17 September 2025

Domain Park flats – such a landmark, such a thin profile ! Love the way the lift cores stick up behind too. But yes it’s pretty massive from in front, and bloody windy on Monday.

On Domain Road opposite the Botanic Gardens, it was designed by Robin Boyd, largely completed in 1962, and was pretty controversial – at 20 storeys it was by far the tallest apartment tower in Melbourne (Edgewater Towers in St Kilda, 1961, last pic was 15), it loomed over the gardens and the upper echelons living in nice houses and flats in the immediate area – all that meant that sales were slow, perhaps a reason why Boyd didn’t get to do anything else as big.

Many interesting design choices : it’s a basic expressed concrete grid with brick infill, but the floors vary in plan within that, creating some texture, assisted by the way the balconies stick out slightly; there’s that open walkway behind, an unusual choice for expensive flats; there’s no ensuites, in fact the main bathrooms are combined with the laundry; the ceilings are low, but with the walls of glass to the balconies they feel open; while the rear windows are ordinary rectangles; and there’s no transition at ground level, not even shrubs or an entry canopy, so it feels rather abrupt. The garden is nice though – I’m told it was redone by Andrew Laidlaw in 2021.

And I found one flat that sold last year that had the original kitchen and bathrooms. It didn’t have any local heritage listing until 2023, and should really be on the heritage register. Hasn’t changed a bit though, I guess the residents like it that way.

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