Open House Melbourne

On Sunday 29 July, between 10.00am -  2.00pm our Arlington Campus was open to the public for the annual Open House weekend.  The theme if this year's event was The Collective City, and we had 60 visitors on the day, and while many had a connection to the school, some had come just to admire our Heritage Listed buildings and wonder at the work of Architect Kevin Borland, and what he achieved with the children of Preshil as his clients. 

Below is an interview with Kevin Borland, which was reprinted in the school's Preliminary Heritage Report of 2010, and included in the flyer for visitors.

“At Preshil we have tried to create an informal, not very rigid building which reflects the non-rigid informality of the teaching. I feel that an architect can’t design without the client being involved. They (the children) did little plans and discussed with me the sorts of things they’d like. I involved them in every stage: the planning, the drawings, and they looked over the job and discussed progress… They needed a bit of a catalyst and I provided them with choices and discussed and observed. Observing the fact that kids like to climb and be on different levels, I designed a building that would reflect this…

One of the characteristics of Preshil is the infinite variety of cubby houses that the kids built themselves, so I was concerned with the development of the type of building that was scaled to kids, with all the informality they would like: the excitement of little spaces and bigger ones.  Open classroom designs to date are ones in which you have a great open space with a lot of children, who find it impossible to isolate themselves. I feel an open classroom can only be of benefit if there is an element of isolation possible. .. I think schools have to give the requirements to pupils of being both communal and private on another level.” 

Kevin Borland from Architecture Australia October 1974

A highlight for me on the day was the pleasure, and surprise, of meeting the owners of Hot Dog, a lovely golden retriever who would visit Arlington when I was a girl back in the late 1970s and early 1980s. They let me know his name was Barney, and while they got in awful trouble with Mug, who remonstrated that Barney would bother her dog Randy, us kids all loved him. Nearly as much as Hot Dog loved our lunches!

Until our next edition, 

Cressida