voussoirs: BRADFIELD CITY - HOW MIGHT ONE BEST DWELL?

Saturday, 21 February 2026

BRADFIELD CITY - HOW MIGHT ONE BEST DWELL?

There are not too many opportunities to design a new city these days, but when such an occasion arises, one might hope that the issues that complicate and frustrate city living in today’s dense settlements might be attended to rather than having all of the problematical clichés of these places reproduced in the new plans. Alas, the planned new city currently referred to oddly as Bradfield City seems to be an exercise in traditional planning, incorporating every commonplace notion of this profession’s catalogue rather than any rethinking of city dwelling. Just as smaller residential developments are blocked out in the way that all our suburbs are presently subdivided, this city has accumulated its own blocking system as the idea.

The name itself is a worry. As well as being self-referential in its title, somewhat like having a car branded as a Toyota Prius Car; or a book titled as The Book of Jokes Book, the naming has all of the qualities of a brand, something descriptively mundane like Greenacres. There is a strange self-consciousness assertiveness about this title that seems as though it might be better used in a Hollywood movie; or does one say Netflix these days? One can imagine the scripted Yankee drawl saying, “I’m aff ta Bradfield City ta hun ‘m doownn,” with a fake determination as the cameras roll on, off into the visual drama of highway traffic to illustrate the words.

“I’m aff ta Bradfield City ta hun ‘m doownn."

Does this ‘sense of the movies’ reference come from the design team? The texts – see: Plans unveiled for Australia’s first new city in over 100 years

https://www.dezeen.com/2026/02/11/plans-unveiled-australias-first-new-city-100-years/ . . . and Bradfield City Master Plan

https://www.nsw.gov.au/about-nsw/precinct-development/delivering-bradfield-city-centre/master-plan , explains that Bradfield City has been designed by the US firm SOM and the Australian architects Hassell:

American studio SOM and Australian studio Hassell have revealed plans for Bradfield City, a new, 114-hectare city in western Sydney, which is set to include 10,000 homes, a university campus and a two-hectare park.

Yet again we have that Aussie cringe where local architects have to team up with an overseas architectural firm in order to be considered for any project of any size in this country, as if the local architects might not be competent enough, or carry the required stature or reputation. Whose local standing can beat that of any import? – cringe! Given the events in the world these days, one might wonder why anyone might team up with a US firm. Could pressure be bought to bear to have the city named after the person who claims to be the world leader and constantly seeks naming rights over nearly everything and anything that might be accessible to such indulgent fantasies? Goodness, what with the strategies that seem to be like blackmail that are used as coercion in such cases, anything might be possible here.

Bradfield City.

Western Sydney International Airport.

Being Planned to be located beside the recently-completed Western Sydney International Airport, does not seem to be a good start for any city. Usually international airports are distanced from cities rather than having cities designed to be beside such noisy transport nodes. Given this, one wonders; what are the main strategies for designing this city? Does one shape it around flight paths? Looking at all of the published illustrations that have been provided by SOM - The renders are courtesy of SOM – (what has Hassells input been?) – one sees a collection of what might be AI illustrations of typical portions of cites that we know today, showing places that could be anywhere, with a bit more stylish green being enjoyed by designer people. The collection of rendered buildings seems to only illustrate the usual clutter of ad hoc, random development that our ad hoc, random planning has allowed to generate; there is not one glimpse of any road or vehicle to be seen. Yet modern cities use transport roots as their backbone; their scaffold; their arteries and veins. The most isolated, private place is linked into this transport connectivity that has its own necessities and dominating demands. How is this situation going to be managed in Bradfield City? We just do not seem to be being told anything but that the city will be good – liveable is the usual word these days, with awards being delved out for ‘the most liveable city’ - Smart technologies included throughout to enhance liveability.

How is dwelling going to be managed side by side with the chaos of traffic as we know it in every city today? We cannot ignore this shambles; or should not, as it shapes every action and activity in city lives. Is this existing city chaos merely going to be reproduced and expanded in this new centre? The illustrations all show lovely pedestrian experiences, but where are the cars? How are they managed? Are they all just out of frame?

Bradfield City.

Canberra.

The planning illustrates a variety of typical notions that one can see in designed cities. There are ‘Camillo Sitte’ type intersections that make little sense for traffic, other than that of Medieval pedestrians; and there is the stylised geometric layout that one sees in Canberra with main axes and a concentric octagonal arrangement of pieces. What happens to vehicular flows? Does one think about the noise; the intersections; the pollution when mapping out these diagrams? The success of the city will depend on how the options for both cars and people are intertwined so that both can operate effectively and efficiently, which, in the case of the pedestrian, includes the well-being of citizens; their calm contentment.

