Our City: Manchester Unity Building

Media item: article

Date published: 9 September 2013

This page records the media item. The original article is the property of its publisher and is not reproduced here.

The archive preserves the headline and the date. What follows is general information on how heritage protection actually works in Victoria — the framework that governs the building Smile Solutions occupies, and one that is widely misunderstood.

The layers of heritage protection

Australia protects heritage at three levels, and they are separate systems with separate consequences.

1. The National Heritage List and the Commonwealth Heritage List, under national environmental legislation, for places of national significance. Few buildings are on them.

2. The Victorian Heritage Register, maintained under Victorian heritage legislation and administered by Heritage Victoria, for places of State-level significance. The Manchester Unity Building is on the Victorian Heritage Register. See Manchester Unity Building and Melbourne, Australia: Manchester Unity Building.

3. Local heritage overlays, applied through a council's planning scheme, for places of local significance. This is where the great majority of protected buildings sit — far more than are on the State register.

A building can be covered by more than one, and the strictest applies.

There is also the National Trust, which maintains its own classifications. These carry no statutory force. A National Trust classification is an expert opinion and an advocacy position; it is not a legal control, and the two are constantly confused. How the case for significance is built in the first place is the subject of Manchester Unity Building — Penny Craswell.

What listing on the State register actually means

It does not mean the building cannot be changed. That is the most common misconception.

What it means is that works require a permit from Heritage Victoria unless they fall within an exemption published for that place, and a proposal is assessed against the significance of the place. What that does to a project is set out in Manchester Unity Building, Open House — part 6.

• The registration identifies what is significant — which may be the exterior, particular interiors, the setting, or specific fabric. Not everything about a listed building is protected equally. See Manchester Unity Building — Leonard Joel on fixtures, chattels and how interiors are lost.
• Permit exemptions exist for routine maintenance and minor works, so a listed building is not paralysed.
• The test is impact on significance, not whether change occurs.
• Refusals can be reviewed, and decisions are made on assessment rather than sentiment.

And a listing does not:

• require the owner to open the building to the public — see Manchester Unity Building — Melbourne Open House on why owners do it anyway
• require restoration, or fund it
• prevent sale, leasing or ordinary commercial use
• stop demolition absolutely — though it makes it very difficult and requires consent

The principles conservation practice actually runs on

Australian heritage practice is guided by the Burra Charter, adopted by Australia ICOMOS — the standard reference for conservation of places of cultural significance in this country.

Its core ideas, in plain terms:

• ‘Do as much as necessary and as little as possible.’ The single most quoted line, and the governing principle.
• Understand significance first. A conservation decision that has not established what matters about a place is a guess — which is also why dental treatment starts with an examination and a written plan; see Understanding Your Treatment.
• Retain original fabric in preference to replacing it. A repaired original block is worth more than a perfect replica. See Manchester Unity Building, Open House — part 5 on what that fabric is.
• New work should be identifiable as new — not disguised as original. Honest distinction, not forgery.
• Reversibility. New work should, so far as possible, be removable later without loss.
• Record what you do. The documentation is part of the conservation — see Manchester Unity Building — John Gollings.

Those principles are why heritage work looks the way it does, and why it costs what it does.

Why any of this matters to a patient

Because it explains a limitation the practice cannot simply engineer away.

The Manchester Unity Building was completed in 1932. Doorway widths, floor levels, lift dimensions and bathroom layouts were designed to the standards of that era, and heritage listing constrains how far they can be altered. Accessibility upgrades in listed buildings are negotiated against the significance of the fabric, and the outcome is not always what modern standards would specify. See Our Location and Inside the Manchester Unity Building.

So: if you have specific access requirements — a wheelchair, a mobility aid, a pram, a companion, an assistance animal or an interpreter — phone ahead on 13 13 96. Arrangements that are straightforward with notice are difficult improvised on the day. Say what you need rather than what you have. Use Contact Us to arrange it in advance.

Worth asking about: step-free entry, lift access, accessible bathrooms, whether treatment can be provided in the chair you arrive in, a quieter time of day, and a longer appointment if you need breaks. Those adjustments are described at Dental Anxiety and Oral health care for children with special needs.

Adaptive reuse, and why it is the point

The most effective protection for a heritage building is a viable use.

