State Savings Bank Building

Sydney ( (listen) SID-nee; Dharug: Gadi; Greater Sydney, Dharug: Eora) is the capital city of the state of New South Wales, and the most populous city in Australia and Oceania. Located on Australia's east coast, the metropolis surrounds Port Jackson and extends about 70 km (43.5 mi) on its periphery towards the Blue Mountains to the west, Hawkesbury to the north, the Royal National Park to the south and Macarthur to the south-west. Sydney is made up of 658 suburbs, spread across 33 local government areas. Residents of the city are known as "Sydneysiders". As of June 2020, Sydney's estimated metropolitan population was 5,361,466, meaning the city is home to approximately 66% of the state's population. Nicknames of the city include the 'Emerald City' and the 'Harbour City'.Indigenous Australians have inhabited the Sydney area for at least 30,000 years, and thousands of Aboriginal engravings remain throughout the region. During his first Pacific voyage in 1770, Lieutenant James Cook and his crew became the first Europeans to chart the eastern coast of Australia, making landfall at Botany Bay. In 1788, the First Fleet of convicts, led by Arthur Phillip, founded Sydney as a British penal colony, the first European settlement in Australia. After World War II, it experienced mass migration and became one of the most multicultural cities in the world. Furthermore, 45.4% of the population reported having been born overseas, and the city has the fourth-largest foreign-born population of any city in the world after London and New York City.Despite being one of the most expensive cities in the world, Sydney frequently ranks in the top ten most liveable cities in the world. It is classified as an Alpha global city by the Globalization and World Cities Research Network, indicating its influence in the region and throughout the world. Ranked eleventh in the world for economic opportunity, Sydney has an advanced market economy with strengths in finance, manufacturing and tourism. Established in 1850, the University of Sydney was Australia's first university and is regarded as one of the world's leading universities.Sydney has hosted major international sporting events such as the 2000 Summer Olympics. The city is among the top fifteen most-visited cities in the world, with millions of tourists coming each year to see the city's landmarks. Boasting over 1,000,000 ha (2,500,000 acres) of nature reserves and parks, its notable natural features include Sydney Harbour and Royal National Park. Built attractions such as the Sydney Harbour Bridge and the World Heritage-listed Sydney Opera House are also well known to international visitors. The main passenger airport serving the metropolitan area is Kingsford Smith Airport, one of the world's oldest continually operating airports.

Martin Place railway station is a heritage-listed underground commuter rail station located on the Eastern Suburbs line, serving the Sydney central business district in New South Wales, Australia. Named after Martin Place, it is served by Sydney Trains T4 Eastern Suburbs & Illawarra Line services and NSW TrainLink South Coast Line services. It was designed by Fowell, Mansfield Jarvis and McLurcan and built from 1973 to 1979. It was added to the New South Wales State Heritage Register on 2 April 1999.

The MLC Building is a heritage-listed office building located at 42-46 Martin Place in the Sydney central business district, in the City of Sydney local government area of New South Wales, Australia. It was designed by Bates Smart & McCutcheon and built from 1936 to 1938 by Concrete Constructions Limited. It is also known as Mutual Life & Assurance Building. It was added to the New South Wales State Heritage Register on 2 April 1999. From the time of its construction and for many years thereafter, the building served as the offices for Australian life insurance company, Mutual Life & Citizens Assurance Company Limited. As of December 2018 the anchor tenant was Norton Rose Fulbright, formerly Henry Davis York, an international law firm.

The Australia Hotel was a hotel on Castlereagh Street, Sydney in New South Wales, Australia. From its opening in 1891 until its closure on 30 June 1971 and subsequent demolition, the hotel was considered "the best-known hotel in Australia", "the premier hotel in Sydney" and described itself as "The Hotel of the Commonwealth". The hotel was situated in one of Sydney's important thoroughfares in the Sydney central business district.

Kurrajong Heights Hotel was a residential hotel on the main road from Richmond to Bell, known as Bell's Line of Road in the state of New South Wales, Australia. Kurrajong Heights is a town 79 kilometres (49 mi) north-west of Sydney, in the local government area of the City of Hawkesbury. It is stretched across the Bells Line of Road in the Blue Mountains, west of Kurrajong and east of Bilpin. At the hotel's opening in 1928, Kurrajong Heights had a population of around 150.

The Rural Bank Building was a landmark bank and commercial building on a block bounded by Martin Place, Elizabeth Street, and Phillip Street in the central business district of Sydney, Australia. Completed in 1936 and designed in the Inter-war Art Deco style by the bank's chief architect, Frank William Turner, the building served as the Rural Bank's main headquarters until 1982. Despite its distinctive design receiving recognition for its heritage value as "one of the finest art deco buildings in Australia", including from the Australian Institute of Architects and through a listing on the Federal Register of the National Estate, the Rural Bank Building was controversially demolished in 1983 and replaced by the postmodern State Bank Centre development by Peddle Thorp & Walker, prompting greater community efforts to protect the heritage of Sydney.

The APA Building is a heritage-listed office building located at 53-63 Martin Place in the Sydney central business district, in the City of Sydney local government area of New South Wales, Australia. It was designed by David W. King and built in 1936 by Kell & Rigby. It now houses the Lindt Cafe on the ground floor, which was the scene of the 2014 Sydney hostage crisis. The building was added to the New South Wales State Heritage Register on 2 April 1999.

