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The industrial revolution brought about a lot of good and changes that led to the society we have today.
More people have access to goods than ever before. Technological advances occur at accelerated rates. There are many things we have in our possessions we think we cannot imagine life without, yet our parents lived without them.

One thing that hasn’t caught up with the rate of changes is the distribution of goods and wealth. The same goods are constantly produced and distributed to the same groups of people, resulting in the phenomenon of consumerism. Having not enough is not a good thing, but the same also goes with having more than enough. The people who have more are not necessarily happier than those who have less.

Because of the supply of goods pushed out at the same number of people, we are often put under the false belief that we have choices. In fact, marketing campaigns have been telling us what we think we need. The huge supply of products...

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By guest blogger Martin Firrell

I have long held that our arts and culture should be kept close to us. Not shown in hallowed halls requiring visitor trips, tickets and entrance fees, but shown as close as possible to the chaotic business of life itself.

For years I struggled with the practicalities of this point of view. And made experiments with flyposting, text-filled postcards that would float through the mail system and be ‘seen’ along the way, advertising billboards, cinema ‘information films’ and large scale projection onto landmark buildings.

I made a work, about the ideas that shape or ‘hold’ our lives, for projection onto the dome of St Paul’s Cathedral in London to mark the 300th anniversary of St Christopher Wren’s cathedral building.

I was interested in cataloguing those ideas that people say give their lives shape, meaning and purpose in the 21st Century – Death, Sex,...

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Deciphering mysteries, decoding clues, interpreting emotions.

Ana Manzo

Architecture, at least for me, is much more than design and construction. To me it is about cherished dreams, hidden desires, expected feelings. It is about learning to know people, discovering their secrets, becoming their confidant.

Whenever I start a new project, I delight in this first research phase, in which the most important thing is the conversation with the clients. To stop time for a while and listen, not just the words they have to say, but the tone of their voice, their facial expressions, the emphasis placed on certain words. These details are key to the future project. Learning to discover those little secrets that, in many cases, not even the clients know they have, is essential for any designer.

The architect must be more than just an interpreter; we should not be limited to the words the clients...

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Who says construction shots can’t be fun?

Thanks to Neo Feliciano

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For this inner-city family home we are exploring ways to deny scale on the street frontage. The simple and apparently arbitrary facade deliberately lacks a reference point, communicating much less than a traditional house.

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This afternoon’s brainstorming session as we help develop a brief for a Church redevelopment. Undertaking these simple old fashioned relationship bubble diagrams led to a breakthrough in how to approach the project without the need for a design proposal. The time invested in getting the relationship of spaces right means a smaller more compact building and an outcome that will serve congregational interests in the long term. Pre-design is really such a valuable stage that architects and clients could further utilise.

[UPDATE] – Ideas are slowly developing into spaces. This is an exciting project.

We are currently working with the City of Frankston to explore the feasibility of converting an old supermarket into office space. Our campaign to re-life Melbourne continues!

Peter Sackett’s article on our Collingwood Warehouse refurbishment is now available from the MEDIA page.