Melbourne’s Treasury Reserve Precinct includes seven buildings of varying ages. The most recognisable is the Old Treasury building fronting Spring Street, designed by J.J. Clark and constructed in 1858-62. We have a long history of working in the precinct, including recent works to repaint all the window joinery. The Old Treasury building is requiring closer attention in relation to its rainwater systems — highlighting the challenges of developing modern solutions for heritage buildings where substantial modifications are not appropriate.

Melbourne’s Old Treasury building in Spring Street, now a museum and offices

The Old Treasury is now a museum, as well as home to the marriage registry. Efflorescence on the main facade triggered the commissioning of a facade condition assessment from Lovell Chen. This detailed the need for gutter repairs and documentation of the works required.

A drone shot showing the large area of visible efflorescence at cornice level, fronting Spring Street. We investigated the source of this active moisture and then documented repairs to remediate the damage.

left : Detail of existing internal downpipe discharging from one of two sumps to the west gutter. The original cast iron elbow is visible embedded in the masonry wall. The copper elbow is a later modification, which resulted in a reduction of the sump’s capacity.
right : Bacchus Marsh Freestone is used in the walls, and large bluestone blocks support the iron truss roof and provide the framework for the copper box gutter. The original sump lining is visibly corroded and has been penetrated to allow the later copper downpipe to reticulate across the wall, which had had some Freestone removed.

Inside the building, we undertook a detailed investigation of the gutter build-ups, including accessing the roof cavity, which gave us the chronology of previous gutter modifications. We developed compliance solutions for the hydraulics, including replacement of the box gutter, increasing the size of sumps and outflows, and replacement of the downpipe elbows — without modifying the heritage fabric. Further works include replacement of the flat lead roof to the attic and most of the lead flashings to the ridge caps and chimneys.

first photo: Wikimedia (public domain)
other photos : Lovell Chen

Treasury Reserve Precinct is located on the lands of the Wurundjeri people of the Kulin nations