<
https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2024/feb/11/art-deco-density-what-we-learned-from-australias-first-apartment-boom>
"Almost 100 years ago Sydney was in dire peril from “the ravages of barbarians”
– or so the newspaper reports would have had you believe.
The perceived danger was one that echoes the current debate raging over
density, as Australia’s capital cities struggle to reconcile competing demands
for affordable housing and the preservation of heritage.
“Flats rear their heads on some of [Sydney’s] noblest headlands,” Brisbane’s
Courier reported in 1929. “They are invading suburbs which for years have
been the pride of peaceful home-lovers, where the happy laughter of children
has resounded in the streets.”
That year, Woollahra council proposed to ban the building of flats in the
suburb of Vaucluse. In a letter to the
Sydney Morning Herald, the renowned
war historian Charles Bean warned that the sprouting of “mushroom flats” in the
area was a “danger to our future citizens”, forcing children to play on the
streets and posing a risk to national welfare.
Now those same areas in Sydney’s inner city and eastern suburbs, and their
counterparts in Melbourne and elsewhere, boast some of the most desirable
apartments in Australia, built to high standards and prized for their art deco
aesthetic.
Today’s housing debate may be couched in different terms, but Australia’s first
apartment boom suggests that opponents of rapid change in housing stock should
tread carefully before making doom-laden prophecies."
Cheers,
*** Xanni ***
--
mailto:xanni@xanadu.net Andrew Pam
http://xanadu.com.au/ Chief Scientist, Xanadu
https://glasswings.com.au/ Partner, Glass Wings
https://sericyb.com.au/ Manager, Serious Cybernetics
