Marrickville is located 7 kilometres (4 miles) south-west of the Sydney central business district and is the largest suburb in the Inner West Council local government area.

Marrickville sits on the northern bank of the Cooks River, opposite Earlwood and shares borders with Stanmore, Enmore, Newtown, St Peters, Sydenham, Tempe, Dulwich Hill, Hurlstone Park and Petersham.

The southern part of the suburb, near the river, is known as Marrickville South and includes the historical locality called The Warren.

Marrickville is a culturally diverse suburb consisting of both low and high density residential, commercial and light industrial areas.

The Gadigal or Cadigal people of the Eora Nation have lived in the Marrickville area for tens of thousands of years.

[citation needed] Thomas Holt (1811–1888) was a Sydney business tycoon who built a castellated Victorian Gothic mansion named "The Warren" in 1857 in Marrickville South.

It was designed by architect George Mansfield, and contained an impressive art gallery filled with paintings and sculptures from Europe.

It had elaborate stables built into imposing stone walls, and large landscaped gardens filled with urns overlooking the Cooks River.

Thomas Holt was a large land holder in Sydney with another mansion at the edge of Gwawley Bay, Sylvania Waters, New South Wales in 1881,(his last and greatest residence, the monumental forty room Sutherland House mansion which was destroyed by fire in 1918) and vast property holdings from Sutherland to Cronulla.

[citation needed] As Holt's health began to be an issue, the Warren was subdivided in 1884 with the land around the immediate building's grounds being sold off - and the family returning to Britain for the remaining years of his life.

[citation needed] The estate stables were demolished some time between 1884 and 1886, with the nearby Ferncourt Public School being originally built as a house "Prosna" by Polish born artist, Gracius Joseph Broinowski, from sandstone blocks of the stable, and a cedar staircase and marble mantelpiece purchased from Holt's estate installed in it.

[citation needed] It is obvious today the last block remaining where the mansion stood as it is indicated by the newer houses of the 1920s-1930s as well as, obviously the name of the road, driven down the western side of the block - "Mansion Street" - and "Holt St" adjacent to it forming the lower side of the square perimeter).

[citation needed] The Warren became a nunnery when the mansion and 12 acres (5 ha) of land were purchased by a French order of Carmelite nuns.

By this stage the grounds appear to be bare with a high wood fence installed on the western side of the building about this time.

It then was used during WWI for an artillery training range and this fenced area also appears in photos along with smaller buildings on the grounds nearby.

It was resumed in 1919 by the New South Wales government was finally demolished in around 1922 - the land subdivided to build a housing estate for returned soldiers.

Originally piers from the back entrance of the building, which had been stored by the council for many years - they were placed on the headland with a memorial fountain in 1967 at Richardson's Lookout in Holt Street.

[citation needed] "Ferndale" in Kent Lane, Newtown, is the earliest of his four houses and the last surviving residence connected with Thomas Holt.

The suburb developed a strong Italian and Greek community and many immigrants found work in nearby factories, retails and trading.

The Factory Theatre hosts an array of live music and performances - from international rock concerts to cabaret shows, film and dance.

[27] Marrickville has a wide range of cafes and restaurants with cuisines featuring Vietnamese, Thai, Chinese, Nepalese, Portuguese, Lebanese, Turkish, Modern Australian, Greek and Japanese.

Marrickville Road is well known for the artworks, by Ces Camilleri of Creative Artistic Steel, that adorn the awnings of some of its businesses, which gives the strip a unique style.

It is the location of the Addison Road Community Organisation, which runs the a Living Museum program showcasing the history and heritage of the area.

Every Sunday the Addison Community Centre hosts a market where fresh fruit and vegetables, coffee and other edible products and second-hand goods are sold.

[citation needed] A creative reuse environmental not-for-profit selling materials to the public and providing education programs is located at 30 Carrington Road.

[44] The library offers services which reflect the diversity of the community; among these are young readers groups and material available in Arabic, Chinese, Greek, Portuguese, Spanish and Vietnamese.

To coincide with the opening, the site was renamed Patyegarang Place, named after the first Aboriginal person to teach their language to a settler.

Whilst many of the larger estates have been subdivided, some still remain, including the heritage-listed Victorian Italianate manor Stead House, former residence of Samuel Cook, General Manager of The Sydney Morning Herald in the late 19th century.

It is also home to Marrickville A reserve who are consistently made up of mostly Polynesian players (mostly family) [citation needed] who overcame the odds, making it into the semi-finals before falling short in what was described as "Grand Final" performance.