Camillo Sitte.

We need better than this; we need plans with vision, that engage hope fruitfully and accommodate it with a natural ease; plans that can be enforced to give places that can truly enrich rather than ones that we might feel relaxed and comfortable with, as we find ourselves happily agreeing with the presentation of the familiar. We need better than AI’s visual slop, for this is what the place looks like now: self-assured planning images that aim to sell the idea, not define any real outcome. We need clarity, not muddled ‘perhaps’ and ‘maybes’ that mislead with broad generalities that miss the very heart of what a city might be – a place for people to live in and thrive.

Streets are the framework of the modern city, forming its life-giving thoroughfares and pathways that connect everything on a hierarchy of use, ranging from the motorway to the lane. They are the main public places of the city. Approach any city by vehicle and one experiences that change from highway to city transition, that fades into the maze of inner city streets and lanes. One’s full attention is given to the flow through these zones irrespective of the context, be it a new suburban area or an ancient cathedral city. The challenge is the same; to find how to get to the destination; and when one finally achieves this, the next challenge is where to park, a proposition that might only restart the challenge of directions. The core experience of place is the driving, the directions, the seeking of the destination and a place to park. Yet we see nothing of any vehicle in this plan. Even arriving in a city by plane or train, one immediately seeks access to its transport system, be this public transport or private vehicles. One connects with the arteries that link to the finer connectivity until one gets to where one desires to be via the veins.

Planning a city needs to manage the experience of place, not only as a lovely green and pleasant area, but also as the hustle and bustle of traffic, and the management of vehicular accommodation. There is some general talk of the concept of a ten minute city, where everything is only a ten minute away from a residence, but how might this plan out? What happens when one walks out from one’s front door? How is one engaged with place that is a segment of the city? New cities should grasp the nettle and do more than reproduce our current failures, no matter how stylish or green these visions might be able to be made. The question needs to be entertained: how might one best dwell in a city?

It is sad to read that First Nations cultural values [will be] integrated into planting, materials, art, lighting, signage, and language. No doubt everyone involved will recite the mantra about recognition of country etc. – see: https://voussoirs.blogspot.com/2024/06/country-outside-inside-place.html – but to have cultural values involved in this simplistic, trite way, perhaps as street names and decorative pieces, only seriously devalues the subtlety and richness in this reference, turning it into a decorative indulgence, a part of the Public art featured throughout – box ticked.

The list continues with just about every other cliché that can be envisaged – see below. It is a real concern: Bradfield City will prioritise design excellence, unique character, rich culture, and seamless connectivity. The descriptions remind one of a typical planning assessment for any development, full of motherhood statements relying on sounding good, impressive, with no real plan for implementation or enforcement, with the only ambition being the acceptance/approval of the plan. We need much better than this shallow blurb and pattern-making that tries so hard to tell everyone that it will embody everything anyone can think of - to be an "inclusive and climate-resilient" city shaped by indigenous connections to Country – a term used by First Nations peoples to refer to the lands, waters and skies.

. . . shaped by indigenous connections to Country.

'The elephant in the room.'

https://www.nsw.gov.au/about-nsw/precinct-development/delivering-bradfield-city-centre/master-plan

Bradfield City Master Plan

Discover the vision for Bradfield City with our Master Plan, guiding sustainable growth, innovation, and vibrant community development.

About the Master Plan

The Master Plan provides a framework for Bradfield City's growth into a vibrant, 24-hour, 7-day hub of culture, creativity, and innovation within a parkland setting.

Bradfield City - Illustrative Master Plan

Key features

Bradfield City will prioritise design excellence, unique character, rich culture, and seamless connectivity. The Bradfield Centre Master Plan outlines these key elements.

Design

We’re embedding world-class technology, innovative buildings, and vibrant landscapes to create a city that thrives on design excellence.

Our commitment to sustainability and designing with Country supports bold goals for net zero emissions, climate resilience, energy and water efficiency, and the use of sustainable materials. Green spaces will feature across the city, including on the ground, walls, and rooftops.

By integrating cutting-edge technology, we’re building smarter solutions that help people, businesses, and the environment succeed together.

