Stories

Since reading Bruce Pascoe’s Dark emu, I can’t stop thinking about Aboriginal design. In fact it’s changed my entire thinking about what truly a successful design could look like and how it could function.

Unknown to most Australians, Aboriginal Australia had an incredible design and architecture culture. This included specialised and climate appropriate buildings from houses to large meeting halls, irrigation infrastructure and water ways and finely crafted objects and tools such as fishing nets indistinguishable from those that were English made. They had also developed highly efficient organisational processes that ensured adequate food harvests at all times of the year, incorporating major events and multi-tribe gatherings.