The Big Pavlova

That last detail decided its fate. Marulan was bypassed, the traffic went elsewhere, and the Mocador Pavlova Factory closed in 1991 – a casualty of the bypass, as the local historical account puts it plainly. Seven years of trade, then the road moved.

The building survives on what is now George Street, and it is in a strange condition. It has been altered enough that the local history society's own guide remarks you would need quite a vivid imagination to see its resemblance to a pavlova. That is an unusually candid thing for a town to say about its own landmark, and it is why the catalogue records this as remains rather than as a standing Big Thing. The structure is there; the pavlova is not.

Highway bypasses have killed more Big Things than fire, storm and vandalism combined. They do not damage the object at all – they simply remove the audience, and a roadside attraction with no road is just a building with an unusual roofline. Marulan has several such casualties in a short stretch, and this is the sweetest of them.

The town's other historic buildings, including an 1868 hotel continuously licensed for over 140 years, have fared rather better.