The randomly #supertall 90 storey #AuroraMelbourne by @elenberg_fraser has pretty much #toppedout - also almost looks like the rendering from the State Library forecourt if you fiddle with it a lot. And looming up from upper Swanston street too. Hadn’t realised #AuroraMelbourne is actually on the #SwanstonStreetAxis looking south; and it’s as tall as it’s … Continue reading Aurora Melbourne topped out at 90 floors….
Not a case of pointless #facadism as I first thought, the white part was built from recycled bricks as a non-literal memory of what was there before. This house featured on #GrandDesignsAustralia in 2013, but I only saw it a few months ago and then realised I was waking right past every other day ! … Continue reading Grand designs on a tight site
26 July 2022: The wonderfully eccentric Machin & Shepherd, #EstateAgents, built c1902 (here till the 80s!). Fantastic #Edwardian #Queenanne #3D design over extremely narrow proportions, obviously designed to be as tall as possible to stand out. Big chunky projections, topped with a with a kind of #occulus, an arch over a gap with the steep … Continue reading Edwardian verticality in Albert Park.
23 March 2019 On CarlisleStreet Balaclava is one the best of those late 30s Commonwealth Banks, cos it’s on a corner, with a great circular corner tower element. It’s got one of those great wrought iron screens too, though mostly not visible, being a curved sliding gate thing by the looks. Hmmm the one in … Continue reading Art Deco Commonwealth Bank no 2 of maybe a dozen
So, there was a plan to build a tower right here across the #railwaylines in #ChapelStreetWindsor - but #VCAT said no in Sept 2017, citing the 12m height limit on the north side of the railway and saying it clearly didn’t fit the low scale of the heritage-listed #shoppingstrip. (The other side of the railway … Continue reading Building over a railway line isn’t easy
This article in #AustralianHomeBeautiful Feb 1953 features a flat in Kew belonging to Mrs L Y Sher, and pretty sure that was my second (unofficial) #godmother Eve Sher ! - who I knew in the 70s and 80s as a short squat lovely lady who said dahlink a lot, lived in a high rise flat in Toorak … Continue reading My 2nd godmothers house in Australian Home Beautiful, 1953.
23 March 2019: Another bit of family history - after graduating from Commerce from #MelbourneUniversity, my mother in about 1955 instead of becoming a stock broker like she wanted got a job here at #PrestonMotors (now #PMautomotivegroup), in this great streamline Deco / #Moderne #carshowroom on the corner of Russell and #LittleCollinsStreet almost exactly when … Continue reading Preston Motors, a Moderne city showroom (and a bit of family history)
If you own an #officetower with some space between it and #CollinsStreet, why not squeeze in another one ? You only have to leave a 6m gap, front and back. #80collins, pka #NauruHouse. (There weren’t any rules that anyone taking any notice of when this one got a permit in 2011, though the Collins st … Continue reading Kissing Towers, 80 Collins
That’s not just any star, it’s the star of the #LoyalOrangeOrder, the Irish Protestant association. It’s in #CentenaryHall in Exhibition Street which has been the home of the Victorian #LiberalParty since they bought it in 1976 from the Protestants who built it in 1935, replacing an earlier hall. There’s a big auditorium on the first … Continue reading Centenary Hall & Loyal Orange Order Purple Star.
Not terrifically exciting but this lift probably dates from 1960, when the rather cute #LaurensHouse at 414 #LonsdaleStreet was extended from the 1956 four storeys to 8 (it didn’t have a lift before). I do like the fluted aluminium (or is it steel ?) sheet. Architect #HaroldBloom, possibly an #emigrearchitect, but might not be; emigre … Continue reading Mid century mundane, a 1960 lift car.
If the Nazi's never took power, would Berlin have Europe's tallest skyscraper and East Prussia be a honeymoon destination ?
Storey of Melbourne 