A NEW shared space in the Leederville town centre could be ready in time for the Leedypalooza in January.
Vincent council’s planning to raise the road on Newcastle Street, just in front of Bill’s (formerly the Leederville Hotel) to match the footpath, with staffers reporting that will make it more “pedestrian-friendly” by flagging its dual-use to motorists.
They estimate it’ll cost $275,000 to build it.
They’d already put aside $115,000 in the last budget, but the city recently switched to a cheaper recycling contractor and they’re saving about $300,000 a year, so they’ve got extra cash to allocate now.
ONE extra person will be allowed in Amani wine bar on Oxford Street.
Vincent council approved the request to increase the bar’s capacity from 94 people to 95 – so now you can bring your plus-one.
Technically under the city’s rules about how many parking spots a business has to provide, that extra person would mean Amani needs another 0.15 car bays or pay the cash-in-lieu equivalent of $810.
The council let that fractional bay slide — Amani’d already paid $22,127 to make up for missing car bays when it was first approved in 2012.
• Amy Swerlowycz, Allira Humberstone, Ron Arthurs and Robyn McCoy in ARENAarts’ first production in the old Maylands Autumn Centre.
LOCAL amateur theatre troupe ARENAarts’ first production in their new Maylands home kicks off this weekend.
The actors secured a two-year lease of the old Maylands Autumn Centre back in July and while waiting for the building’s stage and lighting to be upgraded, have been rehearsing a production of You’ve Got Hate Mail.
Director Simon James said it was the perfect play to get the ball rolling.
“You’ve Got Hate Mail struck me as a play that could be staged in-the-round in the auditorium area, so it fitted in perfectly with our renovation plans,” James said.
“I also found it to be rather funny and loved the themes of miscommunication in a time when it’s never been easier to communicate with each other.”
Written by Billy Van Zandt and Jane Milmore, the story follows Richard (played by 40-year theatre and film veteran Ron Arthurs) who accidentally sends his wife an email intended for his mistress.
“Richard is a lawyer and a womaniser who cannot help himself,” Arthurs says.
“The trick will be keeping a straight face as the craziness unravels and also not interacting directly with other cast members, as the script dictates.”
Arthurs told the Voice that apart from a new name – it’s now the Roxy Lane Theatre – ARENAarts has also been sub-leasing the space to former users such as the local Lions club and ratepayers association, as well as providing a venue for homeless theatre companies.
You’ve Got Hate Mail plays October 20, 25, 26 and 27 at 8pm, with a 2pm matinee on October 21. Tix are $20 and $16 concession from http://www.whatson.com.au/arena or by calling 9255 3336.
There’s some adult language and themes in the play, so it might be best to leave the nippers at home until the next time the Wiggles are in town.
• The Gleddon Building was Perth’s tallest for nearly 20 years. Photo by Dingo Dude
FIVE Voiceland buildings will get some TLC after the state’s heritage grants were finalised recently.
The University of WA’s Gleddon Building on the corner of Hay and William Streets, and the Atlas Building on The Esplanade (now home of the Museum of Perth) were the big local winners, each scoring $50,000.
The First Church of Christ, Scientist on St George’s Terrace also received $10,555, St Alban’s Church in Highgate received $13,182 and St John’s Lutheran Church in Aberdeen Street received $14,340.
Museum of Perth co-founder Reece Harley says the money will go towards upgrading the Atlas Building’s gorgeous renaissance lifts (think The Titanic’s elevator scene).
The Gledden Building was influential architect Harold Boas’s attempt to emulate the soaring high rise towers of New York, and from its opening in 1938 until the mid-50s it was Perth’s tallest building; primarily because the Second World War disrupted city building development completely.
It was almost built earlier, but the Great Depression put the mockers on any construction and Boas was beaten to the punch with his concept of high rise with retail at the base by the Colonial Mutual Insurance Building in 1936.
Another important feature of the building is a series of friezes incorporating local flora and fauna, which were chosen via competition. George Benson won the competition, but second and third place getters, Clem Kennedy and William G Bennett also got to see their works attached to the building, where they remain today.
Survey skewed WITH regard to the article “Sixty wants 40” (Voice, October 12, 2018).
