Pops of colour are essential for this season.
MODELS: Adelaide Gray and Greta Morton
CLOTHES: Princess Polly, 77 Malop St, Geelong
STYLIST: Courtney Drever (Princess Polly owner)
HAIR STYLST: Georgie Stuart from My Friend George, 2 Percy St, Geelong
MAKE-UP: Melinda Sestito using MAC Cosmetics, 0433 711 233.
It was the heart of communications with the wide world as the fledgling Portarlington township grew into a bustling Bellarine Peninsula commercial centre.
The building of the Portarlington Post Office in Harding St became a lynchpin for the development of the town, along with the newly extended jetty, welcoming steamers from Geelong and Melbourne.
People and goods streamed in and out of the town via the bay, with businessmen as well as residents keeping postmistress Emma Dean busy bustling from the front counter to the mail room.
The opening of the post office was reported as a “grand occasion”, linking Portarlington to the wider world by post and telegraph, and was later the site of the town’s first telephone exchange.
One of the few elaborate architectural works constructed on the Bellarine Peninsula in the 19th century, it is matched for significance only by the famed Portarlington Mill.
Built in 1888, it is a fine example of Queen Anne architecture with triple brick construction and many original features.
The polychrome brown and cream bricks feature contrasting courses, decorative iron grilles, a tiled gable roof, and an elaborate balustrade-and-pediment parapet.
A corner of Portarlington’s Market Reserve was allocated in 1887 as the site for the new brick post office. Portarlington had enjoyed a postal service since the 1860s but public agitation for a more centrally located facility had increased.
A telegraph service began in 1882 and a bank branch was also operating in the town by then, servicing a variety of stores and traders.
There was a daily coach service to Geelong along with a rail service from Drysdale. But the main method of trade was by water, with Portarlington quickly becoming an important port of call for the network of steamers plying the bay.
For more on the historic Portarlington post office building, pick up the October edition of Geelong Coast Magazine.
NORTH Geelong mum Alicia Ryan found just what she needed to create a pair of chord pants for her daughter in a quick visit to a Pakington St opportunity shop.
“I thought, ‘Do I have to go off to Spotlight on the other side of town or will I just check out the local op shops?’ I found what I wanted through thinking outside the square a bit,” she remembers.
This successful mission about three years ago led Alicia to pair her love of sewing with a passion for the environment, recycling old materials into unique children’s clothes for her brand, Evie & Liv.
Alicia gives new life to old blankets, tablecloths, tea-towels, curtains and bed-sheets, sewing girls’ dresses and nightgowns and boys’ vests and pyjama pants for children aged one to seven.
The environmentally-conscious sewing enthusiast initially toyed with making daughters Evie, 6, and Liv, 4, clothes from natural fabrics like organic cotton and hemp but eventually realised reusing unwanted household items was even more sustainable – and truly unique.
“At least 50 per cent of the girls’ clothes I make. They love all the compliments they get,” Alicia smiles.
“People can tell the difference between something that’s from Big W and something that’s handmade and they really appreciate that.”
Alicia and her family certainly live an environmentally-conscious lifestyle, with expansive vegetable gardens, chickens and solar panels all part of their immaculate home.
She juggles school and kinder pick-ups and drop-offs with work on her business, making up to 10 garments a week to sell through handmade and vintage sales website Etsy, at markets and to local shops including Quirk and Nurture by Nature Sustainable Living.
“It’s a creative outlet more than anything,” Alicia says.
“I liked sewing as a youngster and thought that would naturally be what I’d get into but I thought the industry wasn’t a good fit for me. When Liv goes to school next year I’ll have a bit more time on my hands to sort out which direction to go in.”
Similarly, Newtown artisan Monica Walters has created an upcycling business to complement her desired lifestyle.
Monica, a former chief executive officer of Cystic Fibrosis Victoria, merges recycled lamps with stacks of pre-loved books to create unique and personal home fixtures under the name Recycled Enlightenment.
“It first started when I had a big stack of books with the lamp sitting on top,” she remembers.
“I thought I should find a way to put book stacks onto lamps. I think the look of an orb of light over books has a magic to it.”
Monica began stockpiling books, lamps and lamp-shades of all shapes and sizes that she found while rummaging in op shops.
She now dedicates about 70 per cent of her time to this work, drilling holes through the books, gluing stacks on lamps, adding embellishments and having the lamps electrician-checked.
“You can do a retro look or a smart arty style or theme the book stacks on a genre like crime books, Bronte sisters or books about cars,” Monica explains.
“I go with colour schemes as well. I’ve been doing big stacks of orange Penguin books because they just look so vibrant and exciting.”
The self-confessed hoarder and op shop fanatic says she couldn’t stand to see books with such history be thrown away.
“The future of books is fairly uncertain but I think it’s important to save as many as we can. I find it really difficult to cope with seeing good things thrown out,” she laughs.
Shops all over the state as far as Colac, Brunswick and Neerim South have responded well to Recycled Enlightenment, with Monica selling locally to Geelong’s Ballyhoo and Living Etc. and Queenscliff’s Bentley and Hope.
“Teenagers really like them. I think it’s that vintage look,” she says.
“And they’re good presents for men because they can be done on all sorts of things like boating or aeroplanes.”
North Geelong’s Jessie Saligari has achieved online success with her spoon necklaces after she began combining her loves of painting and jewellery-making.
