Satellite Map of St Kilda

Research Site Manager: Dr Martin Mulligan

St Kilda is an inner-urban Melbourne suburb on the shores of Port Phillip Bay. Its mixed history following white settlement and the role it has played in the wider context of Melbourne have led to its status as an iconic urban community. Like many urban communities, St Kilda has experienced much change over time: it has been both the most exclusive address in town and one of the least salubrious. Currently, wealthier residents are buying into this bayside suburb, forcing longer-term, often disadvantaged, residents out. At this point it remains a socially diverse community due to the presence of public housing and rooming houses. But what is the future for the low-income housing options in the area? Furthermore, as an icon St Kilda belongs to the broader Melbourne community, and residents have to put up - as they have since the late 1800s - with a regular influx of visitors, especially on weekends. This vibrant local community with its colourful history faces new challenges in keeping alive the diversity that has made it so appealing to residents and visitors alike.

St Kilda's roller-coaster ride through time has made it a place of many stories. Following white settlement, it rapidly transformed from wild Bushranger frontier to the best address in Melbourne, with its Edwardian 'seaside resort' character funded by gold-rush money. However, by the 1890s the Depression had wrought great change, forcing many wealthy families out and transforming mansions into boarding houses. The opening of Luna Park in 1912 established the carnivalesque identity of St Kilda, and it became the playground of Melbourne as public transport increased and crowds flocked to the cinemas, dancehalls and sea baths. The pleasures were not entirely innocent, however, and by the 1930s, sly-grog trading, prostitution, cocaine smuggling and organised crime were markedly more prevalent.

Increased poverty following the Great Depression and waves of migration, particularly from Europe, around and following the Second World War, again saw St Kilda transform. Boarding houses became overcrowded accommodation for the poor. European cosmopolitan ambiance gradually broke down anglocentric bias; the local Jewish community, already of note since white settlement, grew to be one of Melbourne's most significant. The following decades saw more diversity and change in St Kilda. Many poorer residents remained in substandard accommodation; drug use and prostitution increased as problems. The local council endorsed high-density flat development, causing rapid population increase, yet neglected public works, allowing many once-grand buildings to crumble. However, alongside these shifts a vibrant culture continued to evolve in St Kilda, and residents groups formed to lobby for better representation.

Conflicting interests continue in St Kilda. Action has been taken to preserve the social and physical character of the area, but it is continually changing. St Kilda remains an energetic community able to celebrate itself and rally around issues close to its heart. In recent years, the hit television program The Secret Life of Us projected to an international audience an image of St Kilda again as Melbourne's playground: for hip, young Melbournians. At the same time, disadvantaged and marginalised sectors of the community have access to a range of excellent projects, often co-ordinated through Port Phillip Council, aimed at facilitating a sense of inclusion and place. In a rapidly changing city, how long St Kilda is able to maintain its character, diversity and history - its stories - remains to be seen.

St Kilda Research Transect

For the purposes of this project, the Globalism Institute is using a 'transect', or cross-section, as a structured way of approaching the complexity of local community life. Our research transect in St Kilda takes in its main commercial strips: Fitzroy Street, the Esplanade and Acland Street. These three long and busy streets not only reflect much of what typifies St Kilda today but also hold many of its stories, from pre-settlement indigenous history to controversial development sites.

The St Kilda transect begins at the Corroboree Tree, or Ngargee Tree, at St Kilda Junction. This 400-700-year-old River Redgum is the best known St Kilda site related to Aboriginal spirituality. St Kilda is situated in the tribal territory of the Bunurong people, a tribe of the larger Kulin Nation. The Corroboree Tree was a gathering place for ceremonies prior to European settlement and a fringe dwelling camp post-settlement. Further along the transect we find a 'modern sacred site': Cleve Gardens, a heritage-protected gathering place for local Aboriginal people until they were forced to gather elsewhere in the 1990s. O'Donnell gardens, alongside Luna Park, now has its regular group of indigenous 'parkies', and a public art work - three cast bronze milk crates - by a local artist celebrating their presence.

Fitzroy and Acland Streets are both now dominated by cafes and restaurants boasting a world of cuisines. This was not always the case. In the 1950s and 1960s, new European migrants opened cafes like Leo's Spaghetti Bar, Tolarnos Bistro and Cafe Scheherazade. Such establishments served as refuges for the displaced or homesick and offered European cuisine now taken for granted in Melbourne but markedly different to the standard Aussie fare of the 1950s. Cosmopolitan venues like Tolarnos, with its gallery and charismatic bohemian owners (Mirka and Georges Mora) also attracted artists to St Kilda, where many artists continue to live and work. In such a competitive environment, however, these cafes, and their stories, may not survive beyond their original clientele.

The middle of the transect takes in the full sweep of St Kilda's grand Esplanade. Built at the height of St Kilda's Edwardian prosperity, the Esplanade is now part-crumbling boulevard, part-bustling tourist strip, part-residential apartments. The Sea Baths, originally opened in 1860, fell into disrepair in the 1950s, housed infamous violent nightclubs in the 1970s and were derelict by the 1980s. However, the revamped baths complex opened in 2001, and its spas, indoor baths and vegetarian restaurant are concomitant with the 'glossy' aspects of contemporary St Kilda. Opposite the baths, the Esplanade Hotel has received no such facelift and remains in a state of disrepair. The 'Espy', a legendary live music venue, has been the subject of a long planning dispute and stands today in the shadow of a developer's crane. Further along the Esplanade, the Novotel Hotel stands on the site of the St Moritz ice-skating rink, a St Kilda icon demolished in the 1980s. The hotel's 'St Moritz' bar features an ice skater on its sign. Tensions around development issues in St Kilda continue to run high.

The Globalism Institute is working with a critical reference group in St Kilda to provide a reflective forum and reference base for the project:

Ilka Tampke is a community and health development officer for the City of Port Phillip and has worked extensively in community cultural development in Victoria and NSW

Nelum Buddhadasa is Project Manager, City of Port Phillip Cultural Gateways Project

Sandy Joffe has worked as Executive Officer of the Port Phillip Community Group, and is on the executive of 'Jews for a Just Peace'. She previously worked in rural development in her homeland, South Africa