Plumridge Ltd, Building No 1

The First sale of land in Fortitude Valley occurred in 1844. Nine suburban allotments of two and four acres each were offered at an upset price of £3 per acre. However the land at Kangaroo Point and in the centre of the settlement at north Brisbane was more sought after and when in 1846 the town limits of Brisbane were proclaimed, Fortitude Valley fell outside the limit. 

By 1854 there were about 150 dwellings in the Fortitude Valley area, stretching as far as Breakfast Creek. In 1858 Wickham Street was surveyed from the corner of Ann Street to Boundary Street. At this stage very few commercial premises had been erected, and Valley residents relied on North Brisbane traders for supplies. Despite these difficulties the population was steadily growing. A government census in 1861 showed that there was a total population of over 1300 people in Fortitude Valley by that year. 

Accompanied by the widespread economic boom of the 1880s were population and building booms. Between 1881 and 1891, Brisbane’s population increased from 37 000 to 100 000. More than half the increase in metropolitan population during the period 1881-1886 was concentrated in Fortitude Valley, Spring Hill, Newstead and South Brisbane. 

Within a very short time span the residential nature of the Valley began to be eroded. As the 1890s progressed those residential sections in close proximity to the rapidly growing retail and industrial areas were changing. The Valley became a heterogeneous area, and it was not uncommon for houses to have motor garages, factories, churches and even hotels as neighbours. Throughout the 1890s large factories and warehouses were established beyond the retail centre, close to the workers’ dwellings. 

188 Barry Parade (formerly known as Susan Street) was built in 1900-1901 and was the first of these brick buildings to be constructed. The confectionery manufacturers Bouchard, Plumridge and Rankin Brothers first appear in the Post Office Directories in 1901 at 41 Susan Street, Fortitude Valley. They had purchased the property (subdivisions 40 & 50 of 87) in 1900. The business was known as Bouchard, Plumridge and Rankin Brothers until 1911 when it was renamed Bouchard and Plumridge and in 1912 it became Plumridge Ltd. 

In 1921 the adjoining building (on the right-hand side) was constructed.  Built by contractor H. Robert for ₤7500 the four storey brick building was the second of a set of three to be constructed for the confectionery manufacturers Plumridge Ltd. At this time, the Valley was experiencing substantial growth as the prosperity of the 1920s fuelled both a flurry of construction in the Valley heart and the desire of Brisbane residents for the most modern shopping experience. In addition to the construction of a large number of new, usually masonry buildings, many existing premises were altered or extended in an effort to attract business. In 1936, when the company purchased the building at 166 Barry Parade, this building was leased out to Nestle and Anglo-Swiss Condensed Milk Company and Plumridge Pty Ltd began operating out of the building at 166 Barry Parade.  

The undertaking of road widening in the Central Business District (CBD) to improve traffic flow and park creation was part of a broader international town planning movement that was prominent between 1912 and 1920. This movement had a significant impact on the Brisbane Municipal Council, leading to the implementation of The City of Brisbane Improvement Act of 1916. Extensive plans were then detailed for the widening of the CBD’s ‘principal streets, the resumption of extensive areas of land, and the extension of the city’s parks and recreational facilities’.  The Municipal Council borrowed £1,000,000 and work on the scheme began in 1923.

The construction of Barry Parade, while a 1923 initiative of the Brisbane City Council under Mayor Diddams, was completed within a couple of years by the Greater Brisbane Council, amalgamated in 1925.  The project fell neatly within the plans of the new council for “city improvements” such as the building of permanent arterial roads.  When completed, Barry Parade allowed an easier flow of traffic around the commercial heart of Fortitude Valley and into the city. Just over a decade later it would also feed traffic onto the newly built Story Bridge.

166 Barry Parade, the three-storey brick building on the south wing of the manufactory complex was built in 1927. It is, however, unclear whom initially inhabited the building until it was purchased by Plumridge Ltd in 1936 and the company moved their business from 188 Barry Parade to 166 Barry Parade, leasing out 188 Barry Parade to Nestle & Anglo-Swiss Condensed Milk Company. From 1947, the company trading at 166 Barry Parade was McNiven Pty Ltd manufacturing wholesale confectioners. 

With a tradition of confectionary manufacturing from the early twentieth century 188 and 166 Barry Parade are an important set of large, brick manufactory buildings in Fortitude Valley. Not only do they demonstrate the increased industrial activity that occurred in this area of Brisbane at the turn of the century, they also reflect the impact that the construction of Barry Parade had on the layout of new buildings in the 1920s.

1. Brisbane City Council Building Register, 1904-28

2. Brisbane City Council Minutes, 1923

3. Certificates of Titles, Department of Natural Resources and Mines

4. Greenwood, Gordon and John Laverty, Brisbane 1859-1959: A History of Local Government, The Council of the City of Brisbane, Brisbane, 1959

5. Mahlstedt & Son, City of Brisbane Detail Fire Survey, Map No. 30, 1951

6. Metropolitan Water and Sewerage Board Survey Maps, Detail Plan No. 151, 1914

7. Queensland Post Office Directories, 1894-1949

8. Watson, Donald and Judith McKay. A Directory of Queensland Architects to 1940. (St. Lucia: U of Q Press, 1984)

9. Watson, Donald and Judith McKay, Queensland Architects of the Nineteenth Century: A Biographical Dictionary, Queensland Museum, Brisbane, 1994