Summary

Colour photograph of the Kodak Australasia factory in Abbotsford, Victoria, circa 1962.

This photograph features the 1886 Austral Laboratory building on Southhampton Crescent, on the Kodak factory site. This building was originally part of the Austral Plate Company, photographic plate factory site. Thomas Baker, a pharmaceutical chemist, originally established this business on his residential property, Yarra Grange in 1884. In 1894, under the partnership name Baker and Rouse, the company was owned by Thomas Baker and accountant, John Rouse. In the first decade of the 20th century the company and factory site was bought and operated by Kodak. In the late 1950s Kodak moved from Abbotsford to a new factory site at Coburg on the northern outskirts of Melbourne.

Kodak manufactured and distributed a wide range of photographic products to Australasia, such as film, paper, chemicals, cameras and miscellaneous equipment. Its client base included amateur and professional photographers, as well as specialist medical and graphic art professionals who used photography, x-ray and other imaging techniques.

This photograph is part of the Kodak collection of products, promotional materials, photographs and working life artefacts collected from Kodak Australasia in 2005, when the Melbourne manufacturing plant at Coburg closed down.

Description of Content

The photograph features a multi-storey red brick building with ivy on parts of it and the words "AUSTRAL LABORATORY 1886" on the facade. One of the windows is broken. The building stands behind a wire fence. A white 'No Standing' traffic control sign with red text, on a yellow pole, is in front of the fence.

Physical Description

Colour photograph, printed on medium weight Kodak paper, landscape format with a white border.

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