Values-Based Heritage Conservation: Historical Origins and Future Directions
James Lesh | Heritage City
by admin
7M ago
The Burra Charter and its values-based model is embraced within Australian heritage conservation. For policymaker Max Bourke, it forms ‘the ethical basis for a contemporary “philosophy” of Australian conservation practice [becoming] a sort of “bible”’. Historian Graeme Davison reflects, The Tablets of the Law handed down from Burra have now been translated, like a colonial Book of Leviticus, into the values-based model and an ever-expanding grey literature of heritage statutes, conservation reports, management protocols, and tribunal rulings that are, today, the multi-million-dollar indu ..read more
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Lecture on Fed Square: Public Space, Community and Heritage in Melbourne
James Lesh | Heritage City
by admin
7M ago
On 20 December 2017, the Victorian State Government and Apple Corporation announced plans for a flagship Apple store for Melbourne’s leading public space: Federation Square. The proposal involved the demolition of an original building on the civic square and its replacement by a generic complex. There was an immediate public backlash against the Apple proposal to enter this public space (which had been managed by a government-owned private company). A new advocacy group called Citizens for Melbourne established a campaign called ‘Our City, Our Square’. A key strand of the campaign involved nom ..read more
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ABC Radio Interview on Abandoned Buildings and Heritage Places
James Lesh | Heritage City
by admin
8M ago
Have a listen back to our ABC Radio conversation on Abandoned Buildings and Heritage Places in Melbourne and across Victoria. You’ll find an interview with me among the many speakers! Listen Now at the ABC website Restore, rebuild or raze? Debate rages over the fate of our grand old buildings  From the Murtoa Stick Shed in the Wimmera, to the historic Curtin Hotel in Carlton, Victoria’s architectural landscape is awash with heritage-listed buildings saved from demolition. But for every success there are stories of demise – as observed by comedian Barry Humphries in 1978 who asked ..read more
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Book Review: Cities in a Sunburnt Country: Water and the Making of Urban Australia
James Lesh | Heritage City
by admin
8M ago
This book review is published in the Urban History Review/Revue d’histoire urbaine, Fall/automne 2023.  Australia is the driest continent on Earth. Its regions fluctuate between punishing drought and intense rainfall. With their knowledge of Country, and their conservation cultures, First Peoples have had continual access to water for millennia. Water and weather shaped their everyday activities and cultural traditions. The British colonisation of Australia from 1788 onwards, and the development of its cities since the nineteenth century, has transformed how water is both understood and m ..read more
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We must protect Melbourne’s 20th-century heritage – here’s how to do it rightt
James Lesh | Heritage City
by admin
9M ago
This article was originally published in The Age on 2 July 2023. The City of Maribyrnong has abandoned its local heritage protections for interwar and postwar housing in Melbourne’s western suburbs. The decision was heralded as a win for housing supply and affordability. But there is another side to the argument – will we look back in 50 years time and rue this decision that may well allow the destruction of this unique era of our history, architecture and social fabric? It’s something we need to consider as we move forward. The multi-year conservation project failed not due to a lac ..read more
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YIMBYs and NIMBYs unite! You can have both heritage protection and more housing
James Lesh | Heritage City
by admin
9M ago
This article was originally published in The Conversation on 5 July 2023. It was republished in The Fifth Estate on 6 July 2023. Heritage conservation has been blamed for making the housing crisis worse by standing in the way of new, higher-density housing. But protecting heritage and increasing housing should be complementary objectives. Heritage suffers when not enjoyed by our growing communities. Housing suffers when not shaped by our communal heritage. YIMBYs and NIMBYs are usually on opposing sides of this debate. Yet what they agree on is the desirability of heritage areas. People i ..read more
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Book on People-Centred Heritage Conservation
James Lesh | Heritage City
by admin
11M ago
James Lesh and Rebecca Madgin’s co-edited book collection on people-centred heritage is now available in paperback. The collection People-Centred Methodologies for Heritage Conservation: Exploring Emotional Attachments to Historic Urban Places has a total of 20 contributors from 8 countries. The chapters explore 13 different case studies at the scales of cities, neighbourhoods and sites. This is an essential text on how to go about people-centred conservation and social value protection. Order from Routledge: Use code ‘ADC23’ for a 30% discount. Overview This book presents methodolog ..read more
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Book Review: Giving Value to Architecture and Heritage
James Lesh | Heritage City
by admin
11M ago
This book review is published in the Architecture Theory Review, April 2023. Review of Valuing Architecture: Heritage and the Economics of Culture, by Ashley Paine, Susan Holden and John Macarthur, eds., Amsterdam, Valiz, 2020, 288 pp. ISBN: 978-94-92095-93-0. https://valiz.nl/en/publications/valuing-architecture How do we articulate the value of architecture? How have social, cultural and economic relationships to architecture evolved over time? Exploring such questions is the aim of Valuing Architecture: Heritage and the Economics of Culture, a vo ..read more
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James Lesh Public Lecture at the University of Sydney on Values in Cities: Urban Heritage in Twentieth-Century Australia
James Lesh | Heritage City
by admin
11M ago
CIRCA Presents: Lecture Series in collaboration with Architectural Theory Review (ATR) & Histories of Architecture and Built Environments group (HABEg) from the University of Sydney School of Architecture and Design. Join us at 6 pm on Wednesday 24 May 2023 at the Wilkinson Building, University of Sydney for James Lesh speaking about his book ‘Values in Cities’. Across the twentieth century, heritage and ideas of value had increasing power to shape Australia’s cities. Places found valuable by professionals and communities were conserved. Places perceived to lack value became subject to red ..read more
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Melbourne, Sydney, and the Population Prize
James Lesh | Heritage City
by admin
1y ago
You’ve probably heard that Melbourne has overtaken Sydney as Australia’s most populous city. This demographic milestone has come about earlier than predicted due to the re-drawing of statistical boundaries, somewhat deflating the weightiness of this momentous moment. But Melbourne overtaking Sydney in population terms is still history making. Since Sydney first overtook Melbourne in population around 1901, both cities have swelled ten-fold to almost 5-million people today. These evolutions speak to enduring contests around cities and rivalries. Melbourne and Sydney have competed on many metric ..read more
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