2 million square metres of gross floor area available for development.
Space for over 80 buildings exceeding 40 metres (15 storeys and above).
Circular economy principles supported by the design.
80% green roof coverage or bio-solar systems to combat urban heat.
Climate-resilient features designed to maximise energy efficiency and regulate temperatures.
First Nations cultural values integrated into planting, materials, art, lighting, signage, and language.
Smart technologies included throughout to enhance liveability.

Character

Bradfield City will offer more than 30% public open space, major event and cultural areas, and a wide range of retail and dining options. It’s designed as a place to live, work, gather, play, and stay.

Located next to the Western Sydney International Airport, the city will also be a hub for tourism and entertainment, attracting visitors from near and far.

We’re fostering new industries, jobs, and skills through a world-class research and education ecosystem, connected to global expertise and opportunities.

36 hectares of open space, waterways and playgrounds.
2-hectare Central Park.
2.2 km Green Loop prioritising First Nations culture throughout the city.
Average 40% tree canopy cover for a green cool city.
Major event and dedicated cultural spaces.
Public art featured throughout.

Movement and connectivity

A highly accessible and connected city for everyone.

Green pedestrian pathways and dedicated cycling lanes will create a people-first network across the city.

Major bus, road, and metro interchanges at the city’s centre will link residents, workers, and visitors to Greater Sydney and the world via the new Western Sydney International (WSI) Airport.

Pedestrian-friendly design, with most areas accessible within a 5-minute walk from the Metro Station.
5-minute metro connection to the WSI Airport.
Electric Vehicle (EV) charging stations, designed to support future transport needs.
17.8 km of bike trails and lanes for easy and sustainable travel.

https://www.dezeen.com/2026/02/11/plans-unveiled-australias-first-new-city-100-years/

Plans unveiled for Australia's first new city in 100 years

American studio SOM and Australian studio Hassell have revealed plans for Bradfield City, a new, 114-hectare city in western Sydney, which is set to include 10,000 homes, a university campus and a two-hectare park.

Planned to be located beside the recently-completed Western Sydney International Airport, the Bradfield City masterplan proposes an urban landscape roughly 50 kilometres west of Sydney's central business district, conceptualised as "Sydney's new urban heart".

The masterplan forms one of Australia's largest urban development projects and, once complete, will be the country's first major city built in over a century, according to SOM.

Key aspects of the development will include the creation of 10,000 new homes, a 2.2-kilometre Green Loop park, a two-hectare Central Park and four major civic centres.

SOM and Hassell designed the proposal in collaboration with cultural design partners Djinjama and COLA Studio to be an "inclusive and climate-resilient" city shaped by indigenous connections to Country – a term used by First Nations peoples to refer to the lands, waters and skies.

"To design a new city is both a rare opportunity and a profound responsibility," senior associate principal at SOM Michael Powell said.

"Bradfield City is a chance to shape a vision with Country and community, embedding resilience, sustainability, and innovation into every layer of the city."

At the centre of the development, the First Land Release, also known as Superlot 1, will encompass a 5.7-hectare site described by SOM as Bradfield City's "civic heart".

This central area will be the proposal's first stage and is set to contain 1,400 homes alongside a university campus, offices, retail space, a hotel and public space.

Renders of the First Land Release depict a series of high-rise blocks situated along tree-lined streets and interspersed with expansive green areas.

Complementing the city's green areas, a timber pavilion will shelter a gathering space for the community beneath an interlocking timber structure and woven canopy.

According to SOM, this pavilion design draws on the Aboriginal principle of "enoughness" or taking only what is needed, with the studios opting for low-carbon and high-performance materials.

Other sustainability strategies include the use of passive design solutions, green roofs and solar panels throughout the city's infrastructure to improve their environmental performance.

"We set out to create a precinct where nature and urban life are intertwined, ensuring Bradfield City feels welcoming, sustainable and uniquely of its place," principal at Hassell Kevin Lloyd said.

The Bradfield City development is being developed by developer Plenary and has been backed by more than $1 billion in Australian public investment. Its first stage of development is planned to roll out over the next five years.

The renders are courtesy of SOM.

The void: art imitating life - Country.

