Join ‘Behind the Lines 2023’ curator Dr Alex Walton and Political Cartoonist of the Year Fiona Katauskas as they explore the exhibition and Fiona's work from the year that was 2023. Presented as part of the exhibition, ‘Behind the Lines 2023: All Fun and Games’ on display at the Old Treasury Building from 24 March […]
The teabag may be ubiquitous in contemporary life, but for most of the period from 1840 tea was brewed in a teapot, or in a billy over the fire. Almost every family owned a teapot, and often they owned several, for Victorians were prodigious tea drinkers. So much so, that in 1883 visiting author Richard […]
The Australian Women’s Weekly cookbooks and their influence on Australian food culture The Australian Women’s Weekly’s cookbooks were (and still are) remarkably popular. The Weekly, Australia’s most popular women’s magazine, started publishing a range of cookbooks from the late 1930s, but it was during the 1970s when their cookbooks became incredibly popular. Many of the […]
The next installment in the seminar series from Deakin University, Australian Catholic University and Old Treasury! ‘Material Histories’ presents new scholarship from a wide range of speakers, all united by their passion for objects! First speaker: Turning Over Material Histories of the Sandglass with Matthew Champion In the early fourteenth century, the sandglass made its debut […]
In elaborate white dresses, with filmy veils, happy brides smile at the world in countless photographs. But where did the many ‘traditions’ of the wedding day come from, and did the bride always wear white? Join Margaret Anderson as she looks at the history of weddings and the wedding dress in Victoria, with some surprising […]
A black papier-mâché sewing box, now on display in the Old Treasury Building’s ‘Belongings’ exhibition, would once have been both commonplace in and essential for many homes. This box and others like it – filled with needles and threads, thimbles and scissors, ribbons and buttons – helped women to create new looks from old clothes. Conscious […]
The next installment in the seminar series from Deakin University, Australian Catholic University and Old Treasury! ‘Material Histories’ presents new scholarship from a wide range of speakers, all united by their passion for objects! First speaker: Batavia and the personification of hope with Corioli Souter This cordon pulle, or jug, is reconstructed from sherds collected from Batavia (1629), which was […]
World Children’s Day, celebrated on November 20 each year, offers an opportunity to both look back on the history of childhood and of children’s rights and forward to the ways in which childhood is changing and child rights are contested. How do historians investigate and recover the lives, experiences and perspectives of children in the […]
The next installment in the seminar series from Deakin University, Australian Catholic University and Old Treasury! ‘Material Histories’ presents new scholarship from a wide range of speakers, all united by their passion for objects! First speaker: All the Latest Novelties: Modernity, Luxury and Consumer Desire in Australia’s Nineteenth-century Arcades with Nicole Davis Nineteenth-century arcades were […]
Few of us can truly say that we enjoy housework, despite the plethora of ‘labour-saving devices’ now found in most homes. Imagine then, a time when almost all domestic tasks relied on muscle power and elbow grease alone. The lucky few employed domestic servants to do this work. (Of course, the servants weren’t so lucky!) […]
