Salamanca Place is a historic docks area of Hobart lined with a long
row of simple Georgian sandstone warehouses built in the 1830s. These
mellow north-facing buildings once stored grain, wool, whale oil,
apples and imported goods from around the world. These wharf buildings
and storehouses have been converted into a collection of restaurants,
cafes, art galleries and speciality shops while retaining its
historical buildings.
Salamanca Markets: every Saturday, Salamanca Place takes on a totally
different look and carnival atmosphere when it hosts the famous
Salamanca Markets. Over 300 stallholders congregate to sell produce and
crafts from all over Tasmania as buskers, artists and performers keep
the crowd entertained. Here you can purchase a hand made piece of
Tasmanian craftwork or something special for the dining table, like a
jar of home-made pickles or a bottle of Tasmanian Cassis, a delightful
blood-red, sweet, blackcurrant flavoured liqueur blackberry wine. Open
every Saturday. More >>
About Salamanca Place: Salamanca Place began to take shape in the late
1820s. The number of ships carrying whale products, import and export
goods, immigrants and convicts in and out of port soon proved too much
for the Old Wharf at the foot of Hunter Street. The southern end of
Sullivans Cove possessed deeper anchorage and better shelter, and in
1830 the Government agreed to build New Wharf where Salamanca Place now
exists. New Wharf soon became one of the great whaling ports of the
world and as Tasmania’s export trades increased, the need for
dockside warehouses quickly grew.
Hundreds of convicts that were housed in hulks moored at New Wharf were
used to quarry out the cliffs behind Salamanca Place. Convicts were
used to cut the stone and build the row of sandstone warehouses that
lined New Wharf and now form Salamanca Place.
When whalers began tying up at what then was known as New Wharf, which
had been created to Typical of the merchants who helped create
Salamanca's classic Georgian streetscape, Askin Morrison was a merchant
who arrived in Tasmania in 1829. In the early 1830s he imported a
cargo of tea from China that reputedly made him a profit of 10,000
pounds. It is thought that he used this money in 1834 to purchase a
parcel of land fronting New Wharf. Morrison immediately built a
warehouse on the property (now 65 Salamanca Place), which became the
base for his import and export business and where he stored whale oil
and products.
Adjacent to Morrison’s first warehouse, Richard Willis, a
merchant arriving from London in 1834, built himself a warehouse for
goods storage, with a covered archway leading to stables in a courtyard
at the rear (65b Salamanca Place). Willis imported pianos, wines and
silverware until his business collapsed in the 1840s depression. When
he lost his building to a creditor, Morrison was quick to purchase it
at a bargain price.
Captain William Young purchased the vacant block next door and built
another warehouse in the same style as Morrison’s. Young was a
whaler and timber merchant who also owned 600 acres of forested land on
Bruny Island. In 1853 he sold his warehouse to Morrison.
The brothers, Hugh and John Addison originally built the two
four-storey warehouses (77-79 Salamanca Place) in 1843 on land also
purchased from Captain James Kelly. John Addison, an architect,
designed the buildings to flank the pre-existing Kelly’s Lane.
Throughout the nineteenth century, the whalers had so dramatically
diminished the whale populations in the waters surrounding Tasmania
that some species were on the brink of extinction. By the late 1800s
Hobart’s whaling days were over; and, like the warehouses in
Hunter Street (where Old Wharf had been), the row of warehouses that
lined New Wharf were given new life as fruit processing and jam
producing factories.
Tasmania’s climate was well suited to growing stone fruits and
the export market for jam and processed fruit expanded rapidly in the
1890s. During the next 50 years, many Salamanca Place buildings
were expanded into each other to accommodate hundreds of workers
producing millions of tonnes of jam and tinned fruit for export all
over the world.
Jam and tinned fruit sales slowed through the 1960s, and many of the
warehouses fell into a state of decline, with various buildings and
floors rented out and others remaining unoccupied for years. The boom
years that gave Tasmania its identity as “The Apple Isle”
lasted until Britain finally entered the European Common Market in 1971
and Tasmania’s main fruit export market collapsed as a result.
In 1972, Australian corporate giant, John Elliott, purchased Henry
Jones IXL, Peacock’s parent company. By 1974 the Peacock Factory
on Salamanca Place had been closed down and was on the
market. Within a few months, a group of visionary locals including
Claudio Alcorso (one of Tasmania’s great arts advocates) saw in
the buildings the potential to establish a vibrant community and arts
centre in Hobart’s working port area. They formed the Community
and Art Centre Foundation, established objectives for the potential
Centre and pressured the State Government to purchase the old Peacock
Factory. The Salamanca Arts Centre came into being in 1976 when the
State Government, led by Premier Bill Neilsen, purchased the seven
historic sandstone warehouses in Hobart’s Salamanca Place (along
with a cottage in Kelly Street) for the people of Tasmania.
The Government leased the buildings to the Foundation for 99 years at a
peppercorn rent. In exchange, the Foundation was responsible for
repairing and maintaining the dilapidated buildings and managing a
range of diverse arts programs and events, funded through space and
venue hire to artists, arts organisations and commercial tenants. Teams
of committed and tireless volunteers moved in to clean out nearly 200
years of industrial dust and grime and bring the buildings back to life.
The rows of Georgian era sandstone warehouses that services the
clippers were converted into a plaza of restaurants and shop, with
pubs, artists, galleries, craft shops and nightlife adding to the
relaxed atmosphere of the place after sundown. Every Saturday,
Salamanca Place takes on a totally different look and carnival
atmosphere when it hosts the famous Salamanca Markets. Over 300
stallholders congregate to sell produce and crafts from all over
Tasmania as buskers, artists and performers keep the crowd entertained.
At the northern end of Salamanca Place is St. David's Park, a popular
lunchtime relaxation spot for the city's workers. Parliament House
adjacent to Salamanca Place.
The name Salamanca Place recalls a town in Spain which the Allied army
led by the Duke of Wellington took on 17th June 1812 during the
Peninsula War (1808-14). Nearby Castray Esplanade recalls Luke Richard
Castray, Tasmanian Commissioner General who conceived and designed that
road to link Hobart's wharves and Battery Point.
How to get there: from city centre, walk south down any cross street to
Franklin Wharf, then head right towards Castray Esplanade.