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ON GARDENING

I am strongly of the opinion that the possession of a quantity of plants, however good the plants may be themselves and however ample their number, does not make a garden; it only makes a collection. Having got the plants, the great thing is to use them with careful selection and definite intention. Merely having them, or having them planted unassorted in garden spaces, is only like having a box of paints from the best colourman, or, to go one step further, it is like having portions of these paints set out upon a palette. This does not constitute a picture; and it seems to me that the duty we owe our gardens and to our own bettering in our gardens is so to use plants that they shall form beautiful pictures; that, while delighting our eyes, they should be always training those eyes to a more exulted criticism; to a state of mind and artistic conscience that will not tolerate bad or careless combination or any sort of misuse of plants, but in which it becomes a point of honour to be always striving for the best. Gertrude Jekyll Colour in the Flower Garden Mitchell Beazley London 1998 – Introduction (first published 1908)

MORE IS LESS

Significantly, in the era of the ‘information revolution’, the same process is now affecting disinformation: whereas in the past it was lack of information and censorship which characterized the denial of democracy by the totalitarian state, the opposite is now the case. Disinformation is achieved by flooding TV viewers with information, with apparently contradictory data. The truth of the facts is censured by over-information, as we have seen from the press and television discussing the Balkans. The globalitarian state, built out of economic-strategic alliances, is no longer old ‘Anastasia’ with her scissors: it is Babel. Now more is less. And in some cases, less than nothing. Deliberate manipulation and unintentional accidents have become indistinguishable.

Paul Virilio Strategy of Deception Verso 2007 p.48

(first published Editions Galilee 1999)

‘That which precedes the event is not necessarily its cause,’ claims the wisdom of the ancients. p.76

As Negroponte has rightly remarked, with the ‘liberation of information’ on the Web, what is most lacking is meaning or, in other words, a context into which Internet users could put the facts and hence distinguish truth from falsehood. On the Web, where, as everyone knows, the terrorist temptation is constant and where depredations of hackers are committed with impunity in a strange state of legal indeterminacy, the difference between (true) information and (false) deception fades a little more each day. In entering the looking-glass worlds of television and home computers, we are in the end left in the position of Kinglake’s old ‘English soldiery’. As they saw it,

insofar as the battlefield presented itself to the bare eyesight of men, it had no entirety, no length, no breadth, no size, no shape and was made up of nothing . . . In such conditions, each separate gathering . . . went on fighting its own little battle in happy and advantageous ignorance of the general state of the action; nay, even very often in ignorance of the fact that any great conflict was raging.

As Albert Camus asserted: ‘When we are all guilty, that will be true democracy.’ p.78

ENCOUNTERING CONRAD

Ryszard Kapuściński The Other Verso London 2018, p. 92

At the end of his book, Kapuściński asks whether, in our encounters with others in the future:

Will we jointly wish to refer to what – as Conrad puts it - ‘speaks to our capacity for delight and wonder, to the sense of mystery surrounding our lives; to our sense of pity, and beauty, and pain; to the latent feeling of fellowship with all creation – and to the subtle but invincible conviction of solidarity that knits together the loneliness of innumerable hearts: to the solidarity of dreams, in joy, in sorrow, in aspirations, in illusions, in hope, in fear, which binds men to each other, which binds together all humanity – the dead to the living and the living to the unborn.’?*

* J. Conrad, Preface to The Nigger of the ‘Narcissus’: A Tale of the Sea, New York: W.W.Norton, 1979.

Architecture stands in between of all of these circumstances of encounter, but how does it explain itself beyond being a bespoke ‘grand design’ of a potential genius?

ON THE CULTURE OF OTHERS

Herodotus . . . wanted to know them because he understood that to know ourselves we have to know Others, who act as a mirror in which we see ourselves reflected; he knew that to understand ourselves better we have to understand Others, to compare ourselves with them, to measure ourselves against them. As a citizen of the world, he did not believe that we should isolate ourselves from Others, or slam the gates in their faces. Xenophobia, Herodotus implied, is a sickness of people who are scared, suffering an inferiority complex, terrified by the prospect of seeing themselves in the mirror of the culture of Others.

Ryszard Kapuściński The Other Verso London 2018, p. 19

CLEVER PEOPLE SELF-DOUBT

I last met him when Philomena came out back in 2013. Back then, Coogan was a bracing, combative interviewee. He saw every question as a potential ambush and moved to thwart any perceived journalistic angle. Today, though, he seems more comfortable with the process, more at ease with himself. It used to be that he felt he always had to have his guard up. Now he accepts that he can sometimes afford to let it drop. He’s middle aged and a mass of insecurity and contradictions. He suspects that, on balance, that’s not such a terrible thing to be.

