Challenges in Protecting 1960s Architect-Designed Houses

Abstract

Despite the involvement of architects, lawyers, conservationists, the local community, publicity on television and an unprecedented decision by the New South Wales Land and Environment Court to refuse the demolition of one of the architect-designed houses in a 1964 project home display village, the house looks set to be demolished shortly. Its likely demise highlights the weakness in the NSW heritage system for less widely recognized heritage places. The case has become a cause célèbre of the heritage movement in trying to save Australia's mid-twentieth-century modern architecture and landscapes.