Laneways

 

I live right on a laneway.  Two in fact.  One runs along the side of our house, and all of our windows open onto it.  The other runs behind my house and provides access to garages and backyards along our street.  Because my street is a short, one-way affair there is frequent traffic in our lane as people seek a cut through between the often congested roads that surround us.  I do like that lane ways are used spaces…although I do wish that people would drive slowly down them and would really prefer them not to clip the side of our studio and garage with their cars.

Laneways are getting a pretty good wrap at the moment and all manner of things are happening in them, both in an arty sense and in a food gathering sense.  Heaps of the best restaurants and cafes are almost impossible to find tucked down some graffiti covered laneway in the heart of the city, or even in the inner suburbs.  There are also numerous festivals and music events happening down deep dark lanes across Melbourne.  In our lane in recent years I can recall a music video being shot at the back of our shed (it was a shocking song and we had to listen over and over again), a short film being shot in our lane (and one in the next block) and a student documentary being made about harvesting food from trees overhanging lanes in the inner city.  

Even zombies drink tea.

The short film is called 'The Zombie Monologues' and as a resident who was asked not to use the lane that day, I was also invited to be an extra 'zombie' in the cast.  A friend and I donned our best zombie make up and starred as the moaning undead in the film.  It was an awesome experience.  We attended the film premier (at a pub) and had a real laugh.   I was also interviewed for the documentary about urban harvesting.  I won't post links here, as I am not really sure I agree with the practise of advertising people's overhanging fruit trees to large numbers of people.  I also don't really think that all of the trees listed are really 'overhanging' or are really providing excess fruit.  Telling people to 'bring a ladder' to harvest fruit from someone else's tree, kind of smacks of invading their privacy a bit. 

The market gardens and chooks at CERES.

There is real history behind the bluestone lanes in Brunswick.  The stones were mined from a local quarry on the banks of the Merri Creek. The site where CERES sits now.  Once the stone had been collected the quarry became a landfill site.  In recent times has been converted into an environmental park, which any local knows.  CERES has community gardens, a café, restaurant, and schools program among other things. 

The lanes were built to give access to properties to the ‘Night Man,’ the man who would come and collect sewerage from backyard toilets.  Most toilets were in the back corner of the yard, and Brunswick still has a good collection of ‘Dunnies’ that you can see if you take a walk in any laneway.  In my old house (incidentally in the next street to the one I live in now), we had a grotty backyard dunny.  It was always covered in cobwebs and had no light.  Sounds gross, but I can’t tell you how PLEASED my housemate and I were to have it after a house guest accidentally burnt our inside toilet down after leaving a lighted candle on the plastic cistern.  For months we had to traipse outside to the dunny until a friend can around with an old cistern he had lying around and fixed our inside loo. 

First Aid Kit.  Young and cool.

Another laneway treat is Sideshow Alley.  This organisation films music being played live in laneways all over the place!  It is well worth having a look at their stuff.  I fell in love with 'First Aid Kit' after seeing the video of 'Waltz for Richard' which was filmed in an city laneway in Melbourne.  I love that a few of the videos are shot in Brunswick laneways.  

An old photo taken in a Brunswick lane.  Details here.

Take a walk down your local laneway before the days get too cold.  There is so much to look at.  So many wild plants and vines that have grown over back fences, untended and jungly.  Our streets are filled with manicured front gardens and renovated cottages and terraces.  So infrequently does a laneway back fence match up.  Most are made of ancient brick, or rusted corrugated iron.  Weeds are often knee high and pieces of discarded furniture or rubble can be found.  Walking down a Brunswick laneway is almost like walking into a time warp.