Union Stores Building
heritage listed building in Fremantle, Western Australia
The former Union Stores Building is a heritage listed building located at 41–47 High Street on the corner with Henry Street in the Fremantle West End Heritage area.
Construction of the building commenced in 1895 for prominent local merchant John Wesley Bateman to house his growing hardware business.
Bateman's business had occupied a building at the corner of Mouat Street and Croke Street for the previous 25 years before he decided to build larger premises at the present address. The new building designed by architects, Davis and Wilson, was built at a cost of £7,000, equivalent to A$1.27 million in 2022, giving Bateman a more central location and more space.
Built in the Federation Free Classical style the two storey building was constructed from brick and stone. The tuck-pointed brick facade features extensive decorative detailing, indicative of the original four-store street frontage. On the rood parapet there are alternating segmented arched and triangular pediments separated by stucco corinthian pilasters and featured urns. The corner feature of the facade is an ornate shell pediment. The widely arched windows are spaced alternately with triangular topped casements separated with decorative stucco architraves. The windows hold stained glass in the upper portion of the frame with regular glass panes below.
“Union Stores Building” enters the record as heritage listed building in Fremantle, Western Australia. Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what Union, Stores and Building can confirm, complicate or overturn.
Why this record matters
“Union Stores Building” is worth following because a concise public description often conceals a longer documentary argument. Here, Union, Stores and Building provides the most credible route into that argument.
The strongest evidence will usually combine a dated visual record with documents produced by the authority responsible for the place. The source revision retrieved here is dated Jul 17, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q28225179. Authority coordinates are -32.055, 115.744. 1 of 2 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1895 and 2022.
Architectural summaries often privilege surviving fabric and can understate demolished phases, contested use or displaced communities. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.
How to read it
Treat names, boundaries and functions as historically changeable. Maps, plans, inventories and administrative records can clarify what the place meant at different dates.
- Historic place names
- Jurisdictional context
- Routes into maps and plans
Contemporary maps, plans, listed-building records, estate papers and the responsible local or national archive.
Three-step research path
- Establish the record: confirm the title “Union Stores Building”, its source revision and the description used here.
- Expand the search: follow Union Stores Building primary sources, Union Stores Building archive and Union research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
- Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.
Questions for further research
- Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “Union Stores Building”?
- What physical evidence or contemporary plan supports the description?
- Which earlier names or jurisdictions may reveal additional records?
Search terms from this dossier
This entry incorporates text from “Union Stores Building” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.