The history behind some of Australia's earliest – and best – penthouses

A contender for Australia’s best home is hidden in plain sight.

City workers criss-crossing Sydney’s Castlereagh Street would scarcely be aware of someone’s mansion 195 metres above their heads.

The Boyd Residence, which crowns the ANZ Tower, is widely regarded as the finest penthouse in Australia.

It sold in 2021 for $60 million, and although other penthouses have since transacted for larger sums, the Boyd holds its mantle because its location cannot be replicated.

The 2400-square-metre pad was designed by Richard Francis-Jones and Blainey North and completed in 2015. With a conference room, cigar lounge, gym, swimming pool and signature crescent-shaped ceiling, it won the £40 million-plus residence category at the International Design and Architecture Awards in 2017.

Access to the Boyd, which is named for its creators and first residents – property developer John Boyd and his wife Marly – is via a private lift in the high-security bank. Listing agent Ken Jacobs of Forbes Global Properties, who sold the penthouse in conjunction with LJ Hooker Double Bay’s Bill Malouf, says living atop a bank is fit for a celebrity or a captain of industry. 

“The size was extraordinary and the combination of architectural merit and superb finishes, with input from John and his wife, created something so special,” Jacobs says.

“It had its own boardroom, which was stunning. I could go on and on, but it was a one-off.”

Australia’s first penthouses

The earliest skyscraper penthouses in Australia emerged in the early to mid-1990s. As they were considered ambitious for their time, they were as rare as they were expensive.

Today, penthouses are still limited edition, but wealthy buyers have more options.

A groundbreaker of the genre is one of the first residential penthouses in Melbourne’s CBD at 171 La Trobe Street, which is up for sale.

Built in 1991 and designed by Nonda Katsalidis – a pioneer of modern urbanisation – it is currently listed with price hopes of $6.5 million to $7 million.

SOLD - Price Withheld

Penthouse/171 La Trobe Street, Melbourne VIC 3000

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Kay & Burton listing agent Andrew Sahhar says red tape was overcome in creating the tri-level trophy home with two lifts, an internal pond, rooftop gym and brutalist character.

“At first, the council was not keen to have residential penthouses in the city, but the developers were able to get it through, so it is unique,” he says.

But not all of the most coveted penthouses in the country are on top of skyscrapers. In a building only several storeys high, late architect Harry Seidler’s Milsons Point penthouse rates for its eternal style, curvaceous staircase and dress-circle seat to the Sydney Harbour Bridge.

Architecture historian and author Stephen Crafti includes the Seidler penthouse in his design tours.

“What I look for is a penthouse that takes me out of the zone,” he says. “You walk out of the lift and it is a surprise – you are in a space that is memorable.”

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In Melbourne, a penthouse that’s also revered for its views graces the so-called “tower of power”: 150 Clarendon Street, East Melbourne.

The 1000-square-metre home with silk carpet, a cinema and a meditation room once had a reported price tag of $46 million, before it was quietly withdrawn from the market.

That sum reflected its exclusivity and one of a penthouse’s most important virtues: Its position, opposite the Fitzroy Gardens and state parliament, can never be built out, forever protecting the leafy vistas.