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The Guardian - AU
The Guardian - AU
Lifestyle
Kate Hennessy

‘At first, it’s fun’: could a night in Sydney’s ‘mushroom’ tower make me lucid dream?

Inside the Commercial Travellers’ Association Club, which has been transformed into a retro hotel, club and sound art experiment for the Sydney festival.
Inside the Commercial Travellers’ Association Club, which has been transformed for the Sydney festival. Photograph: Jacquie Manning

Hiding in plain sight in Sydney’s city centre, inside the Harry Seidler-designed building fondly known as “the mushroom”, the Commercial Travellers’ Association (CTA) Club has remained unmodernised, unrenovated and un-bought-out for 46 years.

That the building still exists is surprising enough. That it is still operating in the same guise as it was in 1977 is a miracle in a city that’s far more inclined to sell heritage buildings to the highest bidder for luxury apartments or cool new restaurants – or get rid of them entirely.

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