How often have we heard government decree that we need to build affordable housing close to jobs, transport and services? Yet in Melbourne these very locations continue to be amongst the least affordable locations to rent or buy a place to live. Developers argue (not unreasonably) that the combination of high land values and build costs mean that smaller apartments are the only way that the market can deliver affordable housing in these more accessible and sought after suburb

Low rise apartments in suburban Melbourne are the overlooked ‘middle child’ in the urban housing family. With a character that is neither the typical suburban house nor the high rise apartment block, it is a housing typology that has struggled to find its own identity in Australian suburbia. As middle children are prone to do, the suburban apartment block has developed a reputation for misbehaving and attention-seeking. This is hardly surprising given that we have created an