Tag: Fitzroy

  • Black Cat Cafe Fitzroy

    Black Cat Cafe Fitzroy

    In the haze of the late 1980s, I was transported from a yahoo Tasmanian town to the eclectic suburb of Fitzroy, Melbourne. Eager to wander the uncharted alleys of this bohemian city, little did I fathom that the Black Cat Cafe would emerge as my compass for extraordinary geographic and intellectual odysseys. An enclave on…

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  • Why is Smith Street important? A history of one of Melbourne’s most diverse streets

    Why is Smith Street important? A history of one of Melbourne’s most diverse streets

    This evening, I will discuss the historical significance of Smith Street. This street forms the border of Collingwood and Fitzroy, one of Melbourne’s most important and diverse streets. This presentation borrows from heritage work I did a few years back before the development of the site over the road, which is now the Smith and…

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  • Fitzroy as a post-industrial frontier

    Fitzroy as a post-industrial frontier

    Post-Industrial Frontiers The suburb of Fitzroy may not be one of the most significant nodes in the globalised world but in a similar way to other inner city districts of Melbourne and elsewhere it does have significant symbolic engagements with the world. Because it is Melbourne's oldest suburb (and thus richly historically layered) and because…

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  • Gentrification in Fitzroy

    Fitzroy is the archetype of a post-industrial Australian suburb. As Manual Castells, the Economic Geographer Kevin O'Connor, and a plethora of other authors argue, post-industrialism is the underlying catalyst for the present globalisation process.[1] Inner city Australian communities are experiencing rapid gentrification, closing factories, rising rents and property values, and the appropriation of the working…

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