19 Centennial Avenue, Brunswick West, VIC, Australia

A renovator's dream!

This charming little hellhole has been on our list of potential properties for some time now, but for some reason or another, we hadn't quite got around to writing about it until today. I don't know why, because this place just exemplifies the abandoned buildings side of his blog. The first time we went past it, I very nearly drove off the road in shock, because up until that point all the surrounding houses had been quite nice. This just hurts my eyes. Usually when you see something in this state of disrepair, it's surrounded by a wire fence with demolition orders up. But no, this one is just chillin', clearly without having seen any love or attention since it was first built. It clearly hasn't been painted since then - the original coat has just flaked off over time to expose the bare boards underneath. It seems that the plaster rendering on the upper section of the house has just fallen off, exposing a tasteful sort of wood skeleton underneath. In fact, those sections remind me forcibly of the huts I used to build in my back garden, which were made of bit of old trellis fence. The roof tiles are falling like autumn leaves, and I think the house has shifted a little on its foundations, because those windows certainly don't fit as snugly in their frames as they once might have. The garden is messy with a crumbling fence, and there is a lot of accumulated rubbish shoved down between the house and the fence.

I'm sure it was nice 100 years ago.

Now, let me draw your attention to the pictures taken through the windows. We examined these after our first visit here, and were surprised to see that there was actually some stuff inside. A fan is clearly visible, as well as some other random clutter. We assumed that the residents had just left, leaving all their old furniture to fester. I mean, seriously, out of all the houses we've collected for this blog, we were quite sure that this place was totally, absolutely abandoned. We assumed it must have been sitting there for years with just that horrible, fetid old caravan for company.

That poor, poor fan!

Here's why we should never assume anything ever again. Recently, we drove past this place at night. We had been keeping our eyes peeled, since we thought it might be quite hard to find in the dark. Well, this wasn't the case at all. You want to know why? Because there was a light on. A proper fluorescent light, not the torchlight of vandals or squatters. The place is actually in use. I couldn't fucking believe it. This is probably the closest we've come to finding something worthy of a Dot Dot Curve rating, and it turns out that people actually USE IT, perhaps even live in it. Out of all the places we've found for this blog so far, this was one of the few cases where we didn't even have a flicker of doubt about the "abandoned" status we gave it. Even if this is just someone's workshop rather than their residence, you'd think they'd at least fix the roof. I would be genuinely worried about this place staying up in a high wind, so I certainly wouldn't leave anything I'm working on in there unattended. In addition to that, it looks so easy to break in to. All you'd need to do is tap on the wall and you'd probably make a gap big enough to crawl through. I'm not even going to think about someone actually living here, but after seeing that light on, it's a troublingly plausible thought. I hope that they move out before that wonky chimney falls through their bedroom roof!

You win the "worst house on this blog" award. Well done.

To be honest, I would rather live in that caravan for a year than spend a week in that house. You might not quite understand how momentous that is, but I am massively ill-disposed towards caravans. They creep me out and they're dirty and horrible and get in the way while you're driving. Caravans are the crows of the mechanical world. I hope that helps you understand how bad these place actually is. I hope for the sake of everyone living on that street that the termites and the elements get rid of this place sooner rather than later. Perhaps then the mystery residents can move somewhere nicer - I think even this would be luxurious compared with their current wreck.

Rating: Cellar floor.

39 Barry Street, Brunswick, VIC, Australia

The Barry Street frontage.

OK, this house is one of the reasons why this blog exists. It raises so many questions, though most of them are permutations on "how the fuck did this even happen?!", and if anybody out there can sate our curiosity, we'd be most delighted. Because holy shit, we had to look twice (or three times) when we first saw it just to believe it was real.

Dawson St side, seen through gigantic fence gap.

Let's go through the more minor points first. What colour was this house originally? White? Cream? Light brown? Something in between? Or a tasteful flourescent pink? Your guess is as good as mine! The paint has flaked so incredibly much that it's hard to tell; just look at the Dawson Street side (at right) and it's more the colour of mud and mushrooms due to the paint having worn away to an incredible extreme. And how about that fence? It's not fencing in much any more, that's for certain. On both the Dawson and Barry Street frontages, it is collapsing, splintered, and missing legs. You can stroll into the back yard effortlessly; there is such a large gap in the fence that you needn't duck or dodge anything. Never mind the rusty nails poking out too. And how about the drainpipe? Snapped and broken.  The lawn? Mow your lawn! Though we've actually seen worse lawn at occupied properties; not quite sure what to make of this.

