Issue No. 215 October-November, 1970 ville, designed by Lund, Hutton, Newell Paulsen Pty. Ltd., Townsville architects (See C-S No. 209, April '70) received this award. The Commercial category saw a winner in Stephenson & Turner's T. & G. Building in Brisbane (See C-S No. 199, May '69). ¶ Peter Blake successfully and entertainingly delivered the second Melbourne Architectural Papers Oration in October, to a large audience. He speculated on the term "oration", hoping it did not mean a speech at the funeral of architecture. His aims were to talk about some of the new forces and attitudes that have emerged in the last 25 years which he illustrated having as much luck with the projector as J. M. Richards did last year. His main themes were Pop, technology and the unfinished, open-ended society. Blake believes the first architect to understand pop is Robert Venturi who follows the existentialist view that the environment around one is to be accepted and not considered degenerate and one improves it if possible rather than imposing an aesthetic ideal. Venturi talks of buildings being decorated sheds and loves the "dumb" and the "boring" building that happened and does not draw attention to itself by its excited or imposing form. It's a matter of the designer "learning to love the status quo", the quality of life expressed in Nixon's silent majority — not a high or the low style but the Mid-style which Venturi seeks to progress. Venturi is aware of and loves facadism found in say the Western pioneer towns and the flat pierced front appears in many of his designs. Venturi's atti- tude is: the building is just there and forget it. The design is unpretentious with no allusions to signifi- cance or to one ideal, but carefully considered and worked over though it is. On the issue of technology Photo: Richard Edwin Stringer being a force in latter day architecture, Blake stressed This fountain was designed by the Assistant U. Archi- the technology of services. Mies expressed structure tect K. S. Crump with Prof. G. H. McKay, professor in the habitat which was a realisation of the structural of civil engineering and N. Bailey, mechanical engi- aesthetic of bridges etc. in the 19th C. The 20th C. neer, for the lake at the U of Queensland. An attempt engineer is involved in producing the megalithic ser- was made to achieve a height and width of water vice system programme construction, seagoing oil rigs movement, thrusting about 70 feet up (about 21 metres) etc. which is having its impact on proposals for and spreading about 50 feet (about 15 metres), which habitat e.g. the Archigram and Metabolist schemes would be in scale with the lake and its surroundings. for megalopolis. Lou Kahn with the Med labs. in In this aim the fountain seems successful. The whims Philadelphia, expressed the service cores and not the of wind play the infinite variety of patterns of moving structure where Mies would have centred the services water. Submerged pumps force the jets of water inside the outer perimeter of symbolic structure. through copper sheathed P.V.C. pipes set at heights Blake enthused about the new windowless research ranging from 4 feet (about 1 metre) and 12 feet (about lab. at Cornell U. formed in the sentiments of Kahn 4 metres). When not operating the columns appear where the fortress-like indented reinforced concrete as simple man-made elements like piers. At night structure is "covered in brick sauce". This is "archi- the vertical jets are lit to their full height by incan- tecture out of plumbing". Illustrating the mobile descent lights within each column and the horizontal multi-storey structures and the giant vehicle assembly jets lit by submerged fixtures. Brisbane architects building at Cape Kennedy, in which a microcosmic are considering the fountain the best in that city. storm cloud might form and drop rain, he remarked If The Queensland Chapter of the R.A.I.A. has just had that only babies and architects are still building out its turn at presenting awards by architects for archi- of mud. Rather unsatisfactorily the lecture rounded tects. The Bronze Medal was for Malleys Limited off with comments and illustrations on buildings administration block at Wooloongabba designed by which complied with the needs of a growing population Prangley & Crofts (See C-S No. 207, Feb. '70). Six rather than with the nature of the present day social other buildings in different categories received cita- condition of perpetual change which the third theme tions of merit. The prized house was the Carter resi- promised. Illustrating the Lincoln Centre and John dence in Toowong, designed by P. J. Moroney. The Andrew's Scarborough College, he said of the first that ecclesiastical citation was awarded for St. Mark's it was