“And actually I think acknowledging your own fallibility makes you a better artist and a better person,” he says in a rush. “It’s fairly obvious to me that the real wisdom lies in seeing people’s failings and trying to understand them. Because the alternative is that very childlike, Donald Trump thing of believing that admitting any weakness is fatal. What was it Bukowski said? All the clever people are full of self-doubt and all the stupid people are very confident. That’s the era we’re living in now. That’s the era I don’t want to be a part of. So all you can do is try to go about things differently. Do interesting work and don’t be a cunt.”

Coogan gulps for breath. His eyes widen and then he rocks with laughter. “There you go, that’s my big artistic statement,” he says. “Do interesting work and don’t be a cunt. Took me the best part of an hour. Got there in the end.”

https://www.theguardian.com/film/2019/jan/04/steve-coogan-interview-stan-and-ollie

HILLS

The hills bespeak a healing power and closeness to unseen help now lost in the security of modern welfare. Those who befriend the silent peaks in a lifetime's work know well their embracing strength. (p.91)

For only once is it given to man to lie in the arms of the eternal forces which give all matter form. (p.98)

Iain R Thomson Isolation Shepherd Birlinn, Edinburgh, 2007

I will lift up mine eyes unto the hills, from whence cometh my help.

My help cometh from the Lord, which made heaven and earth.

Psalm 121 King James Version (KJV)

SPAN

17 August 2012

This blog began as a co-operative concept. While the idea and the stimulus was generated through discussion, the blog has turned out to be an individual enterprise. SPAN stands for ‘Spence and’ in the context of others. As a word, it fitted in nicely with the idea of voussoirs - parts and pieces, complete with keystones, that could ‘span’ the gaps in understanding and communication. The word SPAN also allowed for a shared input into a blog.

Spence Jamieson is an architect and the author of these articles. The blogs show the scope of his interests.

THE IDEA

chapters and verses as architectural commentary:

the wedge to isolate, array and shape ideas; the keystone to highlight core, supporting issues. voussoirs is a concept to start an architectural discussion to span the large gap in the debate on things architectural; a bridging of the void in architectural issues by exploring considered bits and pieces. The state of the profession today is highlighted by silence and self. It is introvert and protective. Educational centres remain isolated within their own constructs, being run primarily as businesses. They put very little back into the community. They indulge themselves in their own interests and exclude contrary and different ideas and ideals. They constantly avoid any challenge on concepts or strategies that might change the plotted course. Rarely does comment ever come from this academic world into the public or any arena. Very few publications help direct the public interest. Rarely do newspapers grasp the issues and explore them. One aspect may be given space in the popular press, but architectural debates and concerns are rarely given attention. The professional institutes are doing much the same as the educational institutions. Private practice is doing likewise, offering, if anything, only its own pushy propaganda to the public. Yet there is a discussion and debate in these silences that needs a larger and more open platform. Discussion is alive and well amongst a few in at least one curry house, but the debate needs to be a broadened. voussoirs is the place for this discussion. It is a site for ideas, comment, articles, and critiques on things architectural and associated issues. It is here that matters can be aired and ideas discussed and debated without fear of the neglect and disdain that institutions and private groups and publishers give to open speaking and differing ideas.

There can be no true understanding of any idea if discussion and debate are curtailed in favour of a preferred position.

ON COMMUNICATION

. . . there has been a growing feeling of concern to solve what is now commonly called “the problem of communication.” But if one observes efforts to solve this problem, he will notice that different groups who are trying to do this are not actually able to listen to each other. As a result, the very attempt to improve communication leads frequently to yet more confusion, and the consequent sense of frustration inclines people ever further toward aggression and violence, rather than toward mutual understanding and trust.

David Bohm On Dialogue Routledge, Oxon, 1996 (2004) p.2

ON ART & METHOD

Even in relationships with inanimate objects and with nature in general, something very like communication is involved. Consider, for example, the work of an artist. Can it be properly said that the artist is expressing himself, i.e., literally “pushing outward” something that is already formed inside him? Such a description is not in fact generally accurate or adequate. Rather, what usually happens is that the first thing the artist does is only similar in certain ways to what he may have in mind. As in a conversation between two people, he sees the similarity and the difference, and from this perception something further emerges in his next action. Thus, something new is continually created that is common to the artist and the material on which he is working.

David Bohm On Dialogue Routledge, Oxon, 1996 (2004) p.4

THE NECESSITY OF THE INCOMPLETE

The early 50's and 60's is a period that is gaining interest in architectural ideas. Perhaps this is why Princeton chose to republish The Tao of Architecture. It is a beautiful little book that discusses the implications of traditional wisdom in architecture. Given the astonishing lack of direction in current architectural theory, the publication is very timely.

