The Currie Street Model School was erected as a model for other schools to follow and as such represented the most advanced architectural thinking of its time. Built to accommodate 900 at the cost of 7,841 pounds, its date of completion was 3 March 1891. Erected as the advanced school for girls, it was the first two storey public school built within the city limits.

In 1879 John Anderson Hartley, Catherine Helen Spence and others created the Advanced School for Girls in Grote Street, Adelaide; the first public secondary school in South Australia. The school became the part of Adelaide High School in 1908, the same year the South Australian state high school system was launched. Adelaide High School was officially opened on September 24, 1908 by the premier of South Australia Thomas Price. It was the first secondary school in the Commonwealth of Australia.

It started off as two schools, with a boys' and a girls' campus; though these combined in 1908. In 1927 it had an enrolment of 1,067, making it the largest school of its kind in the Commonwealth. By 1929, the school occupied two sites - one at Grote Street and another at Currie Street. The current site of the school on West Terrace was originally set aside for an army barracks in 1849, but an Observatory was built instead in 1859. This became the Bureau of Meteorology in 1939.

In 1947–1951 a new school was built west of West Terrace, and the Currie Street building became the Remand Centre.