6 August 2024

The exotically named twin apartments called Mandalay on the Upper Esplanade, St Kilda. Built 1935, and @cityofportphillip heritage planner tells me the architect was busy flat builder/designer Bernard Evans. It was built in the front garden of a large 1882 house originally called Rathlin, then Mandalay from 1916. Facebook people have found/scanned a photo of it from the 1920s, and one of it after a fire in 1975. By the late 80s the flats were very run down too, and proposed for demolition, and it became a focus of resident action, for heritage reasons, and for the low income tenants. They found new homes and in 1988 it was all fixed up, and jaunty new blocks built behind too (presumably the mansion was long gone). In 2022 it was repaired and repainted, which involved researching the original colours (according to Dulux), but I’d be very surprised if those two shades of blue were original, rather than a 1988 Miami-inspired palette. The fence is also 1988, with a pattern matching the doors.

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