Buildings that earn their keep are maintained. Buildings that do not are neglected, and neglect — not demolition — is what destroys most heritage fabric. Water gets in, fixings corrode, and the repair bill grows until it exceeds the building's value. See Manchester Unity Building, Open House — part 7.

So a 1932 building containing shops, offices and consulting suites is not a compromise of its heritage. It is the mechanism by which the heritage survives. The Manchester Unity Building has housed medical and dental practitioners since it opened, and that continuity of use is part of why it is still standing and in good condition. Who practises there now is at Our Team and Dentists & Registered Specialists; the work itself is at Our Services and Specialist Care.

The other Manchester Unity Building pages in this archive

• Have a Deco at a Classic — origins, Marcus Barlow, and the faience cladding
• Inside the Manchester Unity Building — the arcade, the escalator and the restoration
• The new shopping centre opens today — the 1932 opening, and what dentistry was like that year
• Party time to mark milestone — the Oddfellows and friendly societies
• Art Deco oasis in the heart of Melbourne, Barry Humphries gets his teeth into art deco beauty, The Manchester Unity Building — Costa Rolfe
• Let there be light for Manchester Unity's brighter future and Manchester Unity all lit up again
• Open House: Part 2, Part 3, Part 4
• The complete index is Our Media

Common questions

What exactly is registered at 220 Collins Street — the whole building, or parts of it?

Both, and some of the furniture. The notice of registration published in the Victoria Government Gazette sets the extent in three parts: all the building known as Manchester Unity Building, being marked B1 on plan 602994 held by the Executive Director; all the following specified objects: Boardroom table and twelve boardroom leather chairs located in the former boardroom on 11th Floor; and all the land marked L1 on Plan 602994.

That is why the place carries two Heritage Act categories on the record — Registered place and Registered object integral to a registered place. The notice is dated 11 April 2002 and was published in the Victoria Government Gazette G 15 of that date, at p.671. A boardroom table registered alongside a twelve-storey building is unusual. Source: the Victorian Heritage Database entry for place 728 (Victorian Heritage Register H0411).

Is this building on a council heritage overlay as well as the State register?

Yes — it is one of the buildings covered by more than one system, and the record lists both numbers. The Victorian Heritage Register number is H0411; the Heritage Overlay number recorded for the same place is HO590, in the municipality of Melbourne City. The record also fixes the address for both: 220-226 Collins Street and 91-107 Swanston Street Melbourne.

So the general point made above is literally this building's situation rather than a hypothetical. The State registration is administered by Heritage Victoria under the Heritage Act; the overlay is a control in the council's planning scheme. Heritage Victoria and the council are the authoritative sources on which approval a particular proposal needs. Source: the Victorian Heritage Database entry for place 728.

If a tenant refits a consulting suite in this building, is that a permit matter?

It depends which part of the building, and the published exemptions are specific about it. For tenancy units on floor levels two to ten, Heritage Victoria's specific exemptions make all interior alterations, including decorative changes, refits and changes to internal layout permit exempt — but any changes to location of unit doorways leading out to corridors will require a permit, and existing doorknobs with the Manchester Unity logo, and any original glass in doors are to be retained and consequently require a permit to be removed.

Outside those units the licence narrows sharply. In interior public spaces, common areas and corridors only minor repairs and maintenance that replace like with like are exempt, because the policy records that those areas retain a high level of integrity. That tenancy-unit exemption is written for floor levels two to ten, so a suite on another level is not within its terms. Heritage Victoria decides any particular proposal, and nothing in this declaration prevents the Executive Director from amending or rescinding all or any of the permit exemptions.

Practical details

Smile Solutions, Level 1, 220 Collins Street, Manchester Unity Building, Melbourne VIC 3000. Phone 13 13 96, or theteam@smilesolutions.com.au. Monday–Friday 8.00am–6.00pm, Saturday 8.30am–1.30pm, Sunday by appointment.

Every practitioner's registration can be verified free on the AHPRA public register at ahpra.gov.au.

This page records a published article and its date. The heritage material above is general background rather than legal advice; statements attributed to the registration are drawn from the Victorian Heritage Database entry for place 728 (VHR H0411), heritage legislation and permit requirements change, permit exemptions can be amended or rescinded, and Heritage Victoria and the Victorian Heritage Database are the authoritative sources. The building is not a claim about clinical care. This is not a diagnosis or a treatment plan. Third-party published content is not reproduced.

Smile Solutions trades under ABN 28 193 514 103.