The new vet clinic and hospital at 537 Crown Street is “striving to be different, but in a good way.” Lachlan Colquhoun called by for a visit. Dr Nima Rahmani is a very youthful looking 39 years of age, but he says he aged around ten years from the stress of his veterinary exams. This […]
The menu is a starch contrast to your typical Surry Hills fare. There’s a lot more to the humble spud than you’ve probably ever imagined. It can be safely assumed that not many have imagined a spud’s various incarnations more than Mad Spuds café owner Lou Pagano. Mad Spuds has been in Surry Hills for […]
A fixture on Crown Street for 25 years, Matt and Cheryl Clarke have raised a family and run their business from the same location. Look for the wall mural on the terrace opposite Crown Street school next time you need your hair done. Matt Clarke jokes that he and his partner Cheryl have raised […]
“This gym is a bit like the Tardis,” Lynsey tells me as we climb the stairs to its second level, “from the outside it looks pretty small, but we fit a lot in here.” Lynsey, Mac and Mac’s mother Susan run Hiscoe’s Gym on the corner of Crown Street and Miles Lane. The family run […]
“I love colour and I love seeing people happy about colour. Dying is about transforming something that’s yours already and making it exactly what you want.” Rosemary Wright-Dyer and her husband David started Cullachange in 1990. Since then it has developed to be an Australia wide business, with the introduction of their CullaPac postal service […]
Pulse turns users into paying customers, by looking beyond likes into the real business. Nico Pustilnick got into advertising to sustain his love of music. Now he owns Pulse Agency, a Sydney bespoke digital marketing agency with a focus on increasing business visibility organically. “I like playing with creativity and strategy. I’m a musician so […]
Neighbourhood icon Meg Hewitt returns to Surry Hills after years abroad for her exhibition Tokyo Is Yours at Flinders Street Gallery. The exhibition showcases her photography series created in Japan over two years. Meg was inspired by the Great East earthquake and tsunami in Japan in 2011 and wanted to truly understand what it felt […]
Kawa Café has withstood seventeen years in its shady Crown Street nook, a rare achievement for any business in this ever-changing suburb. Kawa’s longevity is owing to its honest menu, European style on-street dining and its worn in charm that comes only from a place that has lived the history of the suburb. In its […]
Gallerist Michael Reid has been influential in the art world for over 20 years as an art writer, educator, researcher and dealer. He has represented artists and sold their works since the early 2000’s, initially in Elizabeth Bay then in Berlin and Murrundi (regional NSW) and now in Surry Hills and increasingly, online. The gallery’s […]
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Geoff Bracken, the boss behind Acme Framing, is quick to ask “Do you know what Acme means? It means highest point, point of success, of achievement. What it isn’t, is the ‘beep beep road runner’!” And that point of success overflows at Acme, with some of the best designers, framers, conservators and craftspeople in the country working under his roof.
For over ten years, Geoff worked as a rehabilitation nurse, until one day an injury saw him have to leave the health industry. But then serendipity quickly stepped in, when Geoff tagged along with his friends who were picking up some framed pictures completed by the then owner of Acme.
At the time the owner needed someone to help in the business, and Geoff, with his enthusiasm and skillset for woodwork, was the chosen one to do so. Shortly after Geoff purchased the business, and as the saying goes, the rest is history, two decades and still counting.
Being bespoke framers means every job is unique. “It’s an involved process, one that sees us work closely with the artwork and the expectations of those having it done. Because there’s so many ways you can frame a picture, collaboration is important.” One way is using the Acme Profile, a frame that has become so popular that leading molding companies have copied it, which Geoff laughingly points out is “rather flattering.”
This article first appeared in Urban Village
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