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  5. arrow_forward_ios Regional Bureaucracy: Architecture of the NSW Government

Regional Bureaucracy: Architecture of the NSW Government

26 October 2021

What do a country post office, school and police station have in common?

Uninspired grey concrete courthouse

Queanbeyan Courthouse. Photo by Hamish McIntosh, UTS Photography graduate. 

If they’re in regional NSW, then it’s likely that they – along with the town hall and perhaps the local swimming pool – were designed by the NSW Government Architect’s Office. The GAO was especially prolific from the late 1950s into the late 1980s, creating a ‘set’ of civic structures often seen as purely utilitarian and overlooked as so-called serious architecture.

UTS School of Architecture researcher and academic Guillermo Fernandez-Abascal has collaborated with Hamish McIntosh and a range of contributors to create Regional Bureaucracy. Using meticulously researched  drawings, stories and images, this book outlines an oeuvre that stands as recent evidence of how modern architecture can construct a state – albeit a complicated and ambitious one.  

None of the projects are presented in a comprehensive manner. Rather, space is left for readers to make their own interpretations and perhaps visit the buildings themselves. The result is a publication that is sometimes nostalgic, often congratulatory and always critical – and one that functions almost as a travelogue of the GAO’s ‘good enough architecture’ of this period.

Plain brown book cover. Regional bureaucracy.

Regional Bureaucracy is published this month (Oct 2021) by Perimeter Editions.

More information

Order your copy today

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