Flavours of Melbourne’s Collingwood and Fitzroy

Gemma Nisbet enjoys the vibrancy of Melbourne while staying in a converted warehouse.

“Up there, that’s concentrated Melbourne,” Adrian says, motioning out the window, up towards Smith Street. He pulls a face to indicate this is both a good and a bad thing.

Adrian, my boyfriend’s brother, has been a resident of the Victorian capital for almost a year. He and his girlfriend have made that quintessentially West Australian pilgrimage east — via a stint in London — in search of jobs, lifestyle, something different from home. It’s the first time we’ve come to visit, though not our first time here.

The place we’ve rented on Airbnb for the week is just as the listing had described, a “light- filled warehouse apartment” in a late 19th century factory building in Collingwood, completely open plan, with a claw-foot bathtub in the kitchen, all very beautiful but slightly dusty. It is just a block from buzzy Smith Street, which forms the border with neighbouring Fitzroy.

The building is part of a precinct of immaculate Victorian factories that once hummed with the industry of workers producing goods to be sold in the Foy & Gibson department store complex that once dominated Smith Street.

A Foy & Gibson building near Smith Street on the border of Fitzroy and Collingwood. Picture: Gemma Nisbet

These days, they’re pretty much all apartments and the sounds come mainly from the street: people laughing and shouting as they walk by, the background noise of traffic, the whine of the trams, construction noise from down the block.

Often cited as Melbourne’s oldest suburban shopping street, Smith Street is lined by a gaggle of shopfronts, many dating from the late 1800s, when a lot of the original buildings were replaced with some substantial constructions. Some are rather grand, many a little grubby, sometimes in a way that seems deliberate, almost artful. There are old bank buildings with stone facades, old-fashioned shopfronts, the Patersons furniture store building now being converted to yet more apartments.

The old Foy & Gibson Ladies’ Store, rumoured to still have intact the tunnel which once provided direct access to the eastern side of the road. And suspended above the street, the tangle of tram wires, a little messy but distinctly Melburnian.

More recently, this strip earned the unedifying nickname “Smack Street” on account of its reputation for illicit drugs. But these days, it is rapidly gentrifying. Cafes selling artisanal cold-drip coffee and barbershops where you get a fancy beer with your trim now intersperse the $2 shops and pawnbrokers. Hoardings advertise an apartment development that will boast city views from the rooftop terrace and something called a “European garden”.

Behind taped-up sheets of newspaper, shopfronts are being fitted out. Everything is changing.

Allpress Studio is housed in an old industrial building. It also supplies coffee for local cafes. Picture: Gemma Nisbet

We set out to try as much of it as we can. Every morning we have coffee and breakfast at a different cafe — Lemon, Middle and Orange, Allpress Studio and the Japanese-flavoured Mina-no-ie, all tucked away in old industrial buildings in the backstreets, become new favourites. We buy records and second-hand paperbacks at The Searchers, clothes at Somebuddy Loves You, books and bits and pieces at Happy Valley.

We dream about shipping back a whole house load of vintage furniture from Angelucci, Smith Street Bazaar and Modern Times. We eat dinner at Lee Hoo Fook and at the New Orleans-style Le Bon Ton a few blocks away, pop our heads into the nautical- themed Grace Darling pub and have gelato from the local outpost of Sydney’s much-loved Messina nearly every night. And we still don’t manage to try it all.

“Smith Street’s the new Brunswick,” declares my boyfriend’s friend, another transplant from Perth, living in nearby Richmond. Brunswick Street, five minutes walk west of Smith, has long been known for its independent boutiques, live music venues, cafes and restaurants. I get the impression it’s not quite what it once was but it’s still well worth a wander and a window- shop, as we do on a Saturday morning on our way to the Rose Street Artists’ Markets.

Brunswick Street has long been known for its independent boutiques, live music venues, cafes and restaurants. Picture: Gemma Nisbet

Tucked on a backstreet off Brunswick, the markets have been running for more than a decade, open each weekend to allow artists and designers to sell their work direct to the public. There’s a good selection on the day we visit — prints, jewellery, some clothing and homewares — and I’m sorely tempted by a stall filled with beautiful vases and platters by ceramicist Connie Lichti, perhaps best known for her collaboration with Melbourne fashion label Gorman.

The two main thoroughfares connecting Smith and Brunswick are also worthy of attention. There’s the less glamorous Johnston Street to the north, with a concentration of furniture and homewares shops. And to the south, elegant, tree-lined Gertrude Street, home to a whole spread of independent businesses. We have coffee at De Clieu and Birdman Eating, a lunch of fried chicken and slaw at Belle’s Hot Chicken, a South American snack at Sonido, and settle for peering in the window at the fine-dining Cutler & Co. We browse at Northside Records, Title and Cooks for Books, shop for ceramics at Mud Australia and clothing at Obus, Leonard St, Handsom and, perhaps my boyfriend’s favourite shop anywhere, heritage menswear store Pickings and Parry.

Gertrude Street is home to many independent businesses, including cafes, restaurants and boutiques. Picture: Gemma Nisbet

The web of streets stretching between these four thoroughfares is just as appealing, as we discover on a sunny afternoon, walking north from Gertrude Street to visit the Centre for Contemporary Photography. Lots of trees, narrow old cottages where factory workers once would have lived, more than a few of them in the process of having sleek modern extensions plugged on to the back.

Behind them, a web of laneways, bushes and trees hanging over walls and fences. Lots of street art — this is Melbourne, after all — ranging from stencils on the pavement and scrawled tags to massive murals: animals, a geometric pattern spread over a double-storey wall, a blue and white design I recognise as the work of local artist Lucas Grogan.

Street art abounds, such as this piece by local artist Lucas Grogan. Picture: Gemma Nisbet

Later that night, we’re back in the apartment near Smith Street, the big windows wide open to the evening air and the plane tree outside. I can see lights flicking on in apartments across the road as people arrive home from work.

Down below, I hear a woman loudly berating a friend, her voice fading as they continue down the street. The guy in the cafe across the way is shutting up for the night, singing along to the stereo. Concentrated Melbourne: mostly a very good thing, I think.