The survey about the proposed 40kmh speed limit was skewed to get the result the city wanted.
Statistically about 40 per cent of a target group will respond to a survey.
However, the city maintains it carried out an “extensive consultation”.
Only 392 people responded to the survey. This is about 2 per cent of the total population of the city of Vincent.
Of those responding, 169 people (57 per cent) supported the trial, with 129 (43 per cent) against it, according to the city. This is not an overwhelming majority.
In addition, how many of those saying “yes” belonged to the lobby group Streets@40?
A convenor of this group was a member of a Vincent advisory group.
Therefore her opinion, and those of any others so involved, is biased.
There is a definite conflict of interest.
Responsible motorists adjust their speed to allow for the road and weather conditions at the time.
In an earlier letter to the Voice, I shared information from Main Roads that there has not been any pedestrians killed in motoring accidents in the city of Vincent in the 2016-17 period.
If there have not been any fatalities, how can one improve on zero deaths?
Yes, Carr and Cleaver Streets have had a 40kmh speed limit for some time now, but many motorists and motorcyclists choose to ignore it.
Last week, Lifeline in Northbridge was seeking $150,00 to maintain its work in assisting people with mental health conditions and to reduce the number of suicides.
Surely if Vincent council has spare cash it could donate the $150,000 it intends to spend on a trial, which will achieve nothing, to a very worthwhile cause.
We have just experienced Mental Health Week, and the city could win applause for donating to a worthy cause. Hope Alexander West Perth
Both sides WITH regard to the Speaker’s Corner “Heads must roll” (Voice, October 6, 2018), by year 12 student Joel van Boxtel.
Joel it was pleasing to see your first efforts in tackling an issue that you apparently feel strongly about.
The next step in the process is to examine the subject from the opposite point of view.
What would constitute a better system and how would it be implemented?
In popular debate, the United States system is often argued as a better model of government.
It is interesting to note that 150 years after their civil war their law and justice system is still riddled with racial discrimination.
It is also worth looking at their political inertia on gun control. But enough of the United States.
I like the way you have managed to sidestep the problems that the US presents as an alternative to our system by proposing a “ruling group of elected citizens”. This does sound rather like our present federal parliament.
Are you proposing a fourth level of government above federal, state and local?I would also be interested to see the make-up of this group.
Are quotas to be imposed to ensure minority representation?
Remember, the devil is always in the detail.
Well done on your first effort. You have managed a “loud shout” on an issue that you care about.
This qualifies you as a genuine placard-carrier.
It is up to you now to grow beyond that stage, to develop the skills and character that permit you to examine an issue from all sides and contribute to this country as a truly responsible citizen. Tom Goode Harold Street, Mount Lawley
Fresh seafood, fresh local produce and traditional favourites
Passion is the key to running a quality restaurant. And no restaurateur is more passionate than Wayne Champion, owner and head chef of Red Cray.
A Mount Lawley icon, Red Cray has been serving up mouthwatering seafood, succulent meats and world-class international fare for years. Since Champion’s takeover, this relaxed restaurant has an enticing new energy about it.
“I’ve been a chef for just over twenty years and I still have a deep love for it,” Champion tells the Voice.
“I’m trained in Italian cooking but I love to put a more contemporary twist on traditional techniques.”
“One of my favourite dishes is the Crab Capellini as there are so many fresh ingredients,” Champion said.
This sensational dish consists of fresh crab meat, garlic and chilli brought together with a home-made tomato sauce with a real lovely basil kick.
A favourite with hungry diners is the impressive Red Cray Platter piled high with grilled and battered fish, Moreton Bay bug, grilled scallops, prawn skewers, fried calamari, chilli mussels, chips, greek salad, tartare and a white Sambuca mayonnaise.
If you have a taste for the theatrical, you can’t go past the sizzling prawns cooked in a creamy Pernod sauce and served with a soft tortilla, the dish is served in a piping hot cast iron pot with a rich sauce that bubbles away at your table.
Red Cray’s menu goes far beyond Italian favourites and explores a diverse range of international cookery – a great example being the Meaty Pork Ribs.
