Hyde Park Barracks

The Hyde Park Barracks, Sydney is a heritage-listed former barracks, hospital, convict accommodation, mint and courthouse and now museum and café located at Macquarie Street in the Sydney central business district, in the City of Sydney local government area of New South Wales, Australia. Originally constructed between 1817 and 1819 as a brick building and compound to house convict men and boys, it was designed by convict architect Francis Greenway. It is also known as the Mint Building and Hyde Park Barracks Group and Rum Hospital; Royal Mint – Sydney Branch; Sydney Infirmary and Dispensary; Queen’s Square Courts; Queen’s Square. The site is managed by the Museums of History New South Wales, an agency of the Government of New South Wales, as a living history museum open to the public.

The site is inscribed on the UNESCO World Heritage List as one of 11 pre-eminent Australian Convict Sites as among “the best surviving examples of large-scale convict transportation and the colonial expansion of European powers through the presence and labour of convicts”, and was listed on the Australian National Heritage List on 1 August 2007, and on the New South Wales State Heritage Register on 2 April 1999.

The historic site was closed in January 2019 for $18 million restoration work to transform it into “a rich new, immersive visitor experience like no other in Australia” and reopened in February 2020. Today the museum tells the stories of the thousands of men, women and children held or housed there, and the Aboriginal communities profoundly impacted by colonial expansion.