A couple of old spoons with great character she found in an op shop last year lit a creative spark in the criminology PHD student.
“Since I was little I’d always been drawing and sketching and the spoon was a perfect size to put a little painting on,” she explains.
Jessie now spends much of her spare time heating and bending old spoons into pendants for necklaces, painting little trees, animals, silhouettes and landscapes on them and finishing them with resin.
“There are a few people bending spoons into rings and things but as far as I know I’m the only one painting on them.”
Her online Etsy store, Jessie’s Junkyard, has attracted sales from as far as Europe and America, with about half her sales going overseas.
“Etsy’s been amazing for it,” she enthuses.
“As soon as I put the spoons up and advertised them as upcycled and recycled that’s when my shop really took off.”
Since moving to Geelong from Hamilton five years ago, Jessie has embraced the region’s bounty of op shops.
“I’m always scouring the op shops looking for things that I can make other things out of. I guess I just like taking something old and giving it a new life.”
Despite deciding to keep her art aside from her criminology career, Jessie hopes to expand her business into markets and shops.
“If I’m at home watching TV or something I always like to keep my hands busy, so I’ll always be doing it after uni or work,” she says.
“The Christmas period was awesome because I sold a lot as presents, so I was able to buy presents for my own family out of that.”
SHE’S the queen of the Bellarine. Cloaked in pine, sandstone and the diamond sparkle of Corio Bay, crowned with pine, cypress and oak. Waited on by courtiers of spectral form, historic renown and moneyed disposition.
Welcome to the elegant, redoubtable, even haunting, Spray Farm.
This stunning 1851 homestead _ amid a 59-hectare property sprawled across the rolling hills of Balla-Wein _ is not just a celebrated example of Victorian architecture, it’s also a showcase of evolution.
And a showstopper at that, too, as it seamlessly melds the old, the new and the in-between to make a knock-out piece of real estate worth, according to realtors, something in the order of $20 million.
That’s not spare change, of course, and the changes effected to this Victorian Gothic in recent years reflect that. Design, style, heritage, building, craft and trade experts have pored over this queen since it was bought from the Browne family of Scotchman’s Hill renown by Rick Jamieson of Black Caviar renown in 2010.
What 20 years ago was a sorry, dilapidated mess of crooked wooden shutters and untended coach houses, stables and homestead has been restored. Not so much to its original form _ just what might be considered original is kind of perjorative anyway, for this property has always been a kind of work in progress _ but restored to reflect its varied phases.
The new extensions, some of the finest in contemporary architecture, sit comfortably with the restored older sections of the property. Think imported Italian marble, cool sandstone, stained Baltic timber alongside grey slates, ochre bricks, soaring gables and spires. Coach houses, stables and pressed-metal ceilings with modern mezzanines, polished granite baths, steel-framed windows.
It now boasts seven bedrooms and six bathrooms a large living/kitchen area with adjoining dining room for 14, a cigar bar lounge, picturesque stone patios and terraces, office, formal hall reception, a large cellar, massive courtyard.
And all this in an environment of parasol pines, avenues, vineyards and sweeping vistas across the slopes to Corio Bay, the You Yangs and Melbourne.
It doesn’t look as haunted as it once did.
Which isn’t to say Spray Farm’s not haunted. The stories of spectres have persisted for too long to be dismissed out of hand.
But it does seem the ghost of Fanny Clee, daughter of pioneer Charles Ibbotson _ whose name was synonymous with Dalgetys and Newtown’s The Heights and who bought the property in 1865 _ is perhaps enjoying the restoration and upgrade.
Fanny, raised to be a paragon of Victorian female society, caused convention to go awry when she chose the family’s groom, John Clee, for a husband rather than a gentleman of greater means and scarpered away to Ballarat.
Estranged from her heart-broken father, it was a great many years before the two reconciled, but Fanny eventually saw out her days at her childhood home among the magpies, king parrots and rosellas whose warbles and squawks reverberate across the hills.
Why she’s deemed to be the ghost is rather unclear but reports of overnight visitors sent packing by unexplained noises _ floorboards groaning, windows rattling, doors slamming shut _ even a bride refusing to stay there on her wedding night, ensure the story survives.
Heritage advisor David Rowe, who worked closely with Melbourne’s Artisan Architects on the renovations, isn’t too sure about ghosts.
What he does know about Spray Farm’s architectural fabric, however, is prodigious. And his input ensured heritage elements were both safeguarded and re-introduced, with some innovative thinking.
“The interesting point is this property was developed and changed in the 1850s, ’70s, ’80s and the 1930s,’’ Rowe said.
“Basically, you have this evolution and development where some is important and where some is not.
“Where the new works have occurred, it’s been attached to the newer parts of the building. The owner had a very strong interest in maintaining the building’s original ambience.’’
Spray Farm dates backed to 1851, early in the district’s history and only 15 years after settlement.
It was designed by Geelong architect John Young for British Army officer Captain Charles Conway Langdon and initially named “Ellenvale’’ for Langdon’s better half, Ellenore.
Spray Farm has proved itself an ever-changing chameleon down the years and it seems little is about to change.
When bought by the Browne family in the mid-1990s it was rescued, restored and turned to a range of functions: open-air international concerts, Olympic equestrian training, a smart café, weddings, private events and more.