Moroccan-inspired, the ribs are slow-cooked in spices and punchy orange juice and served with a smooth mashed potato and pickled eggplant.
There’s also an extensive dessert menu to lust over which includes Cheesecake, Panna Cotta, Tiramisu, Sticky Date Pudding, Smores and a Marsala Zabaglione – a warm and silky marsala infused Sabayon Mousse made at your table and topped with shaved couverture dark chocolate and sponge finger biscuits for dipping. Just lucious!
For the early risers, Red Cray’s breakfast menu boasts a broad selection of seafood starters including the divine Jelly Jar – a layer of avocado and steamed crayfish set in a white wine jelly. You can also have scallops, prawns, smoked salmon and for the more traditional Old Faithful, bacon, eggs, garlic mushrooms, grilled tomato, sausage and ciabatta.
“The thing that stands out for me about Red Cray is our local produce, with a keen focus on fresh seafood,” says Champion.
“Red Cray has a real upmarket feel about it without the hefty price tag. There’s something for everyone.”
EIGHT years after becoming an artist, James Cross is preparing to display his works to the public for the first time.
“I started doing art when I was up in Darwin in palliative care,” he says.
Years before when he was building houses for poor communities overseas, he never imagined he’d be an artist.
But while in a palliative ward in Darwin, with a life-threatening lung infection and his body rejecting stem cells from an earlier operation, he started drawing recurring, parallel lines while weathering the effects of the notoriously powerful painkiller Fentanyl.
“They give it to you when you don’t expect to live,” Cross says.
Philosophies
“On those very heavy drugs…basically I would see those artworks in my sleep and wake up and create them.”
He now finds it hard to relate to those early works, saying his style has evolved to include other philosophies.
“I can’t imagine how to do that art or what it means.”
After he survived he started exploring his family’s Aboriginal heritage, unknown to them for many years due to the broken connections caused by the Stolen Generation.
He spoke with Aboriginal lore men about philosophy, art and spirituality, discovering that the lines he’d drawn in hospital echoed the line-styles they used in their artwork.
What he’d learned started to influence his artwork, and he also began to incorporate his own Catholic background and elements of Buddhism.
These days, busy raising his kids and sometimes fatigued from chemo, art is still his main outlet.
Sometimes his process is meditative, and drawing the lines for him was like the way Buddhist monks spend many quiet hours raking patterns into sand in a zen garden, only for their painstaking work to be smoothed over afterwards.
Sometimes they’re deeply spiritual and personal pieces, and other times they’re influenced by what’s going on around him: He was recently watching the Brett Kavanaugh hearings in the US – the investigation into an accusation of sexual assault by the supreme court nominee.
Frustrated by the injustice and angered by how the victim was being treated, Cross took a pen and manifested his feelings on paper, turning them into abstract lines representing borders that were crossed and safe spaces that had been intruded on.
Disabilities
He’s now one of 10 artists on show in an exhibition by Identitywa, an agency that supports people with disabilities and their families.
The organisation aims to help people with a disability “live the life they choose”, and this exhibition is intended to show off the creative side of the people they work with.
The exhibition is November 3 and 4 at Identitywa, 61 Fitzgerald Street Northbridge, from 10am to 3pm.
I TOLD the real estate agent I’d turn the upstairs lights off, only to be told there were none on and it was just the natural light flooding into this Mt Lawley home.
The three bedrooms are on the second level, including the generous main with its built-in-robes and swish en suite.
The main bedroom faces onto Joel Terrace, a quiet suburban street, while another looks out across the river and has great views of the hills and Optus Stadium.
The downstairs living areas were also flooded with lights, thanks to almost floor-to-ceiling windows.
Wormy chestnut
The floors are made from Australian wormy chestnut; a timber grown in a eastern states region that is prone to fires, drought, insect attacks and winds so strong trees are often stunted.
All these factors create a red-golden timber with unique pin holes and squiggly worm marks.
The house, number 19, is at the front of a boutique complex of townhouses facing Joel Terrace.
You can enter the home via a timber deck in the private courtyard, where lush planting has created a tranquil sanctuary.
In the summer they’ll be plenty of shade from a mature variegated Chinese tallow tree.
