Where I Work

(no, not here, this is an undemolished house around the corner from home) 

If had been sitting in my current office working away as a solicitor in 1935 (most unlikely given my gender) this is what my building would have looked like:

The National Trust has just released an app which tracks demolished buildings of Melbourne.  Like every city, there are many, although we demolished maybe more enthusiastically than others.  Save for the English of course.  Bill Bryson points out in his book At Home that literally thousands of magical country homes were demolished in the middle of the last century, a sad fact now the subject of a site which Lisa pointed me to in a recent post.

The building above was used by the US General Macarthur as his residence during WW2, and also played host to Mark Twain and Alexander Graham Bell.It was demolished and replaced with the current high rise. 


Almost too sad to think about, that such a building has gone for good.


There are plenty more where that came from.  Remember the 1950's? I don't but apparently old things were considered ugly and out of fashion, and people wanted new clean lines.   There were very limited heritage controls and so people could buy large blocks of land, demolish the inconvenient Italianate mansion located on it, and build a lovely orange brick block of flats.


Here are some no longer with us, just in my area:

(Alta Vista, South Yarra, 1859)

(Corrabert, Toorak) 

(Leura mid 1800s, Toorak)

(Norla, Irving Road Toorak)

So many memories and people laughing, all gone.

But fear not, there are many buildings which have survived.

(Ripponlea in the suburb of the same name)

and many more still in private hands:

(Coonac in Clendon Road Toorak)

(Miegunyah, Orrong Road Toorak) 

(Images via the Age, National Trust (thanks!)

I have a very personal reason for feeling sad about demolished houses.


I grew up in a pale pink 1920s house, which we sold when my parents divorced.  To me that house was happiness incarnate.  I still dream of it.


Eventually, it sold and then sold again.  A few years ago I happened to drive past, and the wreckers were there, busily pulling it down.   I pulled over, a stared in unbelieving horror.  The gingko tree we climbed on, the ancient pear trees, the morton bay fig, the terracotta roof, the slate verandah, all gone.   A little bit of me died that day, I tell you. 


And what is there now?  A large block of neo Georgian neo Tuscan neo Palladian apartments.     What can you say?


Happy post next time, I promise. 

Tweet

Good Things Spring 2011

(pearl barley and aduki bean salad with char grilled asparagus and salsa verde dressing)

This salad, adapted from the book pictured below. This book is so amazing, I feel like stopping people in the street to tell them.    Brilliant warm salads, lots of wonderful baked vegetable dishes and everything in between.  You do not need to be a vegetarian (I am not).  But if you want to reduce the amount of meat in your life (I do) and need decent interesting recipes this is the book for you.  

For example, quinoa with parsley pesto, cranberries, toasted hazelnuts and mushrooms, a divine raw vegetable and avocado soup, parsnip and rosemary rolls, baked red onions stuffed with toasted, spiced couscous and oven baked pea, barley and broad bean frittata.  She also has instructions for making your own sprouts from any seed (sprouts are a great super food), labne, yoghurt and tofu.    Buy it! 

This Phillip Treacy hat worn by Dita Von Teese to Derby Day, in defiance of the black and white rule of Derby Day.   I like Dita, but I have to ask: why do we Australians persist in importing celebrities from 'overseas' to the Spring Racing Carnival?  Are we so insecure that we need validation by a non-Australian?  Or does it make it a truly international day?  The imported guests over the years have ranged from a charming Rex Harrison to a very bored Paris Hilton.    The celebritizing of the races generally is part of the reason I gave up our Victorian Racing Club membership this year.  Read Francesca Cumani's take on it here.  

This house at 58 Millswyn Street, South Yarra.    I played in this house as a little girl when family friends owned it. It is now renovated and on the market for (no doubt) A Bomb.

Beetroot cheek and lip tint from Ere Perez.  Yes beetroot.  Better on the cheeks than inside the tummy, raw, I think! Great organic Australian makeup.  I also have their mascara. 

This fondue set.   Doesn't ship to Australia, sadly.

(from Jenna at Etsy)

This artist.  I love her.  She makes me feel like a little girl again.    And who wouldn't like a tame fox sleeping on their head? 

(Marisol Spoon on Etsy)

I think I am officially the last person on the planet to get Etsy.  I have browsed many times of course but never bought.   In a possibly fruitless attempt to de-plasticise my life I have bought some non plastic lunch bags for the children.  And sandwich bags.  And snack bags.   Coming from all around the globe, and all really good value. I will show you when they arrive. 

Oh, one more thing.  The children are obsessed with Star Wars at the moment and in a moment of idle googling I came across many people with a similar obsession. To wit:

(sorry couldn't find source)

At that moment, TK-788 and TR-114 made a pact to never speak of this day again to anyone (from legomyday.wordpress.com)

xo 

Tweet

Miracle Cream Monday Morning (Giveaway)

I had some of our family over for lunch for my father's birthday over the weekend and I thought I would try something different for the table setting. I used a fuchsia table cloth from Market Import.  Most unlike me, colour wise, but it suited the beautiful sunny spring day.  The little milk bottle vase is from Ada & Darcy.



