Bob, 74, eases into his courtyard chair and admires the award-winning building he is happy to call home.
He moved out of a rooming house in Laverton, to find the cleverly designed complex far from the homogeneous block he expected social housing to be. The Altona complex visually breaks down size and scale, and divides dwellings into smaller components diverse in identity.
Bob enjoys the shapes and angles that define its exterior, the brightly coloured glass panels, and timber cladding.
”I fell in love with it the first time I saw it,” says Bob. ”I like good things and the whole complex is mickey mouse, ultra-modern.”
For less than $150 a week rent, his spacious one-bedroom flat has modern fittings, stainless steel bathroom and kitchen ware, and an ample garden flanked by flower beds.
”I come out here and sit, have my coffee, have my lunch, and if it’s a quiet night and the weather is not too bad, I sit out here until 11 or 12 o’clock,” he says.
The development’s 69 one-bedroom apartments were built to house single over-55s on low incomes.
All units have solar-boosted gas hot water, good natural light and ventilation with either a balcony or private courtyard.
Bob says the building would not be the same if it had been a private-market project, which would have sacrificed floor size and open space for a greater investor profits.
He has no plans to go.
”When I leave here, I leave in a pine box, and I leave here happy.”
