Skip to main content
Navigated to Mutual Building, 9 Degraves Street | Heritage Melbourne
Mutual Building, 9 Degraves Street, Melbourne VIC 3000
The BuildingsDEGRAVES STREET

Mutual Building

ArchitectReed, Smart & Tappin
Completed1891
StyleVictorian
The building

The Mutual Store began in 1872 as a co-operative, and from the late 1880s it shared its profits with its staff. After a fire destroyed the earlier store on the site on New Year's Day 1891, the architecture firm Reed, Smart & Tappin designed the present building, rebuilt the same year. The Council of Adult Education occupied it for almost forty years before it was converted to apartments in 2006.

In brief

  1. 1872The Mutual Store established as a co-operative
  2. 1891Rebuilt after a fire on New Year's Day destroyed the earlier store on the site
  3. 1965The department store closed
  4. 2006Converted to apartments
The doorstep

Three places within a short walk.

What each one is, and how far it is from the front door. Select a place to see it on the map.

1
Nature266 m · 3 min walk
Birrarung Marr
The city's first major new parkland in a century, terraced down to the Yarra with a Wurundjeri name meaning river of mists.
2
Dining91 m · 1 min walk
MoVida
Frank Camorra's tapas bar opened in 2003 down graffiti-covered Hosier Lane and taught the city to eat Spanish.
3
Character130 m · 2 min walk
The Melbourne Athenaeum
Founded in 1839, it housed the city's first library and gallery and still runs a subscription library above Collins St.
For buyers

After an apartment in Mutual Building?

Leave your email and we'll let you know the day an apartment here is listed for sale. Nothing else — no newsletter, and you can stop any time.

We’ll ask you to confirm your email first. Unsubscribe any time; we won’t share your address.

From The Journal

Mutual Building in The Journal

Browse The Journal →

It burned down on New Year’s Day. By noon the next day it had taken 200 orders.

The Mutual Store opposite Flinders Street Station burned out on New Year’s Day 1891 and was trading again the next morning. It was rebuilt to survive the next fire, and in 1897 it did.

Read the piece →