Windsor is an inner suburb in

Melbourne Melbourne ( ; Boonwurrung/ Woiwurrung: ''Narrm'' or ''Naarm'') is the capital and most populous city of the Australian state of Victoria, and the second-most populous city in both Australia and Oceania. Its name generally refers to a metro ...

Victoria Victoria most commonly refers to: * Victoria (Australia), a state of the Commonwealth of Australia * Victoria, British Columbia, provincial capital of British Columbia, Canada * Victoria (mythology), Roman goddess of Victory * Victoria, Seychelle ...

Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a sovereign country comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands. With an area of , Australia is the largest country by ...

, 5 km south-east of Melbourne's

Central Business District A central business district (CBD) is the commercial and business centre of a city. It contains commercial space and offices, and in larger cities will often be described as a financial district. Geographically, it often coincides with the "city ...

, located within the Cities of Port Phillip and Stonnington

local government area A local government area (LGA) is an administrative division of a country that a local government is responsible for. The size of an LGA varies by country but it is generally a subdivision of a State (administrative division), state, province, divi ...

s. Windsor recorded a population of 7,273 at the 2021 census. Windsor is bounded by Dandenong Road,

St Kilda Road St Kilda Road is a street in Melbourne, Victoria, Australia. It is part of the locality of Melbourne which has the postcode of 3004, and along with Swanston Street forms a major spine of the city. St Kilda Road begins at Flinders Street, i ...

, Williams Road and High Street.

History

Known at first as Prahran South, the suburb's name was changed to Windsor in 1891, after

Windsor, Berkshire Windsor is a historic market town and unparished area in the Royal Borough of Windsor and Maidenhead in Berkshire, England. It is the site of Windsor Castle, one of the official residences of the British monarch. The town is situated west ...

. It is often incorrectly referred to as

Prahran Prahran (), also pronounced colloquially as Pran, is an inner suburb in Melbourne, Victoria, Australia, 5 km south-east of Melbourne's Central Business District, located within the City of Stonnington local government area. Prahran recorded a po ...

, Windsor's northern neighbor. In the past, Windsor was within the

City of Prahran The City of Prahran was a local government area about southeast of Melbourne, the state capital of Victoria, Australia. The city covered an area of , and existed from 1855 until 1994, when it was merged with the City of Malvern to create the ...

's boundaries and many institutions still refer to this. A Windsor Post Office opened in 1856, but was renamed St Kilda in 1858. The Windsor Post Office in the area opened in 1886.

Today

Although Stonnington's smallest suburb, Windsor has its own bank, supermarket and historic pubs, along with a growing number of independent clothing stores, restaurants, bars, lounges and cafés. Windsor contains a diverse mix of housing, including medium density apartments, Victorian terrace housing and a high-rise public housing tower. The Prahran campus of Swinburne University used to be located just south of High Street in Windsor, but this is now

Melbourne Polytechnic Melbourne Polytechnic, formerly NMIT, is an institute of higher education and vocational education (TAFE) located in Melbourne, Australia that has been operating since around 1910. In October 2014, the institute was renamed to Melbourne Polyt ...

– Prahran Campus, although it is actually in Windsor. The National Institute of Circus Arts is in Green Street, Windsor. The painkiller Aspro was invented by the chemist George Nicholas in Windsor.Slough Museum: Aspro History
/ref> Nuttelex margarine was also manufactured in Windsor for many years but production shifted in the last few years to

Knoxfield Knoxfield is a suburb in Melbourne, Victoria, Australia, 27 km east of Melbourne's Central Business District, located within the City of Knox local government area. Knoxfield recorded a population of 7,645 at the 2021 census. History Kn ...

Landmarks

The suburb has many landmarks, including the historic ''Presentation Convent'' (now the secondary school St Mary's College), the Windsor Primary School, old post office, Telstra exchange tower and a campus of Swinburne University. In recent times, the large ''Empire Cinemas'', converted into a nightclub, was gutted by fire before eventually being demolished and replaced by high-rise apartments, also named the Empire. The remains of one side of Punt Road at the Windsor end contains one of Windsor's lesser shopping strips, called ''Little Windsor on Punt''. The suburb also features new design, including the award-winning Windsor Fire station, by architects Edmund and Corrigan. In Raleigh Street are the K2 apartments, a

Sustainable architecture Sustainable architecture is architecture that seeks to minimize the negative environmental impact of buildings through improved efficiency and moderation in the use of materials, energy, development space and the ecosystem at large. Sustainable ...

built in 2006, to the design of Hansen Yuncken and features passive solar design, recycled and sustainable materials,

photovoltaic cells A solar cell, or photovoltaic cell, is an electronic device that converts the energy of light directly into electricity by the photovoltaic effect, which is a physical and chemical phenomenon.

wastewater Wastewater is water generated after the use of freshwater, raw water, drinking water or saline water in a variety of deliberate applications or processes. Another definition of wastewater is "Used water from any combination of domestic, industrial ...

treatment,

rainwater collection Rainwater harvesting (RWH) is the collection and storage of rain, rather than allowing it to run off. Rainwater is collected from a roof-like surface and redirected to a tank, cistern, deep pit (well, shaft, or borehole), aquifer, or a reservoir w ...

and

solar hot water Solar water heating (SWH) is heating water by sunlight, using a solar thermal collector. A variety of configurations are available at varying cost to provide solutions in different climates and latitudes. SWHs are widely used for residential an ...

. There are many remaining hotels in the suburb, including the popular ''Windsor Castle'' and ''The Windsor Alehouse''. The new Prahran High School has been built on part of the grounds of what is now Melbourne Polytechnic. The new High School is a vertical school consisting of 4 levels with a gymnasium on the top floor. The school officially opened in 2019.

Transport

Windsor is serviced by a number of

trams A tram (called a streetcar or trolley in North America) is a rail vehicle that travels on tramway tracks on public urban streets; some include segments on segregated right-of-way. The tramlines or networks operated as public transport ar ...

along Dandenong Road, High Street and Chapel Street (routes 5, 6, 64, and 78) with Metro Trains Melbourne's

Sandringham railway line The Sandringham railway line is a suburban railway line in Melbourne, Australia. It branches from other southeastern suburban rail lines (inferred as the " Caulfield group") at South Yarra station. It serves the City of Bayside, and small se ...

takes commuters from Windsor station to the CBD in 10 minutes. The 216 and 219 bus routes operate along Williams Road. Punt Road is one of the main bus thoroughfares in Melbourne, with route 246 passing through the western side of the suburb.

Notable people

Gustave Slapoffski Gustave Slapoffski (20 August 1862 – 3 August 1951) was an English musician who performed as a violinist and conductor in Britain for two decades, followed by a conducting and film scoring career in Australia over the next three decades. T ...

(1862-1951), conductor, lived and died in Windsor.

References

External links

History of Windsor, Victoria
{{City of Stonnington suburbs Suburbs of Melbourne Suburbs of the City of Port Phillip Suburbs of the City of Stonnington