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Has Surry Hills lost its edge?
Has Surry Hills lost its edge? That was the big question tabled by Time Out to a crowd of influential Sydney identities recently at the Cricketers Arms’ Bistro Morelli.
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Maya Stocks, artist/designer “Surry Hills was so inspiring in my teen years. Now I’m back after 14 years abroad and it feels really homogenised.” |
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Ralph Myers, artistic director, Belvoir St Theatre "Post-war Surry Hills was working class, then came the artists and bohemians, now it's the nouveau riche. Belvoir sits squarely on that housing estate/ arts community schism so, like it or not, we’ll respond to this changing scene." |
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Hellen Rose, performance artist “If they turned the Town Hall into a taco bar there’d be an outcry, but not in Surry Hills. This used to be a place where music was everywhere and pubs were think tanks. Now cash is killing culture rather than aiding it. The soul of Surry Hills is being smothered.” |
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Rich Roberts, creative industries specialist “Sydney wants to be Los Angeles but LA doesn’t have a soul. I see here what I saw happen to Camden in London, but when I walk down Little Riley Street I still love it. I think the rise of small bars and reactivated laneways has been great for Surry Hills.” |
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Andy Kent, You Am I/
Love Police Records “Sydney doesn’t respect its cultural heritage. We need a tangible organised history of Surry Hills so people who are new to the suburb can understand that these streets inspired The Harp in the South and formed the Beasts of Bourbon and Hoodoo Gurus.” |
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Nathan Hudson, singer-songwriter, Faker “I’ve played all the venues, drunk in all the bars, hit all the clubs. But I also spent five years volunteering at a refuge on the needle-exchange night shift. Drug users, sex workers, homeless youth – Surry Hills has changed but that ‘colourful’ side still exists.” |
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Stephen Ferris, FBI radio DJ “Surry Hills has become a professional’s playground and young creatives have to live somewhere else. The dollar power of property developers rules now. But a monopoly of power in venues is dangerous – we need to set a limit on how many bars people can own.” |
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Anna Plunkett, designer, Romance Was Born “I’m a country girl but Surry Hills is my home away from home, personally and professionally. I’d like to see the crazy, wild, completely off-the-hook party that was the Surry Hills Festival returned to run the length of Crown Street and shake it up again.” |
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Mark Poston, CEO, EMI Australia “I love highbrow, I love lowbrow… so I love Surry Hills. EMI relocated to Flinders Street in 2011 because I wanted to rebuild some mystique into the office and give back to the community. That’s why our front window showcases local artists like Beastman.” |
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Dominic Juillet, Cricketers Arms licensee “Between 1996–2000 [the pub] didn’t get one complaint but since 2005 it’s been a nightmare. New residents complain about loud footsteps, even people talking as they walk past. The cops used to help block this street for the Golden Bone dog race on Australia Day!” |
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Jack Tarlinton, publisher, Skateboarders Journal “Surry Hills used to be genuine, a place of real substance, a home and hub for artists and cartoonists. Now it’s where 20-somethings come to fuck up without giving anything back. But creativity isn’t an organised sport, you have to do things on a grassroots level.” |
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Nick Dent, Time Out editor We lost the Hopetoun and the Excelsior as venues. The rents are scaring off the bohemians. But here’s the positive: Surry Hills is hands-down the best place to eat, drink and brunch in Sydney. Question is, can we keep the cool factor but retain a sense of community and shared recent history?” |
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Best rant I have read all year - I 100% agree with Billy Custard. This argument people in the article are trying to make reminds me of people complaining about traffic - if you are in traffic you are traffic - if you don't like it shut the f*ck up and get out!
Posted on Fri 24 Feb 2012 01:31:44
I actually LOL'd at the fact a CEO of EMI who relocated his offices to Surry Hills has to gall to comment about the suburb losing its bohemian edge! This article was so predictable it could be parody. The FBI guy has it right, gentrification is a natural and unavoidable process, now deal with it. "I was into it before it was cool" gives you zero cred and sadly y'all sound like my uncle reliving his glory days "back in my day....". Miss that stabby edge of Surry Hills yesteryear? Take a walk down the road through the estates of Waterloo/Redfern. If you don't like a scene then quit bitching and go create one!
