Original post 6 April 2020 If you like your apartment blocks #minimalist, you’ll like #Kilpara in #ToorakRoad, cnr Orrong, built in 1971, one of the lesser known works of #YunckenFreeman. The lead architect was #BarryPatten, who designed the #penthouse for his family - gosh. Only 28 spacious apartments, a pool, some nice views, nice lobby … Continue reading Kilpara, Toorak, 1970 →

4 April 2024 This grand pile called Mittagong once stood in Grey Street St Kilda, right next to Eildon, which is fortunately still with us. The pic is of the side facing huge long gardens and the bay, just like Eildon did (pic 4). Pic 5 is a map from 1896 showing the two top … Continue reading Lost St Kilda Mansions →

2 April 2024 Some interesting early flats in Vale Street, Jolimont East, built in 1914. Sort of castley, with those octagonal turret bits, but otherwise Arts & Crafts /Edwardian, an uncertain style for a new way of living/investing in Melbourne at the time. Originally 4 flats, with a nice stair, and two squeezy corridors, and … Continue reading Early flats East Melbourne →

1 April 2024 ‘Melbourne Connect’, cnr Grattan and Swanston Street, Carlton, an extension of Melbourne University by @woodsbagot, completed 2021. I’d seen photos, thought it looked a bit odd, and it is. It’s designed around an oval courtyard, which was larger than I expected, by @aspectstudios, and has some nice planting, and on Easter Sunday … Continue reading Melbourne Connect, Carlton →

29 March 2024 Looking impossibly picturesque- the former Melbourne Teachers College, now part of #MelbourneUniversity, and called the #1888building (even though it was built 1889-91). By far the most OTT example of #QueenAnne in Melbourne, with a dash of Dutch Renaissance. Including the fence and gates. Architect #GBHAustin for the Public Works Department. Impossible to … Continue reading Melbourne Teachers College →

29 March 2024 All the Acland Street cake shops, from left to right. Seems like they’ve always been there, and as far as Google can tell me, they’ve all been trading 30 years or more. Monarch is the oldest, opened by the Polish emigre Levine family in 1934; they started out with the Monaco cake … Continue reading Acland street cakes →

30 March 2024: Clarendon Terrace, Clarendon Street, East Melbourne, long owned by the National Trust, is for sale. Built in 1857 it was designed by architect Osgood Pritchard (great name) to look like a single grand house with a Neoclassical columned portico, but it’s actually three houses. Must’ve really stood out in colonial Melbourne. By … Continue reading Clarendon Terrace East Melbourne →

Original post 12 March 2017: St Silas Albert Park, #LouisWilliams, 1925. Obviously never finished, see how they 'completed' the front, probably in the 70s. Not bad, but not great. @ St Silas Anglican Church

Original post 27 March 2014: This sort of thing gave Postmodernism a bad name - some cheaply built offices in Johnston Street Fitzroy near Brunswick from c1984. Update : To make it worse, it replaced the 1931 Fitzroy Regent, used in the 60s as the HSV 7 teletheater, then for Rocky Horror, then mostly unused … Continue reading Tacky Pomo in Fitzroy →

22 March 2024 Nice but of Art Deco at 53 George Street East Melbourne, bully 1940, and designed by IG Anderson. And then in 1942 right next door he designed another one, St Martins, in a more Georgian mode. Anderson did a lot of flats in East Melb around 1940, including 5 blocks in Garden … Continue reading IG Anderson in East Melbourne →