(lunch setting Sunday 21 November 2010)



The colour also suited the conversation, which was a typically lively one.  All current topics were covered (the Greens, climate change, asylum seekers, planning approvals, the Federal minority government, violence in children's movies,  the forthcoming State election and so on).  I felt a bit like I had gone 10 rounds at the end. In a good way.

I have changed my training spot in the mornings, we now do it in Alexandra Avenue near Morell Bridge in South Yarra.  The other day my trainer, who like all trainers I suspect is not prone to exaggeration, said to me 'Look at that vista, Jane.  This must be the best place to train in the world'.    So I took a photo this morning to show you all.

(View of part of the city taken from Morell Bridge, 6.04 am)

(view of some of the rowers on the Yarra River)

Now, to the point of this post.  Yes, it has a point.

A couple of weeks ago I had a severe bout of gastro.  After I recovered I made the mistake of looking in the mirror.  Looking back at me was Actual Death.   So I went straight to High Street where every second shop is a beauty salon, and immediately got a facial.  The excellent lady also sold me many Vitamin C, Vitamin A, soothing, cleansing bits of cream and potion.  

After a week of ill judged and overzealous application of the paint stripper cosmeceuticals my skin was peeling off in strips and had gone red and blotchy.  Note to self: when she says just one pump she means just one, not 5. 

I was getting reasonably desperate and then I remembered this product, currently residing in my daughter's room.  Lucas Pawpaw Ointment is made of fermented paw paw (papaya).  It is spruiked as great for 'boils, burns, chaffings, cuts, cracked skin, gravel rash, splinters, open wounds, insect bits and nappy rash'.   I use it all the time on the children's bottoms and elbows.  

I slathered it over my face and two days later, my skin is perfect.
 

The ointment is made in Brisbane, you can read about it here. 

I love this stuff so much I want to share it with you.   I realise that if you live in Australia you can buy it very cheaply from the local chemist.  But still you can NEVER have too much.

If you leave a comment, and are a follower, I will put you in the draw to win the biggest tub I can find plus a handy purse tube. 

Giveaway is open until close of business 29 November 2010. If you post about it, you get an extra entry.

Happy Monday. 

xoxo

Tweet

St Kilda Dreaming

On Saturday the AFL Grand Final was held before 100,014 people crammed into the Melbourne Cricket Ground.

(Corvey, Brighton Road St Kilda, fell into disrepair and then demolished)

For only the third time in more than a 100 years the game was drawn at 67 points all.

(captains of Collingwood and St Kilda looking stunned at the end of the game)

I don't really follow football, and I can tell you that is pretty unusual in Melbourne. But I always watch the Grand Final and it was an amazing, heart stopping 1970s style game on Saturday.   I actually 'barrack' (I use that word very loosely) for Richmond but St Kilda comes a close second. For no reason other than I love the suburb and spent many happy years living there.

Do you know what happens in AFL when a game is drawn?  Unlike 99.9% of the other ball games played on this planet, there is no extra time.  No no.  They replay the game next week.   Although for future finals, they may need to rethink this.

So here,  for  my second most favourite team, are some St Kilda iconic buildings.   All demolished now.   Do you think we have learned not to demolish beautiful buildings?  I am not so sure.   St Kilda was a wealthy suburb in the 1800s and full of Italianate and Victorian mansions.   Many were saved simply by virtue of being converted into apartments.   Others were demolished in the 1960s to make way for brick flats or glass towers. 

(Iloura in St Kilda Road demolished in 1964)

(Armadale in St Kilda Road, demolished in the 1970s)

(Summerland House, located near the corner of Fitzroy Street and Acland Street, St Kilda)

I read an interesting story on the origins of the name of the suburb.  The buyer of the land on which Summerland House was located was a Lieutenant James Ross Lawrence.  He was captain of the schooner Lady of St Kilda. Captain Lawrence named Acland Street after Sir Thomas Dyke Acland, the ship’s owner.

Acland’s ship was in turn named after a Lady Grange. In 1734, it is said that she was imprisoned by her husband for seventeen years on the St Kilda group of islands, the westernmost point of the British Isles, and way beyond the Scottish Outer Hebrides. Only on his death could she be released. Her crime was in remonstrating with him about his schemes to restore the position of Bonnie Prince Charlie. There are seven islands in the group, but Hirta is the largest. It has not been continuously inhabited since 1930. Lady Grange was probably left on Hirta.

I will remember that next time I remonstrate with my husband about his schemes. 

(Images:  (1) Not sure sorry (2) The Age (3) (4) The Collector (5) St Kilda Historical Society

Tweet

Face on Building

At the end of Swanston Street in Melbourne lies the old Carlton and United Brewery site. It is huge, and has been a bit of a bombsite for as long as I can remember.

This week the developer released images of the building it is proposed to be built there.   It is designed by Melbourne architects Ashton Raggatt McDougall.  