Amos Ih Tiao Chang, The Tao of Architecture, Princeton University Press, Princeton, 1956, reprinted 2017.

p.26

Laotzu's idea of formation is heavily concerned with emptiness or non-existence. To him who regards nothing as persistent, what is essentially important in things is the possibility of becoming something, not the opportunity of remaining as something confronting deterioration. Consequently, meaningful incompletion is taken as the most desirable state of tangible being.

p.22

. . . the full meaning of existence is beyond the power of any manifestation. What appears tangible, architectural or natural, is only a means to suggest that which is lacking in appearance and existing in man's intangible understanding and aesthetic feeling.

LIVING IN IMPERMANENCE

Maybe it is a good thing for us to keep a few dreams of a house that we shall live in later, always later, so much later, in fact, that we shall not have time to achieve it. For a house that was final, one that stood in symmetrical relation to the house we were born in, would lead to thoughts – serious, sad thoughts – and not to dreams. It is better to live in a state of impermanence than in one of finality.

Gaston Bachelard The Poetics of Space

see: THE NECESSITY OF THE INCOMPLETE in the sidebar

THE REAL AND THE IMAGINARY

I prefer, by far, real islands to imaginary islands, just as I prefer prime documents to novelistic remakes. That's because the real is richer than the imagination. The real demands investigation and is an invitation to sensitive knowledge, whereas the imaginary is more often than not just a collection of stereotypes, a soup of clichés offering an infantile kind of satisfaction. Then, a relationship to the real and its resistance requires changes in thought, in ways of being, in ways of saying, it leads to a transformation of the self. Whereas imagination is nothing but compensation. There's even something horribly autistic about sitting in one spot and spinning out invention by the yard. How much more interesting an open and poetic process involving contemplation, study, movement, meditation and composition.

Kenneth White Across The Territories Travels from Orkney to Rangiroa Polygon Edinburgh 2004 p.86

VISION, CIVILIZATION & SPIRIT

The architect who combines in his being the powers of vision, of imagination, of intellect, of sympathy with human need and the power to interpret them in a language vernacular and time - - - is he who shall create poems in stone.

When you look on one of your contemporary 'good copies' of historical remains, ask yourself the question: Not what style, but what civilization is this building? And the absurdity, vulgarity, anachronism and solecism of the modern structure will be revealed to you in a most startling fashion.

It cannot for a moment be doubted that an art work to be alive, to awaken us to life, to inspire us sooner or later with its purpose, must indeed be animate with a soul, must have been breathed upon by the spirit and must breathe in turn that spirit.

Louis Sullivan

AN UNCHANGING PROFESSION

ARCHITECTURAL PRACTICE

. . . no one can relieve (the architect) from the need to rely on his own discretion, for that discretion is linked to a responsibility which belongs to no one but (the architect). It is the exercise of discretion hampered by considerations of cost, of risk, of exact justice, of conflicting interests, of uncertainty as to facts, of misunderstandings and of diverse individualities and dishonest or incapable agents, which is the chief care and preoccupation of architectural practice. To design a building, to draw and specify every part of it, and to direct its construction and see it completed with no other anxieties and dilemmas than belong to the exercise of those duties, is unknown.

H.B.Creswell The Honeywood Settlement Faber and Faber Limited London 1967 (fourth edition: first edition 1930 Architectural Press) p.128

MENDING WALL

Something there is that doesn't love a wall,
That sends the frozen-ground-swell under it,
And spills the upper boulders in the sun,
And makes gaps even two can pass abreast.
The work of hunters is another thing:
I have come after them and made repair
Where they have left not one stone on a stone,
But they would have the rabbit out of hiding,
To please the yelping dogs. The gaps I mean,
No one has seen them made or heard them made,
But at spring mending-time we find them there.
I let my neighbor know beyond the hill;
And on a day we meet to walk the line
And set the wall between us once again.
We keep the wall between us as we go.
To each the boulders that have fallen to each.
And some are loaves and some so nearly balls
We have to use a spell to make them balance:
'Stay where you are until our backs are turned!'
We wear our fingers rough with handling them.
Oh, just another kind of out-door game,
One on a side. It comes to little more:
There where it is we do not need the wall:
He is all pine and I am apple orchard.
My apple trees will never get across
And eat the cones under his pines, I tell him.
He only says, 'Good fences make good neighbors'.
Spring is the mischief in me, and I wonder
If I could put a notion in his head:
'Why do they make good neighbors? Isn't it
Where there are cows?
But here there are no cows.
Before I built a wall I'd ask to know
What I was walling in or walling out,
And to whom I was like to give offence.
Something there is that doesn't love a wall,
That wants it down.' I could say 'Elves' to him,
But it's not elves exactly, and I'd rather
He said it for himself. I see him there
Bringing a stone grasped firmly by the top
In each hand, like an old-stone savage armed.
He moves in darkness as it seems to me~
Not of woods only and the shade of trees.
He will not go behind his father's saying,
And he likes having thought of it so well
He says again, "Good fences make good neighbors."

