celebrate their good fortune in finding a day's work, depending on luck. It was the haunt of 'colourful characters', the much loved centre of the Millers Point community and the headquarters of activists during the era of the Green Bans and the Patrick's dispute. 
It stood on the corner of Argyle and Bettington streets in Millers Point like an exclamation point at the end of High street. For many years it was the tallest building in Sydney, and overlooked the wharves of East Darling Harbour which provided most of its clientele. At the time of its building, workers terraces to house the wharfies were being constructed in High Street which was carved into the sandstone escarpment above the Fingerwharves and Bond stores below.
This painting shows one of the landbridges over Hickson Road, and the railings preventing revellers falling into the deep cutting in front of the Palisade. This strange configuration of the landscape makes the quirky, slightly ramshackle style of the Palisade even more startling.

In 2014, when I painted this canvas, there was a small park in front of the Palisade. It was overgrown, but its figtrees were a welcome source of shade in summer. Since the redevelopment of this area, the park is now a wide green lawn with a few saplings which will need a lot of time before they provide shade.

MP7A Hotel Palisade 2014
oil on canvas 36 x 46cm
Available
There had been an earlier, much smaller hotel built on this site in the 1880s but it was pulled down in the frenzy of slum clearances at the beginning of the 20th century.
After the end of the bubonic plague crisis in the first decade of the 20th century, the population in Millers Point increased so much that the Sydney Harbour Trust had to build replacement hotels to cater to the port workers. Henry Deane Walsh was commissioned to build the new Palisade Hotel, one of 4 that were built by the Trust, the others being Dumbarton Castle, the 'Big House' (Moretons in Sussex Street- now the Sussex Hotel) and the Harbour View Hotel.

MP30 The Reopening of the Palisade
2015 oil on canvas 51 x 25cm

Enquiries about similar paintings
The 5 storey hotel was built in 1915-16, and was one of the last Sydney buildings to be designed in the 'Federation Free' style, with parapets, and sandstone banding decorating the red brick masonry.
From the 1920s the head lease for the hotel was owned by Tooth and Co. who sub let it to various licensees.

MP30 The Reopening of the Palisade
2015 oil on canvas 51 x 25cm

 Enquiries about similar paintings 

From 1936, when the role of the Sydney Harbour Trust was taken over by the newly formed Maritime Service Board, title to the hotel was issued to the MSB, although Tooths continued to lease it until 1950. At that time the licensee, P. K. Armstrong, obtained the lease.
In February 1987 title passed from the MSB into private ownership, then in 1994, Palisade Properties Pty Ltd obtained title.

MP30 The Reopening of the Palisade
2015 oil on canvas 51 x 25cm 

Before redevelopment, the Palisade loomed abruptly on the hill overlooking the wharves. Many wharfies joked that they didn't need to have built the Harbour Control Tower, just use the roof of the Palisade.

MP30 The Reopening of the Palisade
2015 oil on canvas 51 x 25cm 

Enquiries about similar paintings

The Barangaroo Headland Park has been terraced up from the shoreline so that the path leads to the Palisade.

There's also now a series of sandstone steps from the edge of High Street leading to nothing in particular that serve as a prelude to the Barangaroo Headland Park further down.

Related Posts

Sign of the Palisade

 

No Place like Home

 

The Last of the Hungry Mile 

Fish and chips, painting in Windsor

Painting a Thompson Square panorama

in Windsor

Painting Windsor Seafoods and its neighbour Gloria Jean's Coffee from just outside the Macquarie Arms Hotel.

My favourite fast food shop in Windsor!

 TSW11 'George st from Thompson Square '
 2013 oil on canvas 31 x 153cm
Enquiries

 I usually painted the trees, river and the graceful Georgian architecture on either side of the park. I found that I really enjoyed painting Windsor's George st shopping strip or "Eat St".

I've decided to paint a series of studies of individual shops.

Starting to paint a small canvas
'Windsor Seafoods and Gloria Jean's Coffee'
2014 oil on canvas 28 x 36cm
Enquiries

Windsor Seafoods at 74 George St Windsor is in the AC Stearn Building.built in 1907.

The name "A. C. Stearn" and date is helpfully written in decorative maroon lettering on the top floor of the facade of this impressive heritage building.
One of the legendary attractions of Windsor Seafoods is their macaw.

However "Snappa" is only in residence 3 or 4 days a week, and by the lack of raucous screeching, this must have been one of "Snappa"'s days off.

Starting to paint a small canvas
'Windsor Seafoods and Gloria Jean's Coffee '
2014 oil on canvas 28 x 36cm
Enquiries

The original balcony of this handsome two story building  was unfortunately removed in the 1950's.

However it was later restored to its former grandeur  in 1975, and then was updated again in 1988, in preparation for the Bicentenary celebrations.

Halfway through painting a small canvas
'Windsor Seafoods and Gloria Jean's Coffee '
2014 oil on canvas 28 x 36cm
Enquiries

There is a little laneway between Gloria Jean's Coffee and Windsor Seafoods which is topped by a cream wall that I initially thought was a walkway from the top floor of one building to another. It isn't, or if it is, you'd need the skills of a tightrope walker.
On closer inspection it's just a few rows of bricks strangely attaching the two buildings, with no real function. It could be a leftover from a previously existing building, possibly even the Sir John Young Hotel which was built in 1865, then demolished in 1915 following a fire in 1913.

Halfway through painting a small canvas
'Windsor Seafoods and Gloria Jean's Coffee '
2014 oil on canvas 28 x 36cm
Enquiries

 Gloria Jean's Coffee is one of 3 little eateries in what apparently used to be a single building.

The other 2 are "Grill on George" and Stir Crazy" but aren't visible in these pictures.

Starting to paint 
TSW18 'Windsor Seafoods'
2014 oil on canvas 36 x 28cm
Enquiries

I finished lunch and my first painting, then started another.

This time I used the same size canvas, but turned it around to paint a vertical study of Windsor Seafoods.

TSW17 'Windsor Seafoods and Gloria Jean's Coffee '
2014 oil on canvas 28 x 36cm
Enquiries

One of the charming eccentricities of the architecture is that the levels of the crenellations of the roofline of the 2 outer buildings are lower than that of the centre building.

TSW18 'Windsor Seafoods'
2014 oil on canvas 36 x 28cm
Enquiries

All 3 buildings have blue and cream striped awnings, which with the white canvas marquee, fluttering yellow and orange flags and blue and cream umbrellas of Windsor Seafoods, give the whole streetscape a jaunty air.

Related posts

Monet and Streeton meet Windsor Bridge

The Boiling Frog

The Phantom Toll House

Painting Thompson Square, Windsor

See my page in this blog of Windsor paintings