It’s hosted the likes of Matchbox’s 20’s Rob Thomas, Wynton Marsalis and the Lincoln Centre Jazz Orchestra, Lionel Richie, Joe Cocker, Rufus Wainwright and a string of talent closer to home _ Paul Kelly, Pete Murray, Tim Finn, The Seekers, Vanessa Amorosi…
After the Jamieson renovations, it’s a more private affair, one designed for a family and friends lifestyle.
Just what the future holds is unclear. By any measure, though, Spray Farm remains an exquisite retreat with breathtaking views and a wonderful heritage that’s integral to the Bellarine Peninsula.
Who knows? Maybe the ghostly apparition of Fanny Clee will make a re-appearance.
By Michelle Herbison
Charles Rose fine jewellery store owner Marcus Rose can often be found devoting many hours of his day in the rear of the office area.
“I’m often sitting at my desk right at the back of the office in Melbourne. They think I’m working out this great business strategy but I’m actually drawing,” he laughs.
Following his successful founding in Australia of family company Charles Rose jewellers and its introduction to Geelong five years ago, Marcus now combines the creative process of business with his own artistic passions.
“I devoted the first part of my life to building the business and looking after my family and that’s really my priority,” he explains.
“I’ve always been interested in painting and photography. I’ve been in the jewellery business for over 30 years but art is my personal passion.”
Marcus’ work mainly comprises large oil-on-canvas pieces painted in his studio with assistant painters, exhibited since 1994 as far as Los Angeles, Shanghai, Brisbane, Sydney, Canberra and Melbourne.
While the majority of Charles Rose jewellery is handcrafted at the company’s Melbourne workrooms, multiple annual international trips are part of the job for Marcus.
“I like to combine the fun of travel with hunting for visually interesting things. I have a bit of a fascination with the built environment,” he muses.
Many of Marcus’ artworks on display in an upstairs gallery at Charles Rose’s Moorabool St store are examples of his “urban landscapes”.
Travel to various corners of the globe fuelled Marcus to ponder society’s relationships with its buildings.
“When you drive into a city you know well, you feel grounded. Our architecture helps us to understand ourselves and who we are,” he says.
“Buildings represent the aesthetic of the time so it’s almost like looking back in time. But we’re ephemeral – they help us feel a degree of continuity.”
Paris, Tokyo, Shanghai and Buenos Aires are just some of the places featured in Marcus’ work as he enjoys reflecting on the differences between world location’s architecture.
“In Paris they have strict building codes but in Australia different genres of style sit side-by-side. Most Australians like to be free and easy and our architecture reflects that.
“You don’t know what you’re going to see here.”
Each “urban landscape” features Marcus’ own manipulated distortions, inspired by Hungarian-French op-artist Victor Vasarely.
In a modern treatment of the historical facades he often works with, Marcus has introduced to the real environment Vasarely’s concept of geographic lines creating optical illusions through manipulation of his photographs in Photoshop before painting.
“In producing art, you must create a visual tension. The warped bubble is a reinterpretation of the architect’s original vision,” he explains.
“We sense that buildings are permanent but the reality is they’re not permanent either. I’ve liquefied them a bit. Everything will come crumbling down.”
“Lafayette”, “Homenaje a Victor” and “Salon de The”, among others, feature warped bubbles that draw the viewer’s eye to the scene with renewed perspective.
“Exit through the garden”, featuring a striking historic copper door with a manipulated background of a grassy field, represents the need for escape often felt within cities.
“When you’re in a built environment you often feel you need to get back to nature. The doorways allow an exit to go to a new and happier place.”
“Boxcity” reaffirms a similar sentiment, illustrating the claustrophobia within a Tokyo Rippongi scene of dense, tall buildings and busy roads.
“Strikeout” features a city view from above, presenting a different perspective by looking down onto the buildings.
Marcus created this and other artworks utilising computer technology – plotting selected parts of multiple photos to create a montage.
“Paintings take a long time so computers offer a trial and error opportunity. Traditional artists and painters don’t use them enough,” he asserts.
Marcus reveals he is excited by the opportunities emerging technologies are providing for artists.
“I love that brave new world. I’ve indulged myself with off-beat graphic art and the use of technology.
“I’m lucky I don’t have to do it for a living so there’s less restriction on what I can do.”
Lately he has been experimenting with a digital drawing tablet, “like a giant iPad with an electronic pen”, which features the invaluable benefit of a tool available only in the digital world – the ‘back’ button.
“The end result is remarkably similar,” he says enthusiastically.
“But you’ve then got the question of what to do with the digital file? How is it going to get used?
“Maybe one day you’ll have a frame with a different work in there as often as you want to change it. That would fit with our instant gratification society.”
He reflects on the introduction of computer technologies to art in comparison with Andy Warhol’s famous Campbells soup tins, created in a factory-like workshop.
“He did screen-printing in the 20s which was very difficult and labour and time intensive. Now we can produce that flat, uniform graphic appearance,” Marcus reflects.
“Art is changing a lot and its focussing on the idea. But it’s about the essence of a creative act – if it can be done quickly and simply, does that make it any less worthy?”
Marcus finds the artistic process difficult to deconstruct but explains a certain set of criteria he believes good artworks require.
“A work of art needs to express an original idea, to express that idea eloquently and the craftsmanship of the person needs to be of a certain standard. If you get two out of those three, you can make a good work of art.”