Robert Frost

CATHEDRALS and SYMBOLISM

Everything is the symbolical representation of an idea. p.28

The same artists, who had to follow a strict rule when treating the history of God, could use all of their imagination when treating the ornamental: whence the blossoming of the grotesque and the original. p.38

In those days religion, drama, and art had the same aim and sought to provoke the same thoughts. They did not pretend to amuse the people; they endeavoured to teach them. p.51

This way of thinking and reasoning takes sometimes a very subtle turn. p.53

Hélène Fouré The French Cathedrals Their Symbolic Significance Bruce Humphries Inc. Publishers, Boston, 1931

THE COMPLIMENT & THE CRITIC 2

ON DEMOLISHING BUILDINGS

Nothing appears to me much more wonderful, than the remorseless way in which the educated ignorance, even of the present day, will sweep away an ancient monument, if its preservation be not absolutely consistent with immediate convenience or economy. Putting aside all antiquarian considerations, and all artistical ones, I wish that people would only consider the steps, and the weight of the following very simple argument. You allow that it is wrong to waste time, that is, your own time; but then it must be still more wrong to waste other people’s; for you have some right to your own time, but none to their’s. Well, then, if it is thus wrong to waste the time of the living, it must be still more wrong to waste the time of the dead; for the living can redeem their time, the dead cannot. But you waste the best of the time of the dead when you destroy the works they have left you; for those works they gave the best of their time, intending them for immortality.

John Ruskin Lectures on Architecture George Routledge & Sons Limited, London p.109

THE COMPLIMENT & THE CRITIC 1

How to avoid insult

But how much of nature have you in your Greek buildings? I will show you, taking for an example the best you have lately built; and, in doing so, I trust that nothing that I say will be thought to have any personal purpose, and that the architect of the building in question will forgive me; for it is just because it is a good example of the style that I think it more fair to use it for an example. If the building were a bad one of the kind, it would not be a fair instance; and I hope, therefore, that in speaking of the institution on the mound, just in progress, I shall be understood as meaning rather a compliment to its architect than otherwise. It is not his fault that we force him to build in the Greek manner.

John Ruskin Lectures on Architecture and Painting George Routledge & Sons Limited; New York: F.P.Dutton & CO - p.64-65

ON EDUCATION

'. . those who are responsible for giving instruction in the theory of architecture should be practising architects. The warning is necessary because, strange though it may seem, English schools of architecture to-day tend to be run by men who either do not practise at all, or whose practices are for them a very subsidiary spare-time occupation. Often a teaching appointment is a means by which a clever student avoids the humiliation of entering an office as a junior assistant, thus depriving himself of the only opportunity he will ever have of learning something of the practical side of his profession from the bottom upwards. There can be no doubt whatever that the teaching of theory has suffered severely as a result of this habit: and this leads me to the conclusion that no man should be permitted to teach until he is recognized by his Faculty as a Master of Theory and Practice. In other words, he should be not only a practising architect but also, what is unfortunately a much rarer specimen, a good architect.'

W.A. Eden, The Process of Architectural Tradition, Macmillian & Co. Ltd, London, 1942, p.p. 86-87

ETHICS

Thus Pugin laid the foundation stones of that strange system which dominates the nineteenth-century art criticism and is immortalised in the Seven Lamps of Architecture: the value of a building depends on the moral worth of its creator; and a building has a moral value independent of, and more important than, its esthetic value. We must not consider this emphasis on morality peculiarly Victorian. Whenever esthetic standards are lost, ethical standards rush in to fill the vacuum; for the interest in esthetics dwindles and vanishes, but the interest in ethics is eternal.

Kenneth Clark The Gothic Revival - An Essay in the History of Taste, (1^st edition Constable 1928); third edition John Murray 1962, reprinted 1974, p.149.

