Maurice Terzini’s insider guide to Sydney
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I grew up in Melbourne in the early 1990s, the city’s post-punk/jazz/disco years, with the rise of all the laneway bars and cafés, which kind of set it up as Australia’s rocking, urban city. I launched Caffé e Cucina there, which was quite culturally important for Melbourne.
Then I moved to Sydney in 1999; I was giving myself a break from working, and (the late billionaire property developer) Lang Walker made me an offer I couldn’t refuse: to launch a restaurant, which eventually became Otto Ristorante at the Wharf. Sydney, I’d always felt, was the beach capital of the country, and I was really drawn to that. It still surprises me to see someone in the middle of a metropolis with a surfboard.
![The pool at Bondi Icebergs on Bondi Beach, Sydney](https://www.ft.com/__origami/service/image/v2/images/raw/https%3A%2F%2Fd1e00ek4ebabms.cloudfront.net%2Fproduction%2F83cad17c-81fd-4b20-8bc6-af4f50cc2acf.jpg?source=next-article&fit=scale-down&quality=highest&width=700&dpr=1)
Being a secular punk boy from Melbourne, I did a year in Surry Hills. It was a whole other thing back then, much more powerfully gay than it is now, and I was out clubbing every night. Then I went to Bondi. There was a lot of new electronic music and a gallery opening every week back then. Now that’s all gone because it’s become expensive, and those people have moved up to Byron or wherever. But that was a powerful scene for me, and for what Icebergs was when I opened it in 2002.
![Terzini outside the Museum of Contemporary Art](https://www.ft.com/__origami/service/image/v2/images/raw/https%3A%2F%2Fd1e00ek4ebabms.cloudfront.net%2Fproduction%2F7eec44e9-647a-4edf-b08c-5908605907f7.jpg?source=next-article&fit=scale-down&quality=highest&width=700&dpr=1)
![Red-brick buildings in Potts Point](https://www.ft.com/__origami/service/image/v2/images/raw/https%3A%2F%2Fd1e00ek4ebabms.cloudfront.net%2Fproduction%2Fc7fa8207-31f7-404a-bf8b-ada4aa349683.jpg?source=next-article&fit=scale-down&quality=highest&width=700&dpr=1)
Potts Point is where I live now. It feels as urban as Sydney gets, which I enjoy. I eat early these days, having two young sons, and having spent a lifetime eating at two o’clock in the morning. I like Bistrot 916 – I take the boys and we’ll have a nice steak frites or a scotch fillet. I also go to The Apollo a lot. Those guys have been on since day one; the food is real Greek, no frills, it just comes out consistently good. It’s like my home kitchen. Piccolo Bar, in Kings Cross, is nice for a drink. It opened in the ’50s as this kind of Italian café-diner; when it closed a few years back two customers reopened it as a café before bartender Dave Spanton took it over as an aperitivo/cocktail bar in 2021. And I go to Zinc (77 Macleay St) for my coffee because it’s on my run route and they know my order.
There are places I will leave Potts Point for: Ursula’s, in Paddington, is outstanding. Phil Wood is one of my favourite chefs. On Oxford Street there’s a branch of P&V Merchants, who specialise in natural wines from smaller producers and small-batch spirits, most of them Australian. It’s always good for a discovery, and there’s a little wine bar as well.
![Terzini outside the Museum of Contemporary Art Australia](https://www.ft.com/__origami/service/image/v2/images/raw/https%3A%2F%2Fd1e00ek4ebabms.cloudfront.net%2Fproduction%2F71b77198-c4a1-4649-978d-873509a6a0c2.jpg?source=next-article&fit=scale-down&quality=highest&width=700&dpr=1)
![Wines at The Apollo in Potts Point](https://www.ft.com/__origami/service/image/v2/images/raw/https%3A%2F%2Fd1e00ek4ebabms.cloudfront.net%2Fproduction%2F307510c5-c314-45ac-834d-7c9260c023e5.jpg?source=next-article&fit=scale-down&quality=highest&width=700&dpr=1)
![Terzini outside the Museum of Contemporary Art Australia](https://www.ft.com/__origami/service/image/v2/images/raw/https%3A%2F%2Fd1e00ek4ebabms.cloudfront.net%2Fproduction%2F77208d14-2cb2-4b60-be18-853512763ec2.jpg?source=next-article&fit=scale-down&quality=highest&width=700&dpr=1)
But the good thing about my neighbourhood is how close you are to so much. The Museum of Contemporary Art is over in The Rocks; my boys’ mother [fashion designer] Lucy [Hinckfuss] takes them there almost every weekend, because there’s always something on. We go to the Art Gallery of New South Wales all the time too. I love what they did with the addition of the SANAA-designed Sydney Modern Project. You know you’re in Sydney when you’re in that space. I don’t go to galleries [here] to feel like I’m in Paris.
I only really wear Rick Owens, so I buy most of that online. That said, there is some amazing retail here. Dion Horstmans is a dear friend who makes beautiful steel sculptures; you can visit his studio on Saturdays or by appointment. Song for the Mute is a great example of Sydney style – it started as a pop-up on King Street, with men’s and womenswear that’s really conceptual, and opened a flagship on George Street in the CBD last year. And Lucy Folk, who makes jewellery, has a little shop just off Bondi Beach. It has a lot of character.
![Song for the Mute on George Street](https://www.ft.com/__origami/service/image/v2/images/raw/https%3A%2F%2Fd1e00ek4ebabms.cloudfront.net%2Fproduction%2F3fbc949c-1173-4f87-ba14-3e2655829484.jpg?source=next-article&fit=scale-down&quality=highest&width=700&dpr=1)
I’m a big believer in public facilities, something Australia has always done really well. The beaches are 100 per cent egalitarian; once you’re down there, no one cares who you are. One of the most magnificent places in Sydney, for me, is Marks Park in South Bondi – this green space on a headland on one of the most beautiful coastlines, for everyone to enjoy. I remember playing with my boys there a few years ago on an amazing day and just thinking, “Fuck me, man, here we are.” I might be charging you, like, 400 bucks a head down at the Icebergs, but anyone can come here with some anchovies, salami and a nice bit of mozzarella, sit on a park bench on top of the ocean and have the picnic of all picnics. How good is that?
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