There is a nice description of this building in the NSW Heritage Listing, [K089 : James' Buildings]:
"The James' Building is a two storey commercial building in the inter-war free classical style located at the prominent corner of Katoomba Street and Bathurst Road. The building features a curved front sweeping around the corner. The ground floor is divided into 8 shops most of which retain their original metal clad shopfronts and recessed entries. The original awning has fibro cement lining to the soffit and its eaves gutters. High level windows for the shops are located above the awning. The upper floor is divided into 9 bays divided by engaged brick pilasters.
"The building is constructed of brick with concrete lintels to the first floor windows. The simple cornices are rendered. The upper frieze panel has vertical bands of brick and render to the outer bays, with the name "JAMES' BUILDINGS 1925" across three bays on the corner.
"The piers between the shops are tiled, many retaining the original pink and grey tiles."
HISTORICAL NOTES:
"The key position on the south-west corner of Bathurst Road and Katoomba Street was purchased initially by Harry Rowell, just after he had acquired the Carrington site immediately adjacent to the south. The original Rowell property was L-shaped, embracing the hotel site on sub-division lots 10 to 15 and the corner block, lots 1 and 2, with a long frontage onto Katoomba Street and a short frontage onto Bathurst Road.
"When Frederick Goyder acquired the Carrington in 1888, he at once built the hotel’s first tennis court on part of this corner block. The tennis court, however, was moved to the front of the hotel near Katoomba Street around 1890 and when Goyder ceased to own the Carrington in 1901, he detached lots 1 and 2 from the Carrington estate (Low, Pictorial Memories, 37).
"Under Frederick Goyder and his sons, lot 1 was developed as shops and offices separately from lot 2. The shops in the south part of lot 1, nos 9, 11 and 13, were leased by Goyder before rate books survive in 1911 to a variety of shopkeepers.
"The Goyder family sold the entire suite of shops, nos 1 to 13 Katoomba Street, to George James in 1923. James (1856-1938) was a retired butcher, an influential local Congregationalist known as Honest George, a long-serving alderman from 1904 to 1917 and from 1920 to 1927, and four times mayor between 1909 and 1916, who lived at McClintock on Abbotsford Road, Katoomba (Rate Books; Old Leura and Katoomba, 227, 288; Katoomba Daily, 17 February 1938)). James proceeded to remodel the entire block in 1923-5, crowning the corner with a bold surviving frieze panel proclaiming ‘JAMES’ BUILDINGS 1925’. He immediately converted Goyder’s own offices, at the northern end, to three shops, now 1 to 7 Katoomba Street: Greenwell and Thomas, the chemists; a photographic premises; and a bootmaker’s.
"When James finally died at the age of 81 in 1938, his obituary was full of praise. James, the Katoomba Daily wrote, ‘always expressed his belief in the development of Katoomba and the sites of his extensive property interests here are a sign of his foresight. One of his prudent achievements was the building of modern shops such as are to be seen in James Buildings, at the corner of Main and Katoomba Streets, shops in the Leura Mall [no.173], and others at Katoomba, Leura and Wentworth Falls’ (Katoomba Daily, 17 February 1938).
"James retained ownership of the block which bears his name until his death in 1938. His estate, through one of his daughters, Mrs Alice Nimmo, continued to administer the shops until after World War II (Rate Books). There have been many tenants of the shops and of the living accommodation above." (
visit link)
Visited: 1412, Monday, 20 February, 2017
[The Katoomba Subway outlet is one of the Waymarks that occupies a ground floor business of the James' Building.]