MODERNITY

The everyday is covered by a surface: that of modernity. News stories and the turbulent affectations of art, fashion, and event veil without ever eradicating the everyday blahs. Images, the cinema and television divert the everyday by at times offering up to its own spectacle, or sometimes the spectacle of the distinctly noneveryday; violence, death, catastrophe, the lives of kings and stars – those who we are led to believe defy everydayness. Modernity and everydayness constitute a deep structure that a critical analysis can work to uncover.

Henri Lefebvre, The Everyday and Everydayness, in Stephen Harris and Deborah Berke, Architecture of the Everyday, Princeton Architectural Press, New York, 1997, p.37.

NAMING

The simplest act of substitution is to put the name of a maker in the place of his or her work, which amounts to a paraphrase in itself. . . . All paraphrase sets aside the original: To put the name in place of the painting is to remove it from immediate consciousness; to narrate the life of an individual is an act profoundly different from looking into a painting and one that cannot be conducted simultaneously with it. To substitute a temporal narrative, already present in a name, for the physical work of art is to give up those features of the thing that were transient and unrepeatable, bound to a moment that is irrevocably ended; the unique insistence is, for the moment at least, sacrificed on the altar of continuity.

Thomas Crow, The Intelligence of Art, The University of North Carolina Press, 1999, p.1.

ON BRANDING

Branding is now the art of getting people to think what something might be rather than what it necessarily is. It's about the manipulation of the virtual reality in which so many live. The manipulators include anyone with an interest in what we might think of them - not just big companies with products to sell but political parties with votes to win, design gurus with clients to attract - anyone, in other words, acting in some kind of market. They all have an interest in controlling their appearance to make us believe it is the reality.

John Humphrys Beyond Words How Language Reveals The Way We Live Now Hodder and Stoughton. Great Britain 2006, p. 86-87

see:

http://voussoirs.blogspot.com.au/2015/10/faking-provenance-misuse-of-meaning.html

PRECONCEPTION

Leone Huntsman Sand in Our Souls The Beach in Australian History Melbourne University Press 2001, p.16:

Thus first impressions were filtered through existing preconceptions, starkly revealed in Sir Joseph Banks's description of the people seen from Captain James Cook's Endeavour when it first touched on the Australian continent in 1770:

In the morn we . . . [discerned] 5 people who appeared through our glasses to be enormously black: so far did the prejudices which we had built on Dampier's account influence us that we fancied we could see their Colour when we could scarce distinguish whether or not they were men.

Here Banks refers to William Dampier's unfavourable accounts of the West Australian aboriginal people in published accounts of his landings in 1688 and 1699, and reveals his own awareness of the extent to which perception was influenced by expectation.

see: http://voussoirs.blogspot.com.au/2014/04/seeing-what-we-believe-idyllic-visions.html

THE MUSE - GETTING IT RIGHT

"It can be in the morning, any old time, I wake up with an idea and it starts following you around.

"You go, 'Ah that's good' because you know when it's going to work, it's going to be fruitful.

"Other times you'll get the edge of an idea and maybe it fades away or there's just no way it can be made to serve, you know?

"Then you just, it takes its time and you work on it and if necessary you work on it more than once. I'm known to work on it two or three times before you get it right."

Les Murray

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2015-10-02/les-murray-latest-volume-reflects-on-bunyah/6816714

http://www.lesmurray.org/

JARGON

The world seems to find it necessary to use more and more jargon in general reporting and conversation. It is especially noticed in accounts and discussions on the arts. The ABC TV arts programme presented on 7 January 2017 at 6:15pm had more jargon than usual; indeed, had more unusual expressions than previously encountered, ones that had not been heard before:

"unpicking the tapestry" of one's life;

and

looking at "the fan deck of what you do."

These reminded one of other popular fashionable expressions:

“to unpack an issue,” meaning to analyse it in some detail;

and

“to segue,” meaning to shift to a new topic or activity.

This last term is a favourite of radio announcers. The Italian word is often misspelt as ‘segway’ because of the similar phonetic sounding that is more commonly understood as Segway, the brand of a human transporter.

The parallel is interesting, as the idea of being ‘transported’ is common to both words, but it seems to hold little interest to the radio voices that appear just too cleverly happy with the use of this different, interesting expression.

Saturday, 21 February 2026

BRADFIELD CITY - HOW MIGHT ONE BEST DWELL?

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