Building Australia

The first episode looks at inner city living. Beginning with the speculative developments in Lower Fort Street in the Rocks area in Sydney and later moving to Melbourne's neatly organized squares.

From the inner city we move to consider how Australians have adapted to a climate with which most were initially unfamiliar.

The third episode investigates the style of probably the most romantic form of Australian house. As we learn from Palladian Camden Park the initial impulse was to build "country homes" that replicated the fashions and the assertions of a class system.

Up until now, the houses we've looked at were all meant as permanent residences. But, as the Labour Movement agitated for fair working conditions, including paid holidays and the five day week, leisure was on people's minds.

Beginning with the "Father of Federation", and Australia's second Prime Minister, Alfred Deakin's Federation Bungalow "Ballara", Episode Five tells the story of the optimism and confidence that powered the movement to make Australia an independent nation.

While houses from the recently decommissioned airforce base in Tocumwal, New South Wales, delivered via-truck to Canberra went some way toward addressing the housing crisis in our nation's capital.