Queen Victoria Market Precinct Renewal (QVMPR) – Various Projects

Queen Victoria Market Precinct Renewal (QVMPR) - Various Projects

Client: Queen Victoria Market Precinct

The project

The Queen Victoria Market is significant as Melbourne’s principal surviving nineteenth‑century market, valued for its long‑standing role as a centre of trade and community life. The place is also important for its archaeological potential as the site of Melbourne’s first cemetery, and for its intact collection of nineteenth‑ and early twentieth‑century market buildings that demonstrate historic market design. It remains a highly valued social and cultural landmark for Victorians and visitors.

The City of Melbourne is currently embarking on the Queen Victoria Market Precinct Renewal (QVMPR) project, seeking to restore the market’s heritage fabric while delivering modern facilities to make the market work better for traders, customers, and revitalising this growing part of the city.

Extent Heritage has been engaged since 2016, on an ongoing basis, to deliver a comprehensive suite of heritage services on behalf of the QVMPR team. This work has included Aboriginal archaeology and historical archaeology management, the provision of heritage design advice and built heritage assessment, the development of heritage interpretation outcomes, extensive community and stakeholder engagement, and the processing and analysis of artefact assemblages. More recently, Extent Heritage’s involvement has extended to supporting Lendlease in relation to the ‘Gurrowa Place’ development within the Market’s Southern Precinct, ensuring integration between the renewal program and adjacent major development works. 

Extent Heritage has worked closely with the QVMPR team, the City of Melbourne, the Wurundjeri Woi Wurrung Cultural Heritage Aboriginal Corporation (WWCHAC) as the Registered Aboriginal Party for the area, and Heritage Victoria to support multiple stages of the Renewal program. Assessment work has included the preparation of multiple Cultural Heritage Management Plans (CHMPs), Historical Archaeological Assessments (HAAs), and Heritage Impact Statements (HISs), and the coordination of complex statutory approval processes under multiple legislations. Extent have then implemented CHMP compliance conditions, managed heritage permit and consent conditions, and coordinated complex archaeological monitoring and investigation programs, particularly in relation to the former Old Melbourne Cemetery which extends beneath significant portions of the Market. Our team has also recently developed a comprehensive Strategic Interpretation Framework for the market which will set the foundations for the implementation of additional heritage interpretation packages over coming years.  

The breadth and duration of this engagement have provided Extent Heritage with a detailed understanding of the historical, archaeological, social, architectural, and aesthetic significance of the Queen Victoria Market precinct and its environs. Managing a place of exceptional heritage significance that continues to function as a major commercial and tourism destination within central Melbourne is a unique challenge, and the cumulative experience gained through these projects positions Extent Heritage to provide informed, contextually grounded advice to support assessment, conservation, interpretation, and sensitive redevelopment of this important place and others in central Melbourne.

In the past 10 years, our work at Queen Victoria Market, which is included in the Commonwealth National Heritage List (NHL), Victorian Heritage Register (VHR), Victorian Heritage Inventory (VHI) and Schedule to the Heritage Overlay (HO) within the Melbourne Planning Scheme, has encompassed almost 50 different scopes of work, with some of the most recent projects include the following:

  • Installation of Laneway Segregation Barriers – VHR Heritage Approvals (2025 – ongoing)

  • Queen Street Carpark Entry Reconfiguration – VHR Heritage Approvals (2025 – ongoing)

  • Preparation of a Strategic Heritage Interpretation Framework (2025 – ongoing)

  • Franklin Street Roundabout – VHI Assessment and Historical Archaeological Monitoring, Aboriginal Cultural Heritage Due Diligence and Heritage Service (2024-2025)

  • Southern Development Site – Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act 1999 (Cth) Referral (2024)

  • Franklin Street Store Relocation – VHR Approvals, Archaeological Testing and Heritage Interpretation Plan (2023 – 2024)

  • Southern Development Site – Historical Archaeological Assessment, Research Design (AARD), Archaeological Management Plan and Archaeological Services (2023)

A complete list of projects undertaken at QVM can be provided upon request.

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