Since the inaugural event in 1876, the Brisbane Exhibition (or “Ekka” as it has been affectionately known since 1921) has embraced the dual values of tradition and progress, combining a celebration of the Queensland pastoral story with a curiosity for… Read More ›
Welcome to Queensland Deco Project’s first video post! Take a tour of regional Queensland’s magnificent Art Deco town halls built during the 1930s, and enjoy a little jazz music on the road. If you know of other town hall examples in Queensland,… Read More ›
Cyclones are an inescapable feature of living in a tropical climate like Queensland. Since 1858, over 208 of these destructive rain and wind storms have lashed the east coast. The environmental, economic and psychological costs to communities, families and individuals… Read More ›
For over a decade, at the height of the Art Deco era, The Queenslander news weekly helped city and country women alike keep up with the latest in modern fashion. The Queenslander Pattern Service, which went through various incarnations between… Read More ›
9 McLachlan Street, Fortitude Valley T.C. Beirne features prominently in local history, as a business leader who brought the modern department store to Queensland, and as a politician in the senate when the state still had an upper house. One of… Read More ›
Queen’s Park, 10A Milford Street, Ipswich The decorative elegance of Art Deco does not immediately call to mind something so utilitarian as rubbish incineration. But enter one of the world’s most pre-eminent modern architects, Walter Burley Griffin, and majestic form becomes imaginatively fused… Read More ›
A day at the races was popular entertainment in the Art Deco period, part of the spectacle of seeing and being seen that was a hallmark of modernity. Then as now, women’s fashion was central to this spectacle. Each of… Read More ›
Coonan Street, Indooroopilly, Brisbane Walter Taylor Bridge, an elegant Art Deco crossing in Brisbane’s suburban west, has a cousin few might suspect – that grand and iconic bridge that graces Sydney Harbour. The relationship is firstly a material one, with Walter Taylor… Read More ›
While Queensland did not suffer as much as more industrialised economies in the Great Depression, times were still trying for many people. By 1931 Queensland’s unemployment rate had risen to 30%. This set up a very different decade to the… Read More ›
995 Brunswick Street, New Farm, Brisbane Regular visitors to popular New Farm Park will be familiar with Coronet Flats, one of Brisbane’s most renowned Art Deco landmarks. Many stories could no doubt be told of lives lived there, but the building itself… Read More ›
queensland deco project 