Bookshelf Reading
A reading list that captures Australian design, from breeze blocks to suburban Baroque.
01 Australia Modern by Hannah Lewi and Philip Goad (Thames and Hudson, 2019)
There are some stories of Australian modernism that are ingrained in the country’s psyche: there’s the story of the Sydney Opera House and the plucking of Jørn Utzon’s competitionwinning design from a bin; there’s Walter Burley Griffin and Marion Mahony Griffin’s transformation of Australia’s distinctive landscape into a modern capital city; and, in the negative, there’s the story of The Australian Ugliness, so witheringly told by Robin Boyd in 1960. This impressive work by Hannah Lewi and Philip Goad places these pivotal stories within the broader context of a design and architecture movement that shaped modern Australia. Australia Modern features one hundred key works of modernism from 1925 to 1975, ranging from government-led hospital and public housing projects to the houses of the Small Homes Service. Featuring a wide selection of iconic and influential modernist homes, including Best Overend’s Cairo Flats (1935–36), the Harry and Penelope Seidler House at Killara (1966–67) and Ian McKay’s Lobster Bay House (1971–72), this book constitutes an admirable retelling of the story of Australian modernism. 02 Suburban Baroque by David Wadelton (M.33, 2019)
In a similar vein to a number of recently published photography books, such as Warren Kirk’s Suburbia (see Houses 125), this book seeks to mythologize and celebrate a specific type of suburban Melbourne living that is slowly fading into the margins. Photographer David Wadelton, who has been documenting Melbourne’s inner-north since 1975, explains: “Lately, my attention has turned to the vanishing mid-century suburban interiors of the formerly workingclass northern areas that were the destination of choice for many post-war immigrants from Europe. The once-ubiquitous terrazzo, balustrades, marble columns and lions and other manifestations of pride and nostalgia for their homelands have become increasingly rare as the years pass, generations change, and gentrification takes place.” The photos here are humourous, poignant and beautiful. Located in suburbs from Brunswick to Sunshine, the interiors depicted range from the grand to the simple, but all tell a story. As photography historian Patrick Pound writes in an accompanying essay, “Some rooms are full, some are empty. All rooms are full of information and meaning and all of these rooms are interesting.” 03 The Breeze Block Book edited by Sam Marshall and Maitiú Ward
(Uro Publications, 2019)
The humble breeze block has throughout its history been both loved and loathed by architects and homeowners alike. As this engaging book details, the breeze block came of age when modernists were rejecting decoration and craftsmanship in favour of the functional.
So while DIY builders and homeowners embraced them, many architects “detested” breeze blocks and their sometimes kitsch patterns. As this distinctive building block has come in and out of fashion, however, architects have come to appreciate the innate qualities of breeze blocks – particularly, their usefulness in tempering environmental conditions. The Breeze Block Book includes architectural projects from the mid-twentieth century to today that have used breeze blocks to masterful effect. Among them are Edward Durrell Stone’s 1956 Town House (New York),
Iwan Iwanoff’s 1976 Marsala House (Perth) and Studio Prineas’s 2016 Breeze Block House (Sydney). Coeditor and Sydney architect
Sam Marshall says he has “an obsession with breeze bocks” and their “endless possibilities and patterns”. This book should help spread that obsession. 04 Courtyard Living: Contemporary Houses of the Asia-Pacific by Charmaine Chan (Thames and Hudson, 2019)
A cursory flick through recent issues of Houses magazine will reveal a diverse collection of homes arranged around courtyards. This housing type is having a moment, and this book by design journalist Charmaine Chan offers a welcome snapshot of some of the best examples of courtyard living across the Asia-Pacific. Chan has personal experience with courtyards, having commissioned her own courtyard house, in Sydney, designed by
Matt Elkan Architect. In this book she offers a refreshingly light and honest appraisal of the typology and its ongoing appeal. Describing Richard Kirk Architect’s Bramston Residence in Brisbane, she says that the central courtyard allows for “reciprocity, between the building and its landscape” while also saving the owners a lifetime of leaf-litter clean-up. In her review of Saigon House by a21 Studio, she explains how an internal courtyard with a “circus safety net” play area suspended above appealed first to the clients’ children, then the clients. And discussing her own home, she writes about how the “brave” move to carve out two inward-looking sanctuaries turned an otherwise simple design into “something unexpected.”