Click for a large copy to see how warped the southern (left) wall is.

Now for the major point. The house has lost its structural integrity! Look at it: one half of the house is visibly and alarmingly slumping and subsiding. Check out the windows, which now don't even fit in the windowframes and a visible gap has opened up at the base. The southern wall has actually warped. And never mind that the wall beneath the verandah has gone a charming poo-stain brown just to ram home the decrepitude. This is simply depressing.

The rear of the house. Thanks, collapsed fence.

Once upon a time, this would have been another charming old house, cut from the same basic mould as many in the area. Now it's just, uh, mouldy. It's clearly suffered decades of neglect, and I am at a loss to understand how. The house is in a rather handy spot: it's on the corner of a moderately significant road (Dawson Street), it's close to Union Square, only slightly further to the wares and wonders of Sydney Road's shops, and there is plenty of public transport. Houses with those sorts of nearby amenities go for fucking heaps. What I think is depressing is that whoever let this place fall into such an abject state could make a heap of money by selling this to a developer, who'll probably knock it over and build something from the hideous contemporary templates that seem to be the basis for every new house and apartment block around here.

Rating: Cellar floor, and if that southern end loses much more structural integrity (i.e. in a strong breeze!), we may be looking at our first Dot Dot Curve here.

48-50 Evans Street, Moonee Ponds, VIC, Australia

Moonee Ponds is probably my favourite suburb around here. It's brimming with beautiful Victorian-era houses, colourful gardens and friendly neighbourhood cats.  We usually walk there from our place, for all the aforementioned reasons. On this walk, we cross Citylink (using a footbridge that is far less creepy than this one). As we cross, we first see a nice panorama of rooftops belonging to lovely old places. Then, we see this.

Glorious iron desert, stretching on for miles. Note real houses in the background.

This thing is unforgivable. In the world of Walshe and Whitelock turds, this is the biggest, most steamy turd of them all, and we have to smell it every time we walk to Moonee Ponds. Gloriously situated next to the massive sound barrier alongside Citylink, it is a truly depressing place to live. The block is huge - there are at least 15 apartments in it, probably more. It ticks all the wrong boxes - no roof, awful brickwork, tiny windows and from what I've seen through the tiny windows, dank rooms that look as if they haven't been decorated since 1962. Some residents will be lucky enough to have a glimpse of the Moonee Ponds Creek through their tiny windows. The worst thing is that the agent is probably charging hundreds of dollars per month for this shitbox, ripping off innocent international students and old people who can't afford anything nicer.

Tiny windows, but all they have to see is a huge sound barrier.

What drugs are these developers on?! They could have at least built many small units. That wouldn't have been so horribly confronting. Perhaps - and I know this is an absolutely insane proposal - they could have actually given this place a roof and some features which aren't horrible. But no, this edifice takes up a massive lot and everybody in the surrounding streets has to look at it every day. If I had the misfortune to live here, I'd tint the windows of my car so no-one would see me as I left or came home. Nobody should be ashamed of their place, but in this case I can't see how you'd be anything but mortified.

The turd in all its glory.

This thing is so big that it can probably be seen from space. From above, it puts me strongly in mind of a factory, or perhaps a prison. I feel sorry for the poor cyclists who ride over Citylink on the Hope Street bridge, spot this and fall off their bikes in horror. At least as a pedestrian I can prepare myself for what's coming.

Panoramic views of footbridge and sound barrier!

I know it's pretty hard to polish a turd, but they could have at least tried. Shame on you, 1960s developers, shame on you. I hope that when you die, your hell is a never-ending maze of huge soulless brick apartments, and I hope that the residents of this place come to haunt you with awful corrugated iron roofs and monotonous brickwork and entranceways with a whiff of urine about them.

I think the lawn needs a mow, too. I like the bush covering the window.

