Amart Furniture will occupy the bulk of the premises, but there will also be five smaller shops opening at the 1.424-hectare site which backs on to the Sydney to Melbourne railway line.

Details of the plans for the former woolstore location are contained in a development application which has been lodged with Albury Council.

It has been undertaken by Albury firm Habitat Planning at the behest of the Border branch of financial business Crowe Horwath.

Habitat steered The Border Mail’s inquiry to Crowe Horwath manager Samuel Morey, but he did not return calls.

Amart Furniture also failed to respond.

The expansion by the Brisbane-based retailer onto the Border follows the company opening a store in central Wagga in April.

It also has an outlet in Shepparton, which is among more than 60 nationwide. 

Amart opened its first store in 1970 in Brisbane and describes itself as a company which sells “stylish and quality products at affordable prices”.

Bunnings closed at the Young Street block in February ahead of moving into a larger purposed-designed warehouse in East Albury on a former factory site.

A heritage-listed Dalgety woolstore was demolished to make way for the erection of the 8000 square metre building which opened in 2003.

While the plans for Bunnings’ old store do not reveal the brands to occupy the smaller outlets, there are some details about changes for the structure.

The old entrance to the building will be demolished and replaced with separate doorways to each tenant.

Rigging for shade sails used to cover Bunnings’ gardening department will also be removed.

Other alterations will include the construction of a covered walkway along the front of the building and protrusions added to the facade “to create interest and present more aesthetically to Young Street”.

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Changes to car parking are also flagged.

There will be one entrance and exit from Young Street, rather than previous two-way access and overall number of bays will be reduced from 225 to 222.

An unrelated business Amart All Sports operated in the Rebel Sport store across the road from the old Bunnings until 2009.