The urban design theorist and historian Alexander D’Hooghe has argued that Josep Luis Sert’s idea of the core is a key to understanding the “abandoned foundations of the late modern project” in architecture and urbanism. “The Core”, D’Hooghe argues, “is a series of precisely circumscribed figures of publicness in the background of a (dis)urbanizing, privatized...

This paper explores Ruth and Maurie Crow’s contribution to Melbourne’s strategic planning history. It focuses on the 1960s and 70s, when deliberation over future growth patterns for Melbourne dominated urban planning discussion. During this period, multiple models of urban expansion were considered by the Melbourne Metropolitan Board of Works, the Town and Country Planning Board...

In 1899, 72 women enrolled at the Burnley School of Horticulture, Melbourne to study part-time a ‘Certificate of Competency in Horticulture’. This was a ground-breaking moment for women wishing to work in horticulture, as Burnley was the only educational institution in Australia at the time providing horticultural instruction. Australia looked to Great Britain for direction...

The city of Melbourne is one significantly shaped by the activities of private land developers, who undertook the subdivision, planning, and sale of residential estates which now comprise the bulk of extant suburbs. A number of these estates were highly speculative in nature, reflecting renewed public interest in real estate following each of the two...

Urban agriculture has a long history entwined with place creation, personal expression and activism (Steel, 2008; Cohen, 2012). Despite regulatory and design interventions that attempt to hinder urban agriculture activities, communities continue to use it as a platform for exploration, experimentation and demonstration. What is revealing about the new food practices which have emerged in...