Despite his successes, Marcus admits to being “eternally dissatisfied” with his artwork, always striving towards higher aims.
“If Einstein couldn’t be ‘proud’, neither can I. Fortunately I sell well but the art world is not easy.”
The gallery upstairs at his Geelong store is more of a storage place than an egocentric offering, he explains modestly.
“Once we’d developed the store, we had the other levels so I thought, ‘why not?’.”
Besides, fine jewellery and paintings seem to go hand-in-hand.
“Rings are little sculptures,” Marcus affirms with a smile.
WHAT is it about Aussies and Hollywood?
Pearce, Crowe, Kidman, Watts, Jackman, Ledger, Bana, Blanchett, Rush, Gibson, Mendelsohn -Tinsel Town just can’t get enough of them.
Right now yet another Aussie is at the top of the celebrity tree – a Geelong lad, no less.
Dylan Howard might be on the other side of the lens but, as editor-in-chief of monster US celebrity/entertainment website Celebuzz, he’s squarely in the spotlight, too.
But that’s nothing new.
Whether it’s scooping the world with Charlie Sheen and his urine samples or Justin Beiber’s scraps with paparazzi, he’s no stranger to the limelight.
He’s appeared on national news and entertainment programs across America and the UK and had work published everywhere from Woman’s Day to OK!
As one of America’s foremost investigative entertainment journalists, he presides over one of the biggest celebrity gossip media outlets in the US. His tens of millions of visitors each month outstrip even the biggest newsstand entertainment magazines.
It’s a long way from Western Heights College and Channel 31, where he first cut his teeth in TV.
It’s even further from his boycotting by the AFL and its footballers for reporting on Seven News alleged drug use among senior Hawthorn players.
Excessive in light of recent AFL drug-use allegations, the boycott effectively killed his then-skyrocketing career in Australian television.
Unsurprisingly, Dylan feels vindicated in his phoenix-like resurgence to a peak post in the world of new media.
But he doesn’t gloat, remembering the painful fallout his family endured during his 2008 media storm.
Many considered him a sacrificial lamb to the altar of football expediency.
After all, the newsroom reality is that reporters don’t put stories to air – that’s the responsibility of their seniors and editors.
“A lot of people do forget the amount of people involved in the sign-off of a story,” Howard tells GC from his base in Los Angeles.
“It’s not like any reporter can just go on air without being vetted by senior management. Now I’m on that side and I can tell you nothing gets through without me or senior staff giving the sign-off.”
Dylan’s tenacity overwhelmed in Australia but appealed in the US, shooting him through the ranks like a rocket-propelled grenade.
His coverage of the massive Charlie Sheen “tiger blood” scandal made him a household name.
“Charlie Sheen was probably the thing that’s punctuated my career most. I’d never been involved in a story like that before,” Dylan says.
“I remember vividly sitting in his mansion with helicopters chattering above. He and I were in the bathroom as he had a haircut.
“He’d become this disgraced darling of Hollywood and somehow I found myself in his bathroom as a person he trusted to get out his message to the world. You had to pinch yourself.
“I was sitting on the couch with a bunch of his friends when he went to the bathroom then called out to me. Next he pees in a water bottle in front of me and gives it to me and says, ‘Test this’.’’
Dylan’s exclusive video interview with Sheen streamed around the world, becoming a global sensation.
Sheen is now just one of Dylan’s many celebrity encounters.
He recounts a furious Lindsay Lohan phoning him to accuse his reporters of getting stories wrong.
“She was wrong,” he says.
A pig wearing a bow and painted toenails rushed him in the dining room of Paris Hilton’s Mulholland Drive home.
He’s covered everyone from Britney Spears and the Kardashians to Snooki and Holly Madison.
A cursory glance at the Celebuzz website reveals further glitz: Gaga, Ke$ha, Beyonce, Taylor Swift, Bieber, Hemsworth, Timberlake and hundreds more.
“We publish 50 to 60 content pieces a day and 15 videos a day – we’re a fully-fledged multimedia operation,” Dylan says.
“As editor, I’m buying photographs, building relationships with various publicists, chasing sources and stories.
“There’s still this perception that all celebrity media are like paparazzi but I’ve eliminated the word gossip in the pursuit of legitimate celebrity stories.”
This is Celebuzz’s point of difference in an extraordinarily competitive field where Dylan says traditional journalism has morphed into a new brand of contextual, in-depth, authoritative reporting geared specifically for online.
“We’re a brand without borders; on desktop, Twitter, Facebook,” he observers.
“Publishers these days need to look to social media for 30 to 50 per cent of their total traffic, whether it’s Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, whatever. They have to face up to looking at how you tell a story online; whether it’s through live chat, through a photo narrative, through a gallery, maybe a countdown of a top 10.
“Digital story-telling is not the old who, what, when and where. We’ve disrupted the way celebrity is put out there.
“Sure, we can titillate, be provocative, but at the same time we can give it a little seriousness.
“People are still out there chasing cooperation from celebrities every day but we had, for instance, Gerard Butler in our studio last week.
“Celebrities are recognising us as a reputable and authoritative media outlet.”
Dylan spends his time between Celebuzz offices on Hollywood’s Sunset Boulevard and New York’s Fifth Avenue.
His reputation in the US is enormous.