Huge glass doors in the spacious open-plan lounge open onto the deck.
The home was recently renovated and includes a stunning kitchen with white stone benchtops, a heap of drawers, a huge appliance cupboard and two floor-to-ceiling, pull-out pantries.
The Miele cooktop is framed by a huge window that overlooks a lovely rear courtyard.
Secure gates lead to the river, where the complex has its own jetty, and there are paths that meander for kilometres along the foreshore.
by JENNY D’ANGER
19/146 Joel Terrace, Mt Lawley from $759,000 Natalie Hoye 0405 812 273 Acton Mt Lawley 9272 2488
• The sludge being pumped onto Whatley Crescent. • A Bayswater staffer gets down and dirty to clear the sludge from the storm water drain.• The blocked drain.
Mayor promises tough action against polluter
A BAYSWATER garage is under investigation after being spotted pumping a black sludge into storm water drains.
Last Saturday (October 6), environment-loving martial arts expert Charlie Bellamy noticed the sludge, which he described as a cocktail of oil, grease and sand, running along the Whatley Crescent gutter and into drains which end up in the Swan River.
When the local resident traced the pollution back to Meltham Motors, he claims a staff member tried to block him from filming the incident, swore at him and then grabbed his phone.
But Mr Bellamy, who won gold in Muay Thai at the Prince’s Cup in Thailand in 2005, effortlessly took it back without further trouble.
Mr Bellamy says the sludge was so thick it was blocking drains, prompting another Meltham Motors’ staffer to try and clear it by jabbing the grate with a screwdriver.
“I’m a mad keen environmentalist,” Mr Bellamy said, adding the lazy pollution undermines the council’s efforts to maintain the river’s health.
“The City of Bayswater is doing so much good work… and these guys just go ‘stuff it’.”
Meltham Motors is a member of Car Craft, a national group of car repair businesses that boasts on its website: “All Car Craft Members have been audited for compliance with the national Green Stamp Environmental Management System”.
The website says “all are working towards full compliance” with that accreditation.
Neither Meltham Motorsnor the national Car Craft team got back to the Voice.
Bayswater council sent out workers on Monday (October 8) to try to dredge the muck out of the drains, and mayor Dan Bull says they intend to pursue enforcement action and recover their costs.
The maximum fine for unauthorised discharge is $5000.
“The dumping of unauthorised materials into our waterways is illegal and something the city takes very seriously,” Cr Bull says.
“We have put a lot of effort into revitalising our drainage sites to help improve the quality of water flowing into the Swan River and it is disappointing to see such a careless act undermine this work.
“Pollutants can significantly impact water quality and damage plants and marine life. This sort of behaviour is totally unacceptable.
“Fortunately the city was able to limit the potential impact on the environment in this instance by responding immediately.”
• Kedy Kristal from the Women’s council with Vincent deputy mayor Susan Gontaszewski in Hyde Park.
A NEW purple bench in Hyde Park is part of a worldwide movement to honour victims of domestic homicide.
Vincent deputy mayor Susan Gontaszewski says the purple bench movement started in Canada in 2015 to honour the memory of Barb Baillie, who was murdered by her husband 25 years earlier, and has spread worldwide.
“This bench remembers those who have all died in WA recently; a shocking 23 victims since the start of the year,” Cr Gontaszewski said.
“It is for anyone who is currently experiencing domestic and family violence.”
The bench, which includes a plaque with details of helplines, is one of many being installed across Perth.
Purple has long been associated with the movement against domestic violence, but there’s multiple theories on its origins:
• Purple was one of the colours used by the women’s suffrage movement.
• In 1978 many women wore lavender during a march on Washington DC to demand better women’s rights.
• The Purple Heart is the medal given to wounded soldiers in the US military. Purple is also the colour of bruises.
The benches are being installed through a partnership between local councils and the Women’s Council for Domestic and Family Violence Services.
Women’s council CEO Angela Hartwig says the benches raise public awareness and keep the issue visible.
“It provides a physical place to reflect about the important work achieved to date and how we can move, over the next generations, to bring an end to domestic and family violence,” Ms Hartwig says.
Perth Voice Interactive 