Royal Arcade, Melbourne

Built in 1870 and proudly sitting on the Victorian Heritage Register, the Royal Arcade radiates an easy kind of glamour, the sort that comes naturally to Melbourne’s oldest surviving arcade. You can slip inside from Bourke, Elizabeth, or Little Collins Streets, and no matter which door you choose, the place wastes no time announcing itself as a long-standing city favourite. Over the decades, shopfronts slowly drifted away from the original design, but a major early-2000s restoration coaxed everything back into its polished 1894 glory.

Inside, the Royal Arcade delivers the full package: boutiques for browsing, cafés for lingering, and vintage shops that tempt you into “just one more look.” But the true stars are waiting at the Little Collins Street entrance—Gog and Magog, the seven-foot giants who guard the Gaunt clock with the kind of enthusiasm only mythical porters can muster. They’ve been here since 1892, carved from pine and modeled after the figures in London’s Guildhall. Every hour, their arms rise to strike the chime, which is their way of reminding you that time is passing… and perhaps so is your chance to grab that pastry you’ve been eyeing.

Their backstory is delightfully dramatic. In legend, Gog and Magog represent the struggle between ancient Britons and Trojan settlers. Ultimately captured and made to serve as porters, they now hold that role for eternity—both in London and here, where clockmaker and jeweler Thomas Gaunt installed them two decades after the arcade opened. So, as you wander beneath the glass ceilings and mosaic floors, remember: even giants have day jobs, and these two have been keeping Melbourne on schedule for over a century...