In November LA Press Club’s National Entertainment Journalism Awards named him investigative journalist of the year for his story on Leonardo DiCaprio, Toby Maguire, Ben Affleck, Matt Damon and other Hollywood heavyweights gambling away millions of dollars in underground poker games.
He’s at the coal-face of media and entertainment, production but it’s still the thrill of the chase that presses his buttons.
“I remember my old editor, Peter Judd, saying you can never replicate the feeling you create when you break a story,” Dylan remembers.
“I think the day any journo worth their salt loses interest in chasing stories is the day they should hand in their notebook.”
THE kids hold their breath as they run past the old abandoned house in Newtown. That’s how you stop the ghosts inside from getting you, they explain, seriousness writ large across their dials.
Some execute a sign of the cross as they pass the cemetery at East Geelong. Elderly folk keep mirrors in the windows to prevent spirits from entering their home. Others opt for metal amulets, candles, charms, gemstones, chants, holy water, and the old favourite, garlic.
You can’t be too careful with the dearly departed, it seems. You should always remove a dead body from the home feet first, re-arrange the furniture so they don’t recognise the place if they return, or keep a metal horseshoe over the doorway.
Of course, these are old prophylactics against ghosts but are they actually as out of date, or ineffectual, as you might think? Besides, ghosts aren’t really real, anyway. Are they?
Pam Jewson begs to differ. The publicist, director of Geelong Business Network-Training and project manager of the Golden Plate awards, had a protracted relationship with a poltergeist at Belmont’s Buena Vista motel when she managed it in the 1980s.
“The kitchen used to be locked at night, I had the keys and I locked it all up myself,” Jewson recalls.
“I slept below the kitchen and used to hear footsteps in the kitchen going back forth _ all the time, even though no-one could get in.
“One particular night, I heard all this banging and taps going so I ran up and opened up. Here was all this ice from the freezer all over benches and all the taps turned on _ at about two in the morning.
“At first, I really thought ‘Oh, the chef’s playing tricks on me’ and for ages I didn’t come at this ghost phenomenon, but over time there were too many incidents to wipe it.
“It was scary at first but in the end I got so used to it I didn’t worry.”
Jewson says staff and owners were all familiar with the ghost, who they called Nathaniel.
Story was that Nathaniel had worked at a motel over the road, where Kmart is presently sited. He purportedly suicided and relocated to the new motel across High St.
How true the story might be is anyone’s guess but Jewson’s adamant about her experience.
So too is another who differs with ghost cynics: Colin Frisch, executive officer of Karingal and the Karingal Foundation, and former marketing manager at Gordon TAFE.
He swears by a ghost traipsing the upstairs corridors of the Fenwick St campus of a night and says he’s hardly the only person to have encountered the apparition.
“A whole range of people including myself claim to have seen a ghostly image or apparition,” Frisch says.
“The story is all based around a former staffer who committed suicide by either eating rat poison and/or hanging himself in the college’s bell tower.
“This guy supposedly got a girl pregnant but he was the wrong guy. Now he’s upset and he has wandered halls of the Gordon since the 1930s.”
Frisch says it’s “a pretty spooky experience’’ going up the bell tower.
“There’s a trap door he would have pushed aside and a ladder inside the tower to get up and change flags,’’ he said.
“He supposedly opened the door, threw a rope over an Oregon beam and they found him dangling there.
“I’ve been working on the top floor at seven at night when something someone passed the door, it sent a chill right up my spine.”
Irish Murphy’s owner Barb Smoorenburg relates another ghostly tale, about a spectre dubbed ‘Mary’, who’s given guests, drinkers and staff more than a few shivers down the years.
The old Argyle Hotel _ dubbed The Strangler’s Arms after the killing of a woman upstairs in the 1950s _ has been witness to glasses hurled across rooms, urns lifted up and moved, doors slammed shut, dockets spat out of printers, phones set ringing, terrifying voices hissed into the ears of staff and drinkers, and more.
“My daughter Victoria was working here alone one night and rang me almost hysterical after one Mary incident,” says Barb.
“The salt and pepper shakers start jiggling all on their own and someone said something quite clearly in her ear. She was so scared she couldn’t even remember what they said.
“I said stay on the (cordless) phone and go upstairs and turn off the lights. Then while I was still on the phone with her I had a call come through from her mobile _ which she’d left downstairs.”
Mary’s also happily turned washing machines on and off, locked staff in the laundry, rattled doors and windows, shaken bar mats, made creepy wind-like whooshing sounds _ she’s nothing if not a busy poltergeist.
Ghostly stories abound across Geelong. And they’re a shivery species of spooky tale too.
Scratch around and pretty soon you find plenty of accounts:
_ A young female ghost haunting Moorabool Street’s former Pancake Parlour, now the Black Bull, after being raped and murdered out the back in Gore Place. Chairs stacked on tables have reportedly moved back and forth around the restaurant.
_ An apocryphal tale of a ghostly baby trapped between floors in Kitchener House, opposite Geelong Hospital.
_ Books and shoes thrown from shelves and across the floor at Myer’s Malop St store, rows of televisions and radios inexplicably turned on, footsteps, basketballs spinning in mid-air at the top of the escalators _ all thought to be the handiwork of the one-time champion of cheapness, 19th century merchant Morrie Jacobs.
_ The shade of undertaker James Munro, meant to whisper body sizes to passers-by outside his former Ryrie St premises, site of today’s Scof. Munro had a spyhole upstairs where he watched for business coming through the front door. The back yard was meant to have been fertilised by the drained fluids of corpses.
