Jan Vranovsky
NEWCASTLE – Australia has the largest
immigration population by percentage of
any Western country. Just 50.7 per cent of its
inhabitants have two Australian-born parents- a figure that’s dropping – and the majority
of immigrants are originally from Asia. ‘Aus-
tralia is an extension of Asia, with European
grandparents,’ says Ben Berwick, director of
Newcastle architecture studio Prevalent. ‘It’s
also a colony. As such, it’s largely littered with
colonial architecture. If you chance upon an
Australian suburb, you’re hit with houses in
architecture styles from all over the world in
one street. I’m not quite sure that the notion
of “local” architecture or design has ever
really existed in Australia. And I’m delighted
by the thought that I’m not sure it ever will.’
Berwick’s home base does have what
he calls a ‘local mining aesthetic – an appro-
priated old-English style of rusted farming
and mining equipment-cum-decoration that
no longer reflects the background of the
majority of residents’. It’s against this back-
drop that Prevalent’s design for Susuru, »123