Industry > Sandstone > Harvesting Sandstone
Harvesting Sandstone
Pyrmont quarries flourished from the 1840s to the 1940s, mainly organised by Robert and Charles Saunders. The distinctive yellowblock sandstone created majestic public buildings in Sydney and many other cities. Highly skilled stonemasons operated the most up-to-date machinery, and were strong enough to win the world’s first successful campaign for the Eight Hour Day.
Paradise, Purgatory and Hell Hole were quarried to make Sydney’s most elegant buildings. But sandstone is soft, and after a century or more it needs restoration, ideally with identical stone – much of which is now built over. Sandstone is therefore harvested whenever a site becomes vacant. Good sandstone was rescued during the construction of Jacksons Landing, on the CSR site. During that operation, workers rediscovered and adapted techniques developed by stonemasons a hundred years ago to extract huge blocks without breaking them apart. Those techniques, in turn, enabled Troy Stratti and Bundanoon Sandstone to provide the material for the marvellous headland at Barangaroo.
Sandstone deposits may be hundreds of metres deep – but they can be very narrow. The Harris Street-Mount Street site was ideal for this purpose, and the rescue operation is almost complete - while nearby sites such as the Harris Street-Bowman Street and Mount Street-Miller Street building sites have no usable stone.
Harvested stone is stored by the state government, for repairs on existing buildings - and future construction.
Source
Troy Stratti, Cultural Heritage of Sydney Sandstone, and personal communication
Related Items