Then there’s the old Geelong Gaol, touted as one the district’s most haunted buildings.
There you’ll find my dear old man’s namesake, James Murphy, whose presence is said to be felt around cell 47 and was the first person sent to bright yellow gallows the gaol hosted back in 1863 for the murder of a policeman at the Warrnambool courthouse.
Whisper is you should also be wary around cell number 45 where a malevolent energy is rumoured to hold court _ and where visitors are said to have been pinched or even pushed into the cell.
And of course Winchelsea’s National Trust property Barwon Park is renowned for housing a ghost even if sightings are little more than a moving light sighted occasionally from the bedroom where Elizabeth Austin died in 1901. A photograph of a young woman in a low-cut dress that emerged in recent years has been subject of considerable controversy.
St Albans Park is known for ghosts, too. Built 1873 for racehorse breeder James Wilson, it’s meant to harbour several sprites, among them a racehorse owner, a sleazy ladies man and a disappearing jockey.
Newtown’s Barwon Grange, another National Trust property, is known for a long-gowned female ghost while immediately south of the river, Belmont’s Kardinia House, built in the 1850s for Geelong’s first mayor, Alexander Thompson, is known for an old knitting lady found reaching out to children sleeping in their bed.
She seems comparatively well behaved to other poltergeists supposedly inhabiting the property and kicking up slightly more of a ruckus _ emptying kitchen cupboards of their contents, and scattering them across the floor.
Once again, Colin Frisch, whose Karingal duties are undertaken at Kardinia House, attests to working in a haunted house.
“It’s not actually been my experience but it has been for heaps of staff here,’’ he says.
“They talk about security systems and lights going off, about drapes and doors that are icy cold to the touch. Our cleaner, who comes in early in the mornings, just tells it to sod off.’’
Susan Hill, author of The Woman in Black, writes of ghosts and “…howlings and shriekings, groanings and scuttlings, and the clanking of chains, of hooded monks and headless horsemen, swirling mists and sudden winds…” and, it seems, has a fair take on what it is we prefer to curdle our blood and chill our marrow.
Nope, nothing real about ghosts… just remind yourself of that when next you’re walking the streets of Geelong at night.
And don’t forget to hold your breath as you creep past that abandoned old house.
WINTER in Geelong and its coastal regions is mild compared to other areas.
Few frosts and an absence of snow mean the region’s soil remains relatively warm winter.
So gardeners have no reason to pack away gardening gloves and hoses to retreat inside for three months – a great selection of edible crops can be planted and eaten right through the winter months.
In fact, gardening in Geelong’s mild, temperate winter climate is invigorating.
Garden beds need to be prepared during June and July for spring plantings.
Dig them over and add generous amounts of horse manure – generations of gardeners have used the stuff.
Back before the motor car, horse dung was in abundance and plenty is still around. Keep an eye out along the rural roads of the Bellarine Peninsula and Surf Coast where many properties sell manure for as little as $2 for a big bag.
Chicken poo is a little more expensive but is considered a super manure.
Be careful using it fresh, though, because it can burn plants and seedlings.
If preparing beds weeks in advance, it’s fine to dig it straight into the soil to be well-composted by planting time.
Another enjoyable task in winter is visiting nurseries to select from the many bare-rooted fruits for sale.
Regardless of how big or small your backyard or block, large, small and dwarf varieties available.
Again, plan where to plant the trees and prepare the planting holes several weeks in advance with lots of compost and well-rotted manure.
Broad bean seeds can be planted during June to be ready for harvest in late August.
Broadies are a flavoursome and ideal for steaming or vegetable soups.
As a legume, broad beans add nitrogen naturally to soil.
Silver beet is a good pick-and-come-again plant.
High in iron, the colourful variety called chard is ideal steamed or in quiches.
Brassicas can go in during winter for spring harvest. This genus includes cabbage, cauliflower, brusell sprouts and any of the exotic Asian greens.
Carrot seeds can be planted at the start of winter. They can be thinned and used as small finger-sized vegetables and the rest of the crop left in to grow on to regular size.
Nothing matches the scent of freshly picked carrots.
Beetroot grows fast but can be picked small or left to grow larger.
Peas also smell delightful and taste even better when home-grown, although many plants are needed for a full saucepan.
Seed potatoes are available locally, with the wide selection ranging from the elongated kipflers to red-skinned, white-flesh varieties.
Gardeners should always strive to grow vegetables and fruit without the use of chemicals. A wide selection of fertilizers and growing aids approved for organic gardening are now available.
Compost and manures should be used in vegetable beds and under fruit trees.
Healthy plants better resist disease.
Words: Cherie Donnellan
Photos: Reg Ryan
Papa Mio’s Matt Santoro spent six months perfecting his signature recipe for crusty Italian ciabatta at his Corio Street bakery. It might seem like a long time to spend making a loaf of bread but the hundreds of weekly customers buying Matt’s ciabatta seem to appreciate his patience.
“When I got the recipe right, I started off making a two kilo batch a day. Now it’s my biggest line, I make up to a 50 kilo batch a day.”
And now he’s doing the same with his organic sourdough. Papa Mio’s sourdough recipe harks back to the methods used long before you could buy bread from a supermarket shelf, Matt says.