One slightly redeeming feature? At least they made an attempt at putting eaves over the upper windows. At least it breaks the monotony a tiny little bit. But that still doesn't raise the rating of this place. Sorry.

Rating: Cellar floor

55 Nelson Place (Willy Tavern), Williamstown, VIC, Australia

Williamstown is a very nice seaside suburb that I visited for the first time recently. It's not the kind of place where I would expect to find old, rundown buildings - quite the opposite. Nelson Place is home to many interesting restaurants and eclectic shops selling tasteful (but useless) wares for housewives with a bit too much money. So imagine my surprise and excitement when I came across this wreck of an old tavern!

As seen from the corner of Ann Street and Nelson Place.

I can't really work out why this place came to be abandoned. The surrounding streets are full of lovely houses, and I'm sure the residents would love to pop down for a drink at the Willy (teehee) at the end of a long day. In addition to that, I'm sure it would get a fair amount of patronage from all the tourists wanting a cold beer after a hot day at the beach. Yet here it stands looking like it will fall down at the faintest gust of wind. I haven't been able to find out when this place was closed. At a guess I would estimate that it closed in about 1972, but this article from 1992 indicates that it was still in operation then. Also, what a surprise - the Willy Tavern was partly owned by a Collingwood player with a love of topless barmaids! Sounds like it was a pretty classy joint back in the day. The tavern was also used in the filming of the TV series Blue Heelers, in which it was used as the Commercial Hotel.

Graffiti, cracks, broken drainpipe and decrepit balcony.

It may come as a surprise to learn that this building is actually heritage listed. Now I don't know about you, but when I think of heritage listed buildings, I imagine them being cared for and preserved. This is most decidedly NOT that case for the Willy Tavern! Some of the cracks in the exterior walls are terrifying, and all I can say is that I'm glad Victoria isn't prone to earthquakes. The interior of the tavern seems to have been quite heavily vandalised - graffiti is visible through the broken windows on the upper floors, and the windows and doors on the lower floors have been covered in heavy corrugated iron sheets. Those vandals must have been fucking brave - I wouldn't even set foot on that rusty old balcony, let alone go inside and risk the whole thing collapsing on me! Seriously, I'm sure that someone could at least make a quick buck off the Willy Tavern by setting up some kind of Blue Heelers themed bar.

Interestingly enough, I found some photos of the tavern from 2007 and 2008, in which it looks a little less dingy - the windows haven't yet been smashed to bits and the corrugated iron hasn't been put up over the lower doors and windows. This place clearly just hasn't aged well at all. I imagine that towards the end it may have been losing lots of money, so they probably couldn't afford to maintain the hotel's exterior even then. It amuses me that the gaudy neon sign is still intact, though a little worse for wear. Still, even when it was in use, I'm pretty sure that "beer" never resembled anything other than the sludge at the bottom of the Moonee Ponds Creek.

One of many gigantic exterior cracks.

It's sad that a heritage listed building has been allowed to simply rot away like this. Perhaps that's what they're aiming for though - just heritage list it and ignore it, wait for it to fall down and then sell the land off at ridiculously inflated prices so that some "architect" can erect another mushroom-coloured shitbox to ruin the town. I guess they're just waiting for the next big storm to hit Victoria. Until then, though, I'm sure the Willy Tavern will continue to decay, attract vandals and cause complaints from the local residents. Maybe next time we visit Williamstown, we'll be able to show you some photos from inside - it seems that the back wall of the tavern isn't far from just falling off. I really would love to see what it's like inside, but as I mentioned before, I'd be afraid to even tread too heavily nearby in case I brought the whole thing crashing down. Still, the Willy Tavern can now claim the dubious honour of holding our second-ever Cellar Floor rating! Now there's something to be, uh, proud of.

Rating: Cellar floor

Moonee Ponds Creek, northern Melbourne suburbs, VIC, Australia

Dwarfed by Citylink in North Melbourne.

When I first looked at a map of Brunswick West/Moonee Ponds before moving to the area, I noticed Moonee Ponds Creek flowing between the two. “How nice,” I thought, “I could go for pleasant evening strolls along there.” Then I actually saw the creek. To call it a “creek” is to grossly overstate reality. At its southern reaches, it was widened into a small canal for the conveyance of coal to railway yards in the days of steam locomotives and isn't too grotesque:

Railway Canal in West Melbourne.