25 Martin Place (formerly the MLC Centre) is a skyscraper in Sydney, Australia. Designed by architect Harry Seidler, it stands at a height of 228 metres (748 ft) with 67 storeys, and remains one of his most definitive works. The building was awarded the Sir John Sulman Medal by the Australian Institute of Architects. Originally named the "MLC Centre" after MLC Limited, and still commonly referred to by that name, in 2021 the name was removed by its owner, Dexus, which now refers to the building simply by its street address of 25 Martin Place.

The GIO Building is a heritage-listed office tower located at 60-70 Elizabeth Street in the Sydney central business district in the City of Sydney local government area of New South Wales, Australia. It was built during 1929. It is also known as the General Insurance Office Building; the GIO building, and was constructed as the Sun Building or the Sun Newspaper Building. The property is privately owned and was added to the New South Wales State Heritage Register on 2 April 1999.The GIO building was built in the Interwar Skyscraper Gothic style.

1 Elizabeth is a skyscraper in Sydney, Australia. Designed by Johnson Pilton Walker, the tower stands at a height of 174 metres.

The Lindt Cafe siege was a terrorist attack that occurred on 15–16 December 2014 when a lone gunman, Man Haron Monis, held hostage ten customers and eight employees of a Lindt chocolate café in the APA Building in Martin Place, Sydney, Australia. The Sydney siege led to a 16-hour standoff, after which a gunshot was heard from inside and police officers from the Tactical Operations Unit stormed the café. Hostage Tori Johnson was killed by Monis and hostage Katrina Dawson was killed by a police bullet ricochet in the subsequent raid. Monis was also killed. Three other hostages and a police officer were injured by police gunfire during the raid.Police have been criticised over their handling of the siege for not taking proactive action earlier, for the deaths of hostages at the end of the siege, and for the lack of negotiation during the siege. Hostage Marcia Mikhael called radio station 2GB during the siege and said, "They have not negotiated, they've done nothing. They have left us here to die."Early on, hostages were seen holding a Jihadist flag against the window of the café, featuring the shahādah creed. Initially, many media organisations mistook it for the flag used by the Islamic State (IS); Monis later demanded that an IS flag be brought to him. Monis also unsuccessfully demanded to speak to the Prime Minister of Australia, Tony Abbott, live on radio. Monis was described by Abbott as having indicated a "political motivation," but the eventual assessment was that the gunman was "a very unusual case—a rare mix of extremism, mental health problems and plain criminality."In the aftermath of the siege, Muslim groups issued a joint statement in which they condemned the incident, and memorial services were held in the city at the nearby St Mary's Cathedral and St James' Church. Condolence books were set up in other Lindt cafés and the community turned Martin Place into a "field of flowers." The Martin Place Lindt café was severely damaged during the police raid, closed afterwards, then renovated for reopening in March 2015.

Capita Centre, is now known as 9 Castlereagh St Sydney, is a skyscraper in Sydney, Australia. Located at 9-11 Castlereagh Street, it is 183 metres (600 ft) tall from spire and 158 metres (518 ft) tall from roof. The building was designed by Harry Seidler & Associates in 1984 and completed in 1989. The building won Royal Australian Institute of Architects (NSW) merit award 1991. The structural engineer was Miller, Milston & Ferris and the builder was Civil & Civic. The building was designed to be the new company headquarters for City Mutual (Life Assurance Society Ltd). The land-locked site at 9 Castlereagh St was chosen because of its close proximity to the company's old landmark "City Mutual Building" at 60-66 Hunter St. City Mutual wanted their new headquarters to be lavish, so no expense was spared in the building design. In 1987, City Mutual changed its name to Capita. The building cost $200m and was opened in 1989. The Capita Centre is rectangular (with varying floor plans as there is a diagonal light shaft through the building) and consists of 34 levels, with a total floor area of 24,450 square metres (263,200 sq ft). The building is constructed of composite structural steel and concrete, with its support structures making it unique as it wears its structure on the outside as an outer skeleton. The external columns or lateral bracing truss are unique because they exist outside the core of the building. This building’s design is discussed in detail by Harry Seidler in a 1993 lecture (synchronised with illustrations nos 13-24) recorded by UK architectural journalist Monica Pidgeon whose film archive is available online. www.pidgeondigital.com After Capita went into liquidation, the building at 9 Castlereagh St then became a tenanted commercial office tower. Because the tower was originally a company headquarters (with a diagonal hollow shaft to allow sun through the building), this building is one of the few Sydney prestige office towers which can provide small spaced floor plans. The building's lobby was refurbished in 2011 and won Australian Institute of Architects (NSW) Commercial Architecture Award Commendation 2012.[1] There is a porcelain mural by Lin Utzon in the ground floor lobby - installed in 1989. There was a second Lin Utzon sculpture "Capita 2" on the company executive floor. The last managing director of Capita (who later ran the company into liquidation) did not like the executive floor's design so arranged for the whole Seidler -designed executive floor on Level 31 to be gutted. Some architects from the Seidler office saved the Utzon artwork from being destroyed (traced wall paint outline and removed the porcelain cylinders). This Lin Utzon artwork featured at Museum of Sydney during a Harry Seidler exhibition in late 2014-15, and in 2016 was reassembled to Seidler office penthouse, Milsons Point. A Charles O. Perry sculpture "30” Helix Mobius Mace" (1988) was also part of Capita's executive floor on level 31, but when the executive floor was gutted, the sculpture was moved to the building basement. The Perry sculpture was later relocated to the building's entry lobby as part of the ground floor enhancements of 2011.