“Sourdough should only have three ingredients, flour, salt and water.”
Oh, and a natural leaven, too. He believes that not only does bread taste better when it’s made with natural ingredients but there has been a significant rise in the number of self-aware consumers who want quality, nutritionally-rich foods.
Matt says customers shouldn’t be fooled by supermarkets and large franchise bakeries touting “natural” ingredients in their bread.
“People are slowly learning about what good bread is, but it’s hard [for artisan bakers] when you go into bakeries that say proper sourdough, and it’s not sourdough. It’s chemicals that are put in it to make it taste sour.”
Production pressures – making products fast and en masse – is often responsible for larger companies being unable to bake “authentically”.
Perhaps that’s why Geelong’s chefs prefer to serve Papa Mio’s breads in their restaurants and cafes.
“Our biggest customer is Geelong Fresh Foods on Pakington St [and] we [supply] Waterfront Seafood, La Parisian restaurant, Wharfshed café, Chifley on the Esplanade, Ripples By the Bay, Ebony and Ivory…”
The list goes on.
Matt says the wholesale side of the business developed through word-of-mouth. His father Barry’s former wholesale Breakwater Bakery, which had been servicing Geelong and Surf Coast restaurants since 1977, also helped Papa Mio’s reputation.
In fact, Matt learned his baking secrets from Barry, beginning as a bakery assistant at the tender age of 11.
“I used to work on Saturdays with him when I was 11 years old, just for fun. And then I just developed a passion for it. It wasn’t something I was forced into, I just enjoyed it.”
By the time Matt was 15, he became so determined to follow in this father’s footsteps that he left school and joined his father baking full-time. That’s where he learned the tricks behind his father’s sought-after continental bread. But Matt jokes the rolls (sorry, roles) have reversed.
“He sort of takes my advice on the sourdoughs and the ciabattas because they’re the lines I’ve [developed] and it’s like I’m teaching him,” he laughs.
When James Street Bakery closes for the day, Laurent Praud’s work day begins. His name may have given away his French heritage but so could one bite of his mouth-watering macarons. He’s pretty nifty in baking a scrumptious sourdough, too.
Laurent attributes his love of food to growing up in a small, French countryside town where food was sourced “from the garden or sharing with neighbours”. He adopted his parents’ appreciation of food and wine but he also couldn’t ignore the stories his grandfather – a baker – told.
“My grandfather was a baker. He was telling me all these stories about how he used to bake. He had an old oven…and he was telling me about mixing the bread by hand and all these things of things.
“I guess that probably triggered it.”
Laurent began an apprenticeship with a baker in a nearby town and soon learned to perfect the baker’s specialty, sweet bread known as brioche.
But Laurent believes Australians are yet to truly adopt the French penchant for sweeter breads, particularly at breakfast.
“People [in France] love their croissants and pain au chocolats in the morning, cooked fresh.
“And Danish pastries. But not here.
“I think maybe because it’s a health thing. People don’t want to have to go and run 10 kilometres after eating these things,” Laurent laughs.
He also considers the Australian mentality towards visiting bakeries “very different”.
“I don’t see people going to the bakery in the morning to buy their fresh baguette. I think in France it’s a tradition in some ways. People just do it because it’s been [a habit] for a long time. People in Australia haven’t got that mentality.
Maybe one day it will come. Maybe in Melbourne it’s a bit more obvious, but here (Geelong) I don’t think it’s quite there yet.”
Laurent agrees with Matt that when it comes to artisan breads, customers want naturally cultivated breads.
“I suppose people are a bit more aware of what they want to eat. They want it to be as natural as it can be.”
Hanz Weiser handpicked Erwin Halle – from Germany – to take over his Pakington Street bakery when Weiser decided to retire. Erwin says as a 20-something at the time, he jumped at the chance to learn the art of continental baking in a different environment. After all, he’d already trained in bakeries throughout Europe.
“I’ve worked in a couple of places that still had the original woodfire ovens. [Shortly after completing my apprenticeship] I travelled a little bit around Europe to get a bit more experience – in all different styles. In Europe, if you move from one part of the [continent] to another, the tradition is totally different.”
But Erwin remembers artisan breads had yet to set Australian tongues wagging when he first arrived.
“It was a big, big difference.
“Australian bakers at the time were more into [baking] just white blocks. Some bakers did some white viennas, some normal wholemeal and multigrain. That was it.
“Whereas now you get artisan bread virtually everywhere.”
Erwin says like Matt, he has noticed supermarkets trying to pass off additives with fancy labelling. He’s not convinced even additives like chia seeds aid nutrient content.
“My research has told me that it’s more propaganda. You get more vitamins from other products than the chia seed.”
His daughter Sandy Hoffman, store manager of Weiser’s Bell Park, says health messages about low GI or low-carb often confuse customers.
“Customers often ask for something like low-GI white bread but we don’t cater for it because we believe in the natural process.
“Or we’d be steering [them] away from the white and saying ‘well if you want something that healthy for you, why not try a multigrain, wholemeal base?’ Multigrain’s got all the seeds, it’s going to aid digestion because it’s going to make your stomach work for it, but with a wholemeal base it’s going to keep you fuller for longer.”
Erwin’s personal preference is rye, light or dark.
“Twelve hours before we try to make the dough, we have to ferment the rye flour… without any chemicals. It’s a natural process. And we’ve had the sourdough culture here for…well since I started.”
