The Markillies hotel was designed and built around 1915 -1920. It is of regional architectural significance as a richly ornamented example of many surviving high Edwardian baroque hotels in Victoria. Our brief was to turn the existing rooms of the hotel into accommodation for budget travellers, to upgrade existing internal areas, including kitchen, bathrooms and bedrooms and to create the new bar and lounge on the ground floor that would service the requirements of the accommodated travellers. Much of the existing fabric of the building was maintained in the design to minimise major structural changes especially throughout the ground floor bar area. Whilst researching the history of the hotel it was ironic to find that the architect in the 1930s who extended the hotel was this architects grandfather, Patrick O’Connor, an architect with a practice in Collins Street, Melbourne.