The face is that of William Barak, an Aboriginal elder who lived between 1824 and 1903. He was the last traditional elder of the Wurundjeri people, whose land was where the city of Melbourne now sits.  He was an accomplished bark artist, and a respected, articulator for Aborginal interests in the 19th century.

The face is only visible from a distance.   It is certainly original although I haven't seen any commentator yet point out that the concept is identical to an idea ARM had for a residential building in Darling Harbour in Sydney, which would have had an image of the Max Dupain photo 'Bondi' on it.  This was never built.

How does the face work?  ARM's website describes the process for the Dupain building as follows:

To build this image the famous original photograph was scanned and processed into black and white strips using a sophisticated computer generated technique. Each strip became curved and rippled like ribbons or driftwood. Together these strangely evocative balustrade forms create the vivid optical illusion of the original picture, which becomes clearer as distance increases, to emerge as if from a mirage.

ARM are truly original. I wish they did more residential work, like these fabulous pointy angular beachouses:

They tend to stick more to urban design and iconic buildings, like this:

(new visitor centre at the Shrine of Remembrance)

 (RMIT Storey Hall. I especially like the pink tram in this image)

Do you think it would be slightly odd to live in a building with a face on it , or would you not notice after a while?

(All Images from ARM)

Tweet

Drive by Houses - Avoca Street, South Yarra

I often drive up Avoca Street on my way to the Tan for a run.

This is my absolutely favourite street in all of Melbourne. I know there are more perfect streets, and more well known streets, and more paved with gold streets, and this one certainly has its share of 1970's brick 3 storey apartment blocks. But it is on a hill, and is a short walk to the Royal Botanic Gardens, and it has some amazing houses.

I do love a good sticky beak at the outside of houses. It is why I prefer being a car passenger than driving. I am sure I have almost had many near misses, distracted by some wonderful facade as I drive past. In some ways gazing upon the outside is more satisfying than seeing inside a house. I often don't like the inside of people's houses. Especially those houses owned by people with lots of money. Sorry but it's true.

My way, one can furnish the house oneself. Elegantly, sparsely and relatively true to the period, with lots of modern touches thrown in.

Anyway, I thought I would take some sneaky photos to see if you agree with my assessment.

All the food groups are represented in Avoca Street:

Early Victorian 

Georgian 

Victorian Terrace (at the end of this row (called Lee Terrace) is Waterloo which I wrote about here)

Spanish Mission

Melbourne modern Palladian

1930s Georgian revival

Palm Springs

 Italianate

Forbidding and Inaccessible 

Colonial

Do you see why I like it so much?  

.

Tweet

Drive By Houses - Sarathon and Joseph Brown

The 1881 Italianate home of the late Dr Joseph Brown, AO, OBE, is for sale.  I have previously written of my love for Italianate tower houses, and Melbourne has a preponderance, including this one, known as Sarathon.

Located at Grandview Grove, Prahran, it has a completely untouched back area which is very unusual and many intact features.   Here is one of the rooms.  

Guess what kind of person resided here? 

It's not hard to guess - someone who lived and loved art.  As beautiful as this house is, perhaps it is most interesting for its owner, Joseph Brown, who died last year

This portrait of Joseph Brown was painted by Sir William Dargie in 1975.  Doesn't he look like a wonderful person?  I imagine him as slightly gruff but charming, and fascinated by all around him.   (Apologies for tiny size of image).

Here are some hight points of his incredible life.  

Josef Breun arrived as a Polish emigre with his father and siblings in 1932, aged 14. He left school at 16 and found a job working in a fashion house.  This was also the age at which he purchased his first artwork (with his first wage).  He established a fashion business making wedding and evening gowns but still loved to paint and scupt.

He served in World War II for his adopted country, and joined the 13th Light Horse Regiment.

He gave away fashion eventually and opened an art gallery in 1967.  He rediscovered forgotten artists (such as John Glover, whose colonial works fell out of fashion in the 1950s) and mentored young artists (such as Sidney Nolan, Arthur Boyd and Rick Amor). 

He realised early on he could not afford European art and instead over decades amassed an incredible collection of Australian art, spanning centuries.

In May 2004 Brown donated most of his collection of art to the National Gallery of Victoria.  This collection of 150 works ranged from Aboriginal to Heidelberg school works worth $30 million was the most generous single gift ever made to an Australian gallery.  Included are these works:

(Phillipine Girls by Ian Fairweather, 1935)

(Yall-y-Poora Homestead by Eugene Von Guerard, 1864)

Dr Brown kept 300 paintings from his collection.  You can see some of them on the walls of Sarathon.   He repeatedly said he was not a rich man, and emphasised the friendships he had forged with so many outstanding artists. He said in 2004 that he would keep painting himself as long as he could hold a paintbrush. 

((1)-(3) Marshall White (5) and (6) NGV, other sources The Age and Wikepedia).

And thank you all for those who left such nice comments about my friend and her tragedy.  She is doing okay, and you are all very kind to be thinking of her. xoxo

Tweet