Mmmm…I’m hungry.
By Greg Wane
BROWSING in an antiques shop in Melbourne recently I came across a box of old photos, among them an intriguing set of pictures – unmistakably shot at Geelong’s railway station and Johnstone Park. I was immediately intrigued.
Pencilled on the back was the brief description: “Prince of Wales visit”.
One of the photographs showed Edward Prince of Wales emerging from the Geelong Railway Station accompanied by Geelong mayors of the day.
Some detailed research of old newspaper files revealed that the Prince visited Geelong during a Royal tour in June 1920 for just an hour and a half.
Throughout the 1920s, Edward, as Prince of Wales, represented his father King George V on 16 Royal tours to various parts of the British Empire between 1919 and 1935. His good looks, travel experience and unmarried status gained him much public attention and at the height of his popularity, he was the most photographed celebrity of his time.
The Prince arrived by train from Melbourne at 11.15am on Wednesday 2 June. He stepped from the rear observation carriage onto the Geelong platform where he was met by Geelong City Mayor Howard Hitchcock and the mayors of Geelong West, Cr R Rosenberg and Newtown and Chilwell, Cr D Laidlaw.
Outside the railway station hundreds of people cheered as the Prince appeared. He was accompanied by the Royal Australian Navy’s Captain M. Robbins on an inspection of a naval guard of honour. About the same time two Australian navy ships, HMAS Sydney and Encounter, fired a Royal salute from their anchorages in Corio Bay.
The motorcade proceeded past Johnstone Park where loud cheers went up from the 7000 school students representing most of the primary schools in the Geelong district. The procession continued along Gheringhap Street to the town hall where the lady mayoress Mrs Hitchcock presented His Highness with a souvenir gift of his visit to Geelong: A solid gold paperweight embellished with a representation of a fern leaf, a kookaburra, a kangaroo, emu a boomerang and the City’s coat of arms.
The Prince then moved into Johnstone Park where he performed the official duty of naming the main footway through the park between Gheringhap and Fenwick streets. At the request of Mayor Hitchcock the Prince declared the footway the “Prince of Wales Boulevard.”
Newspapers of the day reported that the Prince had said that the city of Geelong had paid him a great honour.
While the Prince moved among the people in the park, a large crowd standing along Railway Terrace rushed across garden beds into the park to get a view of the Prince. The police were powerless against the more than 300 people who surged into Johnston Park preventing the Prince from meeting the assembled school children. This part of the program was quickly abandoned and the Prince was escorted back to his motor car.
Earlier in the morning the mayor Cr Hitchcock had distributed 7300 commemorative medals to the school children.
The Prince was then driven via Malop Street to the Moorabool Street wool showroom of Dennys Lascelles Limited where he viewed an exhibition featuring Geelong’s manufacturing and industrial capabilities.
At the exhibition, the Prince was immediately attracted to an electric sheep shearing machine demonstration. However as the Royal party approached there was a loud crack and the shearing machine stopped. The electricity switch to the machine had fused leaving shearer Harry White unable to demonstrate shearing to the Prince.
The final stop on the Princes’ 90-minute schedule was the Little Malop Street rooms of the Returned Soldiers Club.
The motorcade then made its way via Little Malop, Moorabool, Ryrie and Gheringhap streets, with the Prince standing in the open topped, chauffeur driven car waving to the hundreds of people that had lined the parade route back to the railway station.
On return to the station and before boarding the train to Colac, the Prince moved away from the official party to personally thank his Geelong chauffer Harold Farrell who drove the mayoral car during the Geelong visit.
In the 24 hours leading up to the Prince’s arrival Geelong’s police superintendents Robinson and Selwood had brought in, by an earlier train, an extra 120 constables from stations as far away as Bendigo, Maldon, Warrnambool, Castlemaine and Casterton to handle to large crowds expected at Geelong.
City cafes had closed during the morning, and when eateries finally opened at 1pm after the Prince’s visit, crowds of people flooded in for lunch. The ABC Cafe in Moorabool Street, one of Geelong’s largest, was forced to shut its doors after a short time because of the large crowd already inside.
Police moved in when there were fears the glass doors and windows could be damaged in the crush.
Because of the difficulty of obtaining meals in cafes, there was a rush on pies and pastries – a more convenient food – which forced hundreds of people to eat their lunch in the streets.
Teachers were desperately trying to arrange lunches for hundreds of school children who had travelled to Geelong from country schools. This had put further pressure on the pie and pastry supplies and by 2pm retail records had been broken and there was not a flake of pastry left in Geelong.
Heavy showers in the morning prior to the prince’s arrival threatened to disperse the crowds but people remained defiant against the weather and stayed at their vantage points around the city, getting a soaking.
Few city shops that remained open during the morning did any business, but the rain proved a windfall for the city’s drapers with many selling out of umbrellas as the rain clouds approached.
Sixteen years after his visit to Geelong, on the death of his father George V in January 1936, Edward Prince of Wales ascended the throne to become King Edward VIII.
Soon after, he made headlines when he chose to abdicate the throne in December 1936 to marry American divorcee, Mrs Wallis Simpson. Edward had reigned for just 326 days. He died in Paris in 1972.
AT just 22 years old, Rebecca Martin had been studying nursing, something she considers a “conservative” career, despite her burgeoