Finney Isles & Co Building, Heritage-listed department store building in Queen Street, Brisbane, Australia

The Finney Isles & Co Building is a heritage-listed retail building on Queen Street that spans multiple sections with varying facade treatments. The structure extends six storeys on Queen Street and three on Adelaide Street, with original silky oak staircases and decorative lift wells inside.

The building was completed in 1910 and represented one of Queensland's first uses of reinforced concrete construction techniques in commercial architecture. This method was groundbreaking for commercial structures in the region at that time.

The 1936 Adelaide Street wing is the Art Deco part: cream cement render, pilasters in a modern vertical style and terracotta spandrel panels, with decorative friezes at each floor level and on the parapet. Inside, black and white Rockhampton marble surrounds the lift wells. The 1909 Queen Street section instead carries "THE BIG BLOCK" and "FINNEY ISLES & CO. LIMITED" in raised lettering on the parapet, under a pediment dated A1909D.

Modern shopfronts occupy both street-facing facades, while original wood details and decorative elements remain inside. Visitors should come early to explore the interior architectural details fully, as shops operate during business hours.

The building was equipped with advanced features including a pneumatic cash exchange system for secure transactions and a rooftop water tank for storage. These systems show how important efficiency and safety were for retail operations in that era.