Pedder Street was established at the centre of Hong Kong's commerce in the early colonial days.

Dent & Co., one of the key founding members of The Hongkong and Shanghai Banking Corporation Limited,[3] had a sprawling complex which stretched along the Praya, and a west wing which abutted Pedder Street.

The street was extended north by 1904 when the Praya Reclamation Scheme[4] finished transforming the old Praya into the modern day Des Voeux Road, along with a further stretch of land running north up to Connaught Road on which the General Post Office and Union Building were built.

[7] Dent & Co. went into financial distress in 1866 and sold half of its land on Pedder Street to the newly established Hongkong Hotel Company.

Although at the present day absolutely useless owing to the high buildings since constructed around it, the Clock Tower remains as an obstruction to the traffic.

[5] The 80 feet (24 m) tall clock tower with a lighted dial, designed by a Mr. Rawlings,[9] was to be funded by subscriptions, but the lack of public response meant that many of the more elaborate decorative features were jettisoned.

[6] In its heyday, Dent also occupied the south-western corner of Pedder Street (and Queen's Road), where it had established a "Tea Exchange".

The General Post Office was relocated in 1911 to new premises on the newly reclaimed (northern) section of Pedder Street where the wharf once was.

[6] The basement suite of the building was occupied for most of the post-war period by the auctioneering firm Lammert Bros. which had been operating in Hong Kong since 1855.