Posted on Thu 23 Feb 2012 22:26:56
Daz, do you mean you have to be poor to be creative/cool or is that three different groups of people?
Posted on Thu 23 Feb 2012 07:13:12
Please DONT leave comments on this page - the correct page address is here: http://www.au.timeout.com/sydney/aroundtown/features/10326/is-going-upmarket-sending-surry-hills-downhill Technical error - sorry! Time Out.
Posted on Thu 23 Feb 2012 07:08:11
Wow. Nice of you to put all those f-kheads in the same article, it's a readymade find-and-torture list! What a bunch of smarmy c-ts, all of them talking about how surry hills is no longer "bohemian", and look at THEM: almost all of them sucking satan's corporate c-k one way or the other and contributing to the un-bohemianisation of surry hills that they're complaining about. God. A few live music pubs close because no one goes to the gigs, and then everyone gets upset. It reminds me of when Souths got drummed out of the NRL and all these "supporters" showed up to protest, and it was like why the F weren't all those people at any of the games? If you don't use it, you lose it. Tough tits. Anyway, who cares if a "cool" suburb gets ruined by dickheads. Who gives a fk if the East Village or Prenzlauerberg or Camden get ruined. All the artists just go somewhere else! And who are these artists anyway? I mean, where are these sad, poor, colourful souls who wish they could all commune together in Surry Hills but can't afford the $150/week room? What a bunch of LOSERS. I'm glad they can't afford to be here, they sound PATHETIC. Actually, the biggest flaw in this whole thing is that people think it's the suburb's fault that there is no longer a "bohemian culture". As if the rich people just moved in and destroyed bohemia. But this is not true. Bohemia does not exist in the same way that it used to. The age ended in Sydney because the middle class got richer, and also because people who might once have been "pure artists" now believe that selling themselves to corporations and brands is perfectly acceptable. Many of today's yuppie media/PR/design/advertising f-heads might have been douchebags in teacosies once upon a time. The barefoot philosophising hacky-sack toting chai drinking experimental artist is a thing of the past in this city. They are completely irrelevant to modernity, and irrelevant to where art and culture are heading. I, my friends, I am the nouvelle vague of art in this city. And I live in Surry Hills. The end.
Posted on Thu 23 Feb 2012 07:05:59
The great local pubs have been replaced by wanky bars that will out of date in six months, the restaurants are too expensive, shops along crown st are closing down, Surry Hills is gone....
Posted on Thu 23 Feb 2012 07:05:17
The great local pubs have been replaced by wanky bars that will out of date in six months, the restaurants are too expensive, shops along crown st are closing down, Surry Hills is gone....
Posted on Thu 23 Feb 2012 07:05:17
You don't need Surry Hills "identities" to tell you that the suburb has had it's day in the sun. The natural evolution of cities dictates that cool/creative/poor people make run down suburbs hip then the wankers move in and ruin it. Look what's happened in Berlin for a prime example. Mascot, Marrickville et al beware, the wankers are coming ..
Posted on Thu 23 Feb 2012 07:04:47
You don't need Surry Hills "identities" to tell you that the suburb has had it's day in the sun. The natural evolution of cities dictates that cool/creative/poor people make run down suburbs hip then the wankers move in and ruin it. Look what's happened in Berlin for a prime example. Mascot, Marrickville et al beware, the wankers are coming ..
Posted on Thu 23 Feb 2012 07:04:47
Why does everybody on Crown St look like they're dressed for a day at the races these days? So much shiny flamable fabric and hair gel. A well-flicked match could solve all of my problems with the neighbourhood.
Posted on Thu 23 Feb 2012 06:24:32
Why does everybody on Crown St look like they're dressed for a day at the races these days? So much shiny flamable fabric and hair gel. A well-flicked match could solve all of my problems with the neighbourhood.
Posted on Thu 23 Feb 2012 06:24:32