Secondary sources

Key publications on town planning and Canberra

Benevolo, Leonardo, 1967, The Origins of Modern Town Planning, Routledge and Kegan Paul, London. Traces the rise of town planning as a result of the industrial revolution and the various urban models proposed by social reformers.

Freestone, Robert, 1989, Model Communities: The Garden City Movement in Australia, Thomas Nelson, Melbourne. Examines the influence of the Garden City movement on Australian town planning, with a range of examples including Canberra.

Gillespie, Lyall L, 1990, Canberra 1820–1913, Australian Government Publishing Service, Canberra. Two chapters of this history of early Canberra and the region deal with the search for a capital site, and the federal capital competition.

Harrison, Peter, 1995, Walter Burley Griffin: Landscape Architect, National Library of Australia, Canberra. This work by one of the shapers of modern Canberra focuses largely on Griffin’s Australian career, with particular emphasis on Canberra.

Howard, Ebenezer, 1965 (first published 1898), Garden Cities of Tomorrow, Faber and Faber, London. The key work by a 19th-century English social reformer that inspired the Garden City movement in town planning.

Mawson, Thomas H, 1911, Civic Art: Studies in Town Planning, Parks, Boulevards and Open Spaces, BT Batsford, London. This work gives practical examples of ways of enhancing civic spaces as part of the City Beautiful movement in town planning.

Pegrum, Roger, 1983, The Bush Capital: How Australia Chose Canberra as its Federal City, Hale & Iremonger, Sydney. A detailed historical examination of the process whereby Canberra was ultimately chosen as the site for the federal capital.

Peisch, Mark L, 1964, The Chicago School of Architecture: Early Followers of Sullivan and Wright, Phaidon Press, London. Sets Walter Burley Griffin in the context of the innovative architectural movements that originated in Chicago in the late 19th and early 20th centuries.

Proudfoot, Peter R, 1994, The Secret Plan of Canberra, University of New South Wales Press, Sydney. Examines the esoteric influences on the Griffins’ plan for Canberra, reaching back into ancient geomancy and crystal theory to explain some of the underlying themes of the plan.

Reid, Paul, 2002, Canberra Following Griffin: A Design History of Australia’s National Capital, National Archives of Australia, Canberra. Examines the Griffin plan and its fate at the hands of successive waves of planners and bureaucrats responsible for developing Australia’s federal capital.

Reps, John W, 1997, Canberra 1912, Melbourne University Press, Carlton South. A comprehensive examination of the plans submitted in the competition to design Canberra, and the town planning influences evident in them.

Robinson, Charles Mulford, 1903, Modern Civic Art, or, The City Made Beautiful, GP Putnam’s Sons, New York. A key City Beautiful work describing how civic beauty might be achieved through careful planning, and giving examples.

Sitte, Camillo, 1965 (first published 1889), City Planning According to Artistic Principles, translated by George R Collins and CC Collins, Phaidon Press, London. Viennese urban theorist Camillo Sitte advocated a return to the more charming aspects of the medieval city.

Stretton, Hugh, 1989 (3rd edition), Ideas for Australian Cities, Transit Australia, Sydney. A classic work on influences that have shaped Australia’s cities, and offering new perspectives on future planning.

Sulman, John, 1909, The Federal Capital, John Sands, Sydney. Ideas for a future federal capital by a leading Australian architect and town planner.

Sulman, John, 1921, An Introduction to the Study of Town Planning in Australia, Government Printer, Sydney. A survey of town planning through the ages, and a detailed examination of Australian town planning at the time.

Triggs, H Inigo, 1909, Town Planning: Past, Present and Possible, Methuen, London. A key work by an important town planning theorist, written around the time a new federal capital for Australia was being planned.

Unwin, Raymond, 1909, Town Planning in Practice, Unwin, London. Town planning ideas by one of the designers (with Barry Parker) of the first Garden City, Letchworth (1903), following the ideas of Ebenezer Howard.

Watson, Anne (ed.), 1998, Beyond Architecture: Marion Mahony and Walter Burley Griffin: America, Australia, India, Powerhouse Publishing, Sydney. Comprehensive catalogue of a Powerhouse Museum exhibition examining the careers of both Walter Burley Griffin and Marion Mahony Griffin.

Other publications used to develop this website

Bancroft, Hubert Howe, 1893, The Book of the Fair: An Historical and Descriptive Presentation of the World’s Science, Art, and Industry, as viewed through the Columbian Exposition at Chicago in 1893, Bancroft Co., Chicago.

Jackson, Kenneth T, 1985, Crabgrass Frontier: The Suburbanisation of the United States, New York: Oxford University Press.

LaNauze, John Andrew, 1972, The Making of the Australian Constitution, Carlton, Melbourne University Press.

Reps, John W, 1995, ‘A new look at the Australian federal capital competition’, An Ideal City: The 1912 Competition to Design Canberra, catalogue essay for the 1995 exhibition, National Library of Australia.

Scrivenor, Charles, 1909, ‘Federal capital site, papers and plans etc’, Parliamentary Papers, New South Wales Legislative Assembly, no. 66, 25 February.

Vernon, Christopher, 2002, ‘A vision splendid’, A Vision Splendid: How the Griffins Imagined Australia’s Capital, catalogue essay for the 2002 exhibition, National Archives of Australia.

Walton, William c1893–95, Art and Architecture, G Barrie, Philadelphia.

Argus, Melbourne, 24 May 1912.

Lone Hand, 1 April 1908, W McLeod, Sydney.

Sydney Morning Herald, 27 May 1912.