This photograph book is a first person aesthetic appreciation of a prominent feature of Canberra’s urban environment, the shopping centre. Specifically, the Weston Creek shopping centres in southern Canberra, Australia where I live.

The Weston Creek area is a product of the National Capital Development Commission (NCDC) 1960-70s urban planning culture. This district is divided up into the following suburbs Chapman, Duffy and Holder Fisher, Stirling, Rivett, Waramanga, and Weston. Each of the suburbs except Stirling and Weston has a small suburban shopping centre within walking distance and the district is served by a medium sized shopping centre known as Cooleman Court.

These suburbs were built on the low-density neighbourhood garden city principles, not for any NCDC social ideal such as to promote social interchange. But simply because it offered a useful system of providing travel, education, shopping, and living convenience in residential areas. The shopping centre urban aesthetic is a product of NCDC 1960-70s planning as well as Australian Capital Territory government regulation.

This book as well as showing the nature of these shopping centres depicts how this this built environment looks and feels to those who inhabit and move through them. As a local resident, it is a visual character I am very familiar with and like. This is my normal Canberra urban experience.

Perhaps this is not the same for you the reader. So, how is your urban experience different?