Guide to Fashionable High Street Armadale, Melbourne
The World Loves Melbourne was invited to spend a day imbibing the delights of Armadale, only 6km south east of Melbourne. This precinct has been a favourite over the years and we have visited some of the iconic shops and facilities on past occasions. For 5 hours we enjoyed the superb retail shopping, antiques, galleries, cafes, restaurants and other specialty shops along fashionable High Street.
We started our Armadale experience on Orrong Rd where we were given a sneak peak of the impressive Toorak Park development. In a stylish precinct the modern well equipped contemporary apartments and town residences are a standout, with premium facilities nearby in Armadale.
We were able to check some of the rooms of these contemporary apartment and town residences. The bathroom is a stunner.
Then a short walk to High Street Armadale to premium shopping experiences...
We were keen for a cafe and High Street delivers with some fashionable popular cafes such as The Lovebird, where we had a delightful brunch. Another favourites is 8 Days, as well as Coin Laundry nearby in Armadale.
A retail fix was next on the agenda, with Alpha60 a fabulous Melbourne fashion brand. Also in our sights was Aesop with their premium bathroom and body products (we purchased some delightful hand wash). Matchbox hit the mark with kitchen and homeware products, and we picked up some baking products for home cooking. Other homeware shops that caught our eye included The Industrial Revolution and Provincial Home Living.
Matchbox has a great selection in a large retail space, while boutique Aesop provides a smaller shop where the testing of products is fun!
Antiques are a feature of High Street and we discovered a broad range of antiques from all over the world including from 1950s specialist Imperial Antiques Deco-Biedermeier, art deco Fabrile, Cappochi with mostly French furniture, to more high end at compelling Graham Geddes.
Kings Arcade is a delightful precinct with more excellent boutique stores including Seed Heritage, The Cupcake Queens and Brow Theory Brow Bar to name a few... We picked up a range of clothing at Seed from their Seed Teen collection, with an excellent sale in progress.
A late lunch was imbibed at fabulous Zia Rina's Cucina. Rina cooks delightful home cooked Italian fare and we indulged in Rigatoni with ragu and a beverage or two. This place is a gem!
Pressed Juices are a fast growing business and have a wonderful store on High Street Armadale. We tried the Chocolate for the first time and took a liking to Almond Milk. The Berry drinks are always a delight.
Several excellent wine stores grace Armadale including Armadale Cellars, Toorak Cellars and Wine Bar (Beatty Avenue) and The Tasting Table...
And the Japanese cuisine including sushi is excellent at Sozai (building pictured on the right).
One of our favourite bakery product stores in Melbourne is Phillippa's where we picked up some premium hot cross buns.
Armadale is rich with galleries such as Scott Livesey Galleries, Letitia Morris Gallery and Silver K Gallery.
We took the kids to Silver K Gallery for the compelling animation art, pop culture art and rock and roll images. The Ronnie Wood artwork was also a revelation.
For gourmet grocer needs Thomas Dux has it covered, and we are regular visitors.
We also purchased several of these "Grab Bags" at the wonderful paper and invitation specialists The Paper Empire.
High Street Armadale has its colourful quirk with this retro design at Grassy Dingo.
Special mention to Tartine who have been popular with locals for many years...
More retail therapy was needed at high end designers John Cavill, Scanlan Theodore, Decjuba, Camilla and Marc, Carla Zampatti, Skin and Threads and Josh Goot, to name a few. We also spotted the sporty type wearing their Lorna Jane along High Street.
Moss Green was an intriguing space for us with a compelling High Tea offering...
High Street Armadale is a classic high street in the true sense. While we enjoy mall shopping there's something fashionable about shopping on a proper high street full of boutique shops. High Street Armadale oozes class and style and caters for your every need. We found customer service levels excellent along the precinct. Our 5 hour shopping day on High Street was by no means exhaustive and we have scratched the surface (there are many other boutique shops we would like to embrace, such as jewellery by Kakizaki). The World Loves Melbourne is also keen to try cafes Forest Green, Gardiner and Field on Union St, and Rococo Lane in Beatty Avenue. We are also keen to try the popular Thai and Malaysian restaurants such as Thai on High in the precinct, as well as Spanish Barca Food and Wine and Lona Pintxos Bar. And for French there is the popular Chez Bob to imbibe. For lifestyle and attractive Melbourne precincts, High Street Armadale is a class act.