There’s a whole section of the middle of #StKildaRoad that’s just ...empty - due to the woks for the #MelbourneMetroTunnel at #DomainInterchange.

O dear this #smokehaze is scary ! Didn’t realise it was this bad. Only other time I remember this happening was Ash Wednesday in 1983, and that was just one day or horrifying #bushfires, which burnt 3/4 mill hectares, destroying 100s of houses, including my family holiday house at Fairhaven; it took a good 10 … Continue reading Smoke Haze, 3 January 2019. →

The new Cato Square in #Prahran - I think it suffers from the #publicplaza design problem of trying to cater for too much stuff, ending up reliant on programmed events, a bit like FedSq - also from the odd decision to make the whole thing semi-enclosed, with three raised sides, and a cafe (not yet … Continue reading What should a new civic plaza be like ? →

The amphitheater like design of #CatoSquare means the sides are raised and does feel like it’s turned it’s back on the surrounding streets, an odd decision, the #IzettStreet side is a black wall, the #sprinklervalves had to go somewhere, but ??? On the other side the walls are glass lighting up the carpark, but that’s … Continue reading Blank walls at Cato Square →

Repost 4 January 2020: Always a treat to see the Shakespeare Window up the top level of the @state_library_victoria dome - apparently it was one of the earliest made in Melbs, in 1862. And quite a survivor, originally in the Haymarket Theatre in Bourke Street, but taken out by impresario #GeorgeCoppin who had commissioned it, … Continue reading Shakespeare in stained glass at the State Library →

One of the things I like most about the @library_vic is the chairs ! 107 years old now, still used, and still look vaguely ‘modern’, with simple lines and square cut-outs, in contrast to the very traditional carved and varnished decoration on the central lectern thing, where a librarian would sit in order to shush … Continue reading The State Library furniture is pretty old, and stylish for 1913. →

Obligatory shot of the #DomedReadingRoom attge @library_vic from the top- it’s actually very high up ! For a place that had to house thousands of books, that’s a lot of empty space ! But very glad it’s there. Designed by Norman Peebles of #BatesPeeblesAndSmart, #JosephReed’s firm as it was in 1913. At 35.5 metres it … Continue reading The impressive Domed Reading Room →

#MythBusted ! The StateLibraryofVictoria #domedreadingroom was not the ‘biggest (#reinforcedconcrete) dome in the world’ in 1913 at all ! Structurally complete late 1912, but so was the #CentennialHallWroclaw, which is 62m wide while ours is only a piddly 34.7m. The Wroclaw dome officially opened in May 1913, ours in Nov 1913, so way ahead. I’m … Continue reading State Library dome not the biggest in 1913 after all ! →

Aptly named #ThePebbles, this 1920 house on #GeelongRoad in #Footscray is a #CalifornialBungalow on steroids ! Fat pebbly piers supporting complicated woodwork with wildly cantilevered brackets and spiky edged pergolas, and all perfectly intact ! We learned about this in archi school but I’d never stopped to see it up close. Designed by #SchreiberAndJorgenson, not … Continue reading Cal Bung delight in Footscray →

14 January 2025 A grand block of 20s looking flats off the Esplanade in Brighton, which I posted in 2020 with many questions, still unanswered. It started out as a fine Regency style house, probably built in the 1850s, for James Webb, who bought the large lot from original Brighton developer Henry Dendy in 1848. … Continue reading Hidden Heritage in Brighton. →