a typical 16th C development terminating Catholic Church, Inala, designed by Cullen, Fagg, Hargraves, Mooney & Cullen. In the Institution category, eccentrically a New York vista and of the second its the community building at the Q. Inst. of Tech. de- greatest virtue was its extendable internal linear signed by the State Works Department with design street giving access to more spaces of the same kind and documentation work by Hayes and Scott was when needed. Blake politely brought his audience up merited. In the Scientific building class the Agricul- to date on the assumption that no-one was. ture and Entomology building at U. of Q. designed If Architect G. J. Watt has been awarded the R.A.I.A. by James Birrell & Partners was cited (See C-S No. 203, Victorian Chapter's inaugural $2,000 Kingsley Anketell Sept. '69). In the Urban section Lowths Hotel, Towns- Henderson scholarship. If Neville Quarry, the immediate past editor of C-S, has been appointed Professor of Architecture at the Papua New Guinea Institute of Technology in Lae. Dr. Balwant Saini, another former editor of C-S, and newly appointed reader at the U. of Melbourne, has been appointed to the Council of the P.N.G.I.T. Photos: Laurie Richards The atmosphere of the friendly residential country Photos: Harry Sowden pub is retained in this reconstruction of the Victoria Hotel at Elmore in Victoria. The outward expression The waterfront site to the Myers House, Mosman, of the rural sloping roof is retained internally by N.S.W., is only 48 feet wide, (about 14.5 metres) and timber lining the upper side of the rafters substanti- restricted by building alignments to a cul-de-sac street ating cosy informal clerestoried spaces. All walls have and water line. There are 4 bedrooms, a study, living, been constructed primarily from hand made bricks dining and kitchen/family rooms and a boatshed under from the original 1873 structure (it's a pity they had the house totalling 35 squares (about 325 square to be bagged and painted white). For 603.5 square metres). The design makes no attempt to look out from metres (65 squares) the cost was $150,000 including the restricted side elevations but is heavily fractured air-conditioning, carpets and all furniture. Architect: in plan and section to gain see-through glimpses of James Sadler of Carlton and United Breweries Ltd. the water view from almost every room. The steep Engineers: Kinnaird Hill, de Rohan and Young. Land- slope of the site is echoed in the roof planes. A series scape consultant: Robert K. Skerritt. Builders: Warren of small courtyards lead from all rooms and, at the & MacMahon. lowest level, a timber deck opens the view to 180 ¶ Three major motor hotels (what's happened to the degrees. The bricks were obtained by the client prior term "motel"?) worth altogether nearly $10 million will to architect engagement and are very old sandstocks be built by Mainline Constructions Pty. Ltd. One is a from Liverpool. Their orange and red hues are carried $1 million 64 suite building of 7 storeys at Artarmon through other materials with Western Red Cedar win- dows and boarding, terra cotta tile floors and roof. on the Pacific Highway, N.S.W. Architects: Frank Kolos Architects: Ancher, Mortlock, Murray & Woolley Pty. and J. H. Bryant. An 81 suite $1.3 million nine-storeyed Ltd. (Partner in charge: Ken Woolley). The house em- structure is scheduled for completion in 1971 in New- bodies the aspirations and sentiments evident in Syd castle. Architects: Laurie & Heath. Construction of the Ancher's earlier domestic designs for picturesque $7.5 million Convention Hotel overlooking Canberra's identification with bush suburban site, using what Lake Burley Griffin begins this year with 215 suites in were once inexpensive materials. a 16-storey tower block. Architects: Peddle Thorp & Walker. ¶ A Mentone, Vic., building firm — Kurth Bros. Pty. Ltd. — has been commissioned by the Sultan of ¶ Construction on a new $500,000 hotel is under way Muscat to prefabricate a $75,000 motel for his Arabian in Belconnen, A.C.T., the first pub in the suburb. Archi- desert kingdom. tects: Kevin J. Curtain and Partners of Sydney. for all time. 7. The Melbourne City Council, represent- ing the people of Melbourne, and working in the community interest, has the final say on how the Civic Square and associated buildings will look — nobody else. 8. The eastern boundary of the square has a LOW building along it which will not exceed the height of the Town Hall and St. Paul's Cathedral. The other three sides front streets. (Observe the illustration — Ed.). 9. The Council will receive $601,000 in rent, plus rates, which could add up to $1,000,000 a year for every one of the next 94 years — money which can be applied to community needs.