This paper describes a comprehensive characterisation study carried out on clay from the National Soft Soil Testing Facility located at Ballina in northern New South Wales (NSW, Australia). Ballina clay represents the estuarine soft clays of high to extremely high plasticity from the Richmond river valley in NSW. They are structured and lightly overconsolidated with an average organic content around 3%. Index properties as well as mechanical parameters were estimated from laboratory tests performed on tube specimens retrieved using a fixed-piston sampler. Index characterisation tests were combined with constant rate of strain tests, incremental loading tests and stress-path triaxial testing to evaluate compressibility, stiffness, permeability and strength parameters. These deposits display very high compressibility and a low undrained shear strength which is larger in triaxial compression. Ballina clay shows a non-linear stress–strain response either in one-dimensional compression or undrained shearing. The consolidation coefficient, and consequently the water permeability, reduces dramatically with the stress level in the overconsolidated zone, mainly due to soil destructuration. A brittle response has been observed during shearing that reduces the undrained shear strength by around 50% after peak. Geotechnical profiles describing the variation of index and mechanical properties with depth are provided and compared against in situ test results. It is shown that the use of the fixed-piston sampler, in combination with non-destructive methods, to assess and select samples for laboratory testing provided good quality and reliable test results which are in agreement with data interpreted from in situ tests.