The Queen Victoria Market is a special Melbourne place, loved by generations as a market and meeting place. Historically, the land was an early colonial cemetery and still contains many undisturbed burials, including a section solely for Aboriginal peoples.

In 2015 Context were engaged to assess the significance of Melbourne’s Queen Victoria Market in preparation for its nomination to the National Heritage List. Our methodology followed the National Heritage List assessment process, drawing on documentary and physical research, aesthetic expressions within art and popular culture and consultation with a range of associated communities and cultural groups. The assessment afforded Queen Victoria Market’s management body an understanding of its multilayered community values as a place of importance to Traditional Owners, one of remembrance and one that inspires a sense of belonging, as well as being a landmark for locals and tourists alike.

In 2018 the Queen Victoria Market was placed on the National Heritage List under two criteria: C and D. Criterion C ‘Research’ recognises the Queen Victoria Market as being of national significance for its research potential as the site of the Old Melbourne Cemetery. As an early colonial multi-denominational and Aboriginal cemetery which represents the founding population of a major state capital, it offers rare potential for study into matters such as the diet, lifestyle, wealth, pathology and burial customs of the full cross-section of early Melbourne society.

Under criterion D ‘Principal characteristics of a class of place’, Queen Victoria Market is considered to demonstrate the principal characteristics of a metropolitan produce market in nineteenth century Australia. Allocated as a market site since 1859 and formally opened as the Queen Victoria Market in 1878, the Market demonstrates the importance of fresh produce markets to colonial settlements as a primary means of acquiring food at the time. The Market played an important role in the wholesale and later retail trade of meat, fruit and vegetables. It provided vital income for the colony, and opportunities for recently arrived migrants. [Context Pty Ltd; Australian Heritage Database].
Interestingly, the NHL citation does not recognise community associations (criterion G) as part of its national heritage significance.