Some of you following this blog may remember my Post Boxes. Whilst searching through the digital shoebox for something else I came across this little beauty in The Rocks, Sydney, Australia
This post box is made by Bubb and Sons Victoria Foundry. The first street posting boxes were cast in bronze by the Bubb & Sons foundry at Pyrmont in 1856.
Robert Bubb, born 23 June 1805 in Avening, Gloucestershire, England, migrated to Australia and established a foundry in Sydney. Victoria Iron Foundry was located at 10 Victoria Place, Sydney (the firm is listed in the Sands Directory until 1880).
These boxes were designed by T. W. Levinge of the New South Wales Postmaster General’s Department and initially manufactured by Robert Bubb and Son of Pyrmont. The boxes were in the style of the Penfold boxes with the Acanthus leaves and bud at the top. Note this one has a vertical aperture so probably one of the earlier designs.
Apparently there is another one in the Rocks district on Hickson Street which is dated to the 1880’s-1890’s with a horizontal aperture and still in use. Other Bubb mailboxes can be found in Sydney suburbs such as Manly and Marrickville. So you Aussies out there see if you can spot one for me!
A very jolly postbox, Jude. 🙂
I like the vertical slot, Jude, makes a nice change. I well remember the previous series on these, you got some crackers sent in.
Regards as always, Pete. x
I did indeed, though I am still waiting for a yellow one to pop up!
Very festive for the holiday season! I can picture greeting cards through the decades being slipped through the slot. Do you have family visiting this month??
Actually took these photos just before last Christmas! Doesn’t seem a year since I arrived back from Sydney. And we will be visiting family just after Christmas so it will be quiet here as usual!
Just know I’m thinking of you and wishing you all the best. Quiet is sometimes underrated 😀💖💖
I am very happy with quiet 🙂
What are you up to?
Nursing hub after knee replacement surgery -it’s been time-consuming but he’s a good (impatient) patient and is recovering well. I started art journaling and re-learning my lost love of making books, along with hand-writing essays and memories. It’s a different thought process and contentment than being at the computer screen. The ‘tactile’ of various papers and ephemera is very appealing and I’m happily not judging results. I also dusted off my keyboard last month so every morning I have to choose an activity – not to mention still learning about my ‘new-ish’ camera and diving into book piles 😀 you?
Our weather has been fabulous – great snow dumps in the mountains for skiers but warm walking weather here. Until this week – our first ‘big’ snowstorm with freezing temps. Do you get snow??
You have been busy! Nice to be away from the screen though. I’m afraid I have been very lazy lately, winter makes me sloth-like. All my energy drains away. We rarely get much snow here, a few days at most, but this year is still unseasonably warm. Quite odd.
It’s rather handsome Jude but I’d be the one stubbing my toe on the bottom.
haha… you do have a point 🙂
Is this the Marrickville one? https://www.flickr.com/photos/pellethepoet/8166415587
The Sands directory provides a treasure house of information. I’ve used it a few times.
What a wealth of other information you’ve dug up. And what did you do with all the people crowding the Rocks??
Yes! So annoying too as I stayed in Marrickville some years ago when Ro lived there. Pre-digital though so I was careful with how many photos I took.
Pretty little feller 🙂 I was just thinking the other day that it was a year since your Aussie trip. How’s MR these days? I do miss her around sometimes.
A year today I arrived back home, in the cold and dark and wet! Not a happy bunny. Haven’t heard from M-R for a while, she was fighting being rehoused. She was a breath of fresh air in the blog world wasn’t she – such a stroppy beggar! In a nice way 🙂
Rehousing? Nightmare!!!
It reminds me of a fire hydrant 🙂
Ah, well, we don’t have those otherwise… (tbh I did photograph some in Canada)
I do remember that post Jude as we talked about the drab mailboxes of Canada. Such a shame. I love this bright red Aussie model. 🙂
Very English looking 🙂 But nice to see that old mailboxes have survived in other countries.
This one is a beauty. We don’t have any fancy post boxes around here, just the normal utilitarian ones.
That’s a shame.
Thanks for the info. They are much prettier post boxes than the ones we have now. Do people still call them pillar boxes these days?
I’d forgotten they were called that. Thanks for the reminder 🙂