George McRae (10 September 1857 – 16 June 1923) was a Scottish-Australian architect who migrated from his native Edinburgh to Sydney, where he became Government Architect of New South Wales and designed some of Sydney's best-known buildings, including completion of the Sydney Town Hall, the Queen Victoria Building, and the lower entrance to Taronga Zoo.
The Sydney Town Hall is a late 19th-century heritage-listed town hall building in the city of Sydney, the capital city of New South Wales, Australia, housing the chambers of the Lord Mayor of Sydney, council offices, and venues for meetings and functions. It is located at 483 George Street, in the Sydney central business district opposite the Queen Victoria Building and alongside St Andrew's Cathedral. Sited above the Town Hall station and between the city shopping and entertainment precincts, the steps of the Town Hall are a popular meeting place.
It was designed by John H. Wilson, Edward Bell, Albert Bond, Thomas Sapsford, John Hennessy and George McRae and built from 1869 to 1889 by Kelly and McLeod, Smith and Bennett, McLeod and Noble, J. Stewart and Co. It is also known as Town Hall, Centennial Hall, Main Hall, Peace Hall, Great Hall and Old Burial Ground. The Town Hall is listed on the (now defunct) Register of the National Estate and the New South Wales State Heritage Register and is part of the heritage-listed Town Hall precinct which includes the Queen Victoria Building, St Andrew's Cathedral, the Gresham Hotel and the former Bank of New South Wales. In latter years, it has been discovered that Town Hall lies on top of part of a cemetery complex. Renovations were undertaken in 2008-9 primarily to upgrade the mechanical, hydraulic, electrical and communication services within the building. The renovations, completed by Kell & Rigby, included removing 6,000 cubic metres (210,000 cu ft) of sandstone from underneath the building.
The Queen Victoria Building (QVB) is a heritage-listed late-19th-century building located at 429–481 George Street in the Sydney central business district, in the Australian state of New South Wales. Designed by the architect George McRae, the Romanesque Revival building was constructed between 1893 and 1898 and is 30 metres (98 ft) wide by 190 metres (620 ft) long. The domes were built by Ritchie Brothers, a steel and metal company that also built trains, trams and farm equipment. The building fills a city block bounded by George, Market, York, and Druitt Streets. Designed as a marketplace, it was used for a variety of other purposes, underwent remodelling, and suffered decay until its restoration and return to its original use in the late twentieth century. The property is co-owned by the City of Sydney and Link REIT, and was added to the New South Wales State Heritage Register on 5 March 2010.