The Society existed from at least 1856 and had branches in Sydney, Newtown, Newcastle, Lithgow, North Sydney, Goulburn, Granville, Burwood and Canberra (from 1924 coinciding with the construction of Parliament House). It was part of the Federated Bricklayers' Association of Australia and its members joined the Building Workers' Industrial Union when it formed in 1945.

Reflecting its status as a branch of its English parent union, this society was originally registered as the Australian District of Amalgamated Society of Carpenters and Joiners in 1911 though it had existed as an affiliate of the British union since the 1850s. By the end of 1922 the name had been amended to become the Amalgamated Society of Carpenters and Joiners of Australia. It operated until the end of the Second World War when its name was changed to the Building Workers' Industrial Union of Australia in 1945. The Building Workers' Industrial Union of Australia functioned for just three more years until it was deregistered in 1948. The name Amalgamated Society of Carpenters and Joiners was taken over by a rival, anti-Communist breakaway group and federally registered in 1950, then was itself deregistered in 1951. Reforming in 1952, it eventually amalgamated with a number of unions in 1992 to form the Federation of Industrial Manufacturing and Engineering Employees.

The Building Workers' Industrial Union of Australia formed from the Amalgamated Society of Carpenters and Joiners of Australia in 1945 but was deregistered in 1948. An anti-communist faction of the union established a new Amalgamated Society of Carpenters and Joiners in 1950 which eventually became part of the Australian Workers' Union. The Building Workers' Industrial Union formally reconstituted in 1962. Members of the Federated Bricklayers' Association of Australia (deregistered 1950) and the Slaters Tilers Shinglers and Roof Fixers Union of Australia (deregistered 1976) also joined. In 1991 the BWIU amalgamated with the timber unions to become the Australian Timber and Allied Industries Union and Building Workers' Industrial Union (ATAIU & BWIU) Amalgamated Union and to eventually be part of the Construction Forestry Mining and Energy Union in 1993.