Levels 2–3 · rooms 1–48
Clerks' Room
The standard casino hotel room, in the old counting floors. One tall window, a deep sill, and laneway noise until about eleven.
- Sleeps
- 2
- Size
- 26 m²
- Outlook
- Laneway
From $290 AUD a night
13 °C · southerly Chancery Place · Melbourne
A casino hotel inan 1888 gold exchange.
Bullion House Casino Hotel is a fictional Melbourne casino hotel in the old Chancery Place gold exchange: eighty-eight casino hotel rooms behind the bluestone façade, laneway casino dining at street level, and a twelve-table casino on the original trading floor — still under its 1888 glass vault, and still the brightest room in the building.
24 °C · northerly An hour later. The house
Built on gold,
reused for
everything else.
Bullion House is imagined as a casino hotel that kept the building's whole argument and changed only what it was for.
The exchange was put up in 1888, at the end of the money that came out of the Victorian goldfields, and it was designed to make people feel that something serious was happening. Bluestone at the base, cream plaster above, a trading floor under a glazed vault, and a strong room in the basement. The casino hotel now occupies all of it: rooms in the clerks' floors, dining in the laneway, and the casino on the trading floor, which is where the gambling always actually was.
- 14:00
- Check in, off the laneway
- Ground
- 16:00
- Tea under the glass, weather permitting
- Level 1
- 18:30
- Dinner in the old strong room
- Basement
- 20:00
- The casino opens its tables
- Level 1 · 18+
- 07:00
- Breakfast, and four seasons before nine
- Laneway
The only room in this casino hotel with reliable weather is the casino, and that is because it has a roof made of glass and a thermostat.
88Casino hotel rooms
12Tables in the casino
1888The exchange, as built
4Seasons, most days
17 °C · hail Casino hotel rooms
Eighty-eight rooms
in the clerks' floors.
Fourteen-foot ceilings, arched sash windows onto the laneway, and the original brass and cedar kept wherever it survived the twentieth century. No casino hotel room here is the same shape as the one next to it.
Levels 4–5 · rooms 49–84
Chancery Room
Higher up and quieter, facing the street with a pair of arched windows and a bath set under them.
- Sleeps
- 2
- Size
- 38 m²
- Outlook
- Chancery Place
From $430 AUD a night
Level 6 · 4 suites
The Assay Suite
Four suites in the old assay department under the roof, with the original vaulted ceiling and a view straight down onto the glass.
- Sleeps
- 3
- Size
- 68 m²
- Outlook
- Over the vault
From $780 AUD a night
Rates in Australian dollars, GST included, breakfast in the laneway. Casino entry is never bundled into a room rate.
21 °C · unchanged The casino · adults 18+
Twelve tables,
under the glass.
Most casinos are built to keep the daylight out. This one couldn't be: the trading floor is roofed with the original 1888 glazed vault, so the casino here is a bright room with a view of the sky and a working clock on every wall. Twelve casino tables on the old parquet, a bar where the telegraph desks were, and no poker machines anywhere in the building.
BlackjackFour casino tables, hand-dealt
RouletteThree wheels, single zero
BaccaratTwo tables, hosted
PokerThree tables, cash game
20:00 Casino opens 01:30 Last hand 02:00 Casino closes
How casino play works here →18+ Photo ID is checked at the casino door every night — 18 is the minimum gambling age everywhere in Australia. Tell the host your limit before you sit down at a casino table and they will hold you to it.
29 °C · still, briefly Casino hotel dining
The strong room,
and the laneway.
Two kitchens serve the whole casino hotel: a dining room in the basement vault where the bullion was kept, and a laneway counter that opens at seven and does not close until the casino does.
Daily · 07:00–02:00
The laneway counter
Sixteen stools, an espresso machine that predates the renovation, and a queue at eight most mornings. Open to Melbourne, not just to casino hotel guests.
Plan a stay →Nightly · 18:00–23:00
The strong room
Dinner in the old bullion vault: one metre of brick, forty covers, and the original door left open because it weighs three tonnes.
See the casino →15 °C · rain, sideways Out in the city
Everything is
a ten minute walk
or one tram.
The casino hotel sits in a laneway in the middle of the grid, which means most of Melbourne is closer than it looks. Three things worth going out in the weather for.
6 minutes on foot
The arcades
Two blocks of 1890s glass-roofed arcades, still full of the sort of shops that only survive in arcades. Go on a wet day, which is most of them.
9 minutes on foot
The market, early
Get there before eight for the delicatessen hall and the queue at the bratwurst stand. Closed Mondays and Wednesdays, which catches everyone out.
One tram, 14 minutes
The gallery and the gardens
Across the river to the state gallery, then the botanic gardens behind it. The tram is free inside the city, which nobody tells visitors.
25 minAirport, by SkyBus
4 minTo the nearest tram stop
0 spacesNo car park. Use the tram.
1 h 15Sydney, by air
2 nights Casino hotel package
The Long Weekend.
The stay most people take at this casino hotel: a chancery room, dinner in the strong room, tea under the glass, and an introduction to the casino if you want one.
Check dates →- Chancery Room2 nights
- Breakfast, both morningsLaneway counter
- Dinner in the strong roomThree courses
- Tea under the glassOnce
- Casino introductionOptional · 18+
- From$1,090 AUD
? Casino FAQ
Casino
questions.
What this casino hotel page is, who may enter the casino, and how casino gambling is regulated in Victoria.
No. Bullion House Casino Hotel is an invented Melbourne casino hotel, built to demonstrate casino hotel content and responsive web design. It takes no bookings, holds no casino licence and processes no payments. The building, the rates and the casino are all fictional.
The Victorian Gambling and Casino Control Commission, which was created in 2022 as a dedicated casino regulator following a royal commission into the state's existing casino licensee. Victoria has issued one casino licence. A second casino, in a laneway or anywhere else, would require the state to grant one that does not currently exist.
Adults aged 18 and over, with valid photo identification. Eighteen is the minimum gambling age in every Australian state and territory. In this concept the casino is open to hotel guests and to verified adult visitors, subject to capacity.
Because the building already had them. The trading floor was roofed in glass in 1888 and the vault is heritage-listed in this concept, so the casino could not be sealed even if anyone wanted to. Clocks and natural light are both things Australian regulators and researchers have raised as harm-minimisation measures, so the constraint turned out to be a feature.
None, anywhere in the building. The casino here is twelve live tables and a bar. Victoria has been progressively tightening rules around poker machines, including mandatory pre-commitment and carded play, and this concept simply does not have any to regulate.
Decide a limit in money and in time before you go up to the casino, and only play with money you can afford to lose. Never borrow to gamble and never chase a loss. If it stops being fun, stop. In Australia the National Gambling Helpline is free and open around the clock, and every state and territory runs a venue self-exclusion scheme you can register for.