In the mid-20^th century, the then Melbourne Metropolitan Board of Works had the brilliant idea of concreting the whole bloody thing from Flemington Road north to Strathmore as some sort of flood mitigation strategy. The buffoons turned it into a hideous stormwater drain, a watercourse with almost no natural or redeeming qualities.

Here it is north of Flemington Road in Parkville, complete with bizarre erections that look like they come from U2's insipid Vertigo Tour imagery:

And here it is, marking the border between Moonee Ponds and Brunswick West. During times of heavy rain, it occasionally fills close to the top of the concrete and bears a faint resemblance to an actual river, but it is usually an awful, stagnant skidmark across a slab of concrete:

Nothing lives in here. Even the pigeons usually give it a miss. It is discoloured and it has an unpleasant whiff about it. Apparently some skateboarders have put the sloped concrete walls to use, but if this is your idea of a mad place to skateboard, I don't really know what to say to you except that you must be pretty desperate. Even more laughable, I once saw a father in Brunswick West taking his two children and their dog to frolic in the creek on a hot summer's day. Had the father promised the kids a cool dip in the water without telling them it would be the most pissweak dip ever? I don't know about you, but I prefer not to waste my leisure time beside a skidmark.

Rating: Our very first "cellar floor", for crimes against nature.

Fire up your lawnmowers

Mow Your Lawn! is run by a Melbourne couple, which may or may not explain its geographic focus. After spending many suburban walks discussing the virtues and vices of the properties we passed, we thought it was about time we shared some of the worst offenders with the wider world. Now we don't mean to give the impression that we live in the middle of some kind of derelict slum - quite the opposite. An abundance of nice places have given us many ideas for the house we probably won't get to build for many years yet. However, dotted here and there through the neighbourhood like particularly persistent warts lie a number of properties which raise an inordinate number of questions. Does anybody live here? If so, how do they stand it? Is this a drug den? Was the architect both blind and mad?

What this blog is
This blog exists for the purpose of calling a spade a spade and a horrible house a horrible house. We mainly criticise buildings that have been poorly maintained, though architectural mis-steps are by no means omitted from our purview. I'd say that we don't mean to insult people's homes, but … that's actually the whole point, sorry.

Hey, that's my house!
Well, if you own it, then maybe you should do something about it. If you rent it, we know there may not be so much you can do (though if you're here for not mowing your lawn, MOW YOUR LAWN!), but your landlord should do something about it. Clearly your landlord sucks, eh? Though you probably didn't need us to tell you that.

Hey, I'm the landlord of that place!
So do something about it, you cheap prick. I know some landlords care about their tenants … I just haven't actually met one yet.

That's not a house!
Although our main focus is houses, we also feature shitty shops, office blocks, buildings of all descriptions – in fact any man-made structure. And Huntly. I recognise Huntly is just a force of nature for which nobody should be held responsible.

You snobby shits, looking down from your palatial mansion, why if I ever met you I'd-
Calm down. We have lived in at least two of the residences featured here.

It might be perfectly nice inside!
All the less reason for it to be so bad outside.

Care to explain your rating system?
It aims to strike a balance between clarity and precision:

Lick o' paint: Minor quibbles or sheer blandness. It's perfectly liveable, or if you were visiting you wouldn't be embarrassed to be seen there, but something could be done better.
Unpleasant: Whoever designed it or lives there should have known better. It's not outright offensive to the senses, and if you had no alternative you'd live or stay there with only minor qualms, but it really shouldn't be this bad in the first place.
Damnable: You'd rather not live or stay here, but it has redeeming features. If you bought it and did it up, it may look quite nice. Shame it's possibly condemned.
Condemnable: What the hell happened here? Whoever let this place get this way should be embarrassed. Let's just start again.
Cellar floor: Don't let the bottom of the barrel stop you.
Dot Dot Curve: We hope to god we never actually use this rating.

With that said and done, we invite you to come and join us on our charming suburban adventures. But watch your step, I think there might be some dry rot in the corner there.