RMIT Design Archives Journal - Call for Papers

We welcome a variety of written papers in response to the Call, including:

• Full papers (3000 – 5000 words) presenting original research.
• Case Studies (3000 words) that describe how a particular designer or design practice, group, project, event, or situation has been studied and analysed.
• Conversations (length dependant on case) offering insights through written discussions between students, educators, or researchers around a particular Archive/designer etc.
• Visual Submissions (maximum 2000 words) making use of primarily visual content and structures, including: visual cases; storytelling and narratives; past projects involving the RMIT Design Archives.

Please submit a summary of your proposed contribution to the RMIT Design Archives Journal Editor rdajeditor@rmit.edu.au, before proceeding with your contribution. The summary of your proposal should include:

Within the RMIT Design Archives collection housing is an important theme, and a range of housing typologies are represented: detached houses, walk-up flats and apartments, townhouses, warehouse conversions, and project housing. Within these models' various approaches to community are evident in associated landscaping and public space.

The earliest examples are found in the archives of Frederick Romberg and Robin Boyd. Robin Boyd’s establishment of the Small Homes Service in 1947, focussed economical designs for small housings as a solution to the post WW2 housing crises, and for housing in new subdivisions to the north and east of Melbourne. The plans were developed by leading Melbourne architects and promoted through The Age. The influence of the SHS focus on affordable family housing is seen across the archives of Cocks and Carmichael, Nankivell and Joyce, and Geoffrey Woodfall.

In the post war period walk-up flats and apartments were built in established suburbs, such as Caulfield, St. Kilda, Camberwell, and Kew. There are many examples of this housing typology to be found in the archives of Ernest Fooks, Romberg, and Boyd, and at a later period, in the archives of Nankivell & Joyce.

The Archives collections have also strong representation of the project home industry, which flourished from the late 1960s through the 1970s. Companies such as Merchant Builders, Civic Construction Company, Landmark Solar Housing and Pettit and Sevitt are represented across the architectural archives of Graeme Gunn, Cocks and Carmichael, and in the graphic design archives of Eric Maguire and Bruce Weatherhead.

In the 1980s, under the leadership of architect John Devenish, the Victorian Ministry of Housing (formerly the Housing Commission) embarked on a significant infill housing program. This program, which sought to diversify housing types and engage emerging architectural practices, became a crucial period for innovation in public housing design. Devenish and his team, including Dimity Reed, pioneered an innovative approach to public housing, focusing on infill projects in existing urban areas.

The shift represented a major shift in public housing policy in Victoria, Australia, moving from large-scale, high-rise towers to smaller, site-specific projects designed to fit within existing urban neighbourhoods and aimed to create more humane and creatively designed public housing by building on vacant or reclaimed inner-city lot. In the RMIT Design Archives collection this shift is represented in the infill housing designed by Edmond & Corrigan and Peter Elliott.

In this Journal we seek to explore housing typologies that address the needs for affordable well-designed housing, and the key trends in social housing today, such as sustainability, community and connection, well-being, and high-density innovation.

Contact RMIT Design Archives rmitdesignarchives@rmit.edu.au for further information or to book a research visit.