Hyde Park Barracks

Convict designed and built, Hyde Park Barracks is one of the best surviving remnants of Sydney's convict period that ran between 1788 and 1840.

The barracks was commissioned by Governor Lachlan Macquarie and opened in 1819.

The governorship of Lachlan Macquarie between 1810 and 1821 is considered a momentous period in the evolution of New South Wales from penal colony to prosperous colonial outpost.

The former prison barracks and women's migration centre has long been a Sydney tourist attraction. In 2020, it reopened following an $18 million upgrade. Strangely, a US based company was brought in to produce the new version of stories incorporated into the upgrade. That's probably more a reflection on the state of history in Sydney than the skill of Sydney storytellers. It's hard to imagine many cities bringing in outsiders to tell their deepest historical stories.

Hyde Park Barracks should be one of the best museums in Sydney, in one of its finest historic buildings. But it's not quite there. The 2020 refurbishment added fancy tech and made sure the old building was up to another century of operation. But it may have gone too far in the tech department.

Photo: Mark Bowyer Hyde Park Barracks, Sydney

Photo: Mark Bowyer Sleeping quarters - Hyde Park Barracks

If you're an old-fashioned museum junkie like me, you may find the straitjacket of the audio presentation stifling. Everything is automated and it works off sensors that follow you around. I found it clunky. Sometimes the sensors jumped between presentations. Sometimes I wanted more, Sometimes I wanted less. But you're in the hands of the tech Gods.

You may also find yourself craving some old-fashioned explanatory panels as I did. There is almost no text used and no opportunity for deeper exploration of subjects. It feels a little too smart.

The idea of a one-size-fits-all narrative or museum experience is problematic. This place seems to be intended purely for the Tik Tok generation.

I was also disappointed by the heavy-handed display cases in a heritage building that needs little decorative help.

It's a rigid immersive experience from the New York based people who did the World Trade Centre monument there.

It's possible to take a wander around the building - that'll still give you a pretty good sense of the historic space.

The exhibition gives space to stories of the dispossession of the First Peoples but it is curiously subdued in referencing the frontier wars that began in Sydney - where the momentum for wider dispossession took root. It's an absence that needs attention.

Hyde Park Barracks is a World Heritage listed convict site. The exhibits cover the building's life as a convict barracks and a women's immigration centre.

Recommended - Allow 60 - 90 mins. Nearby Hyde Park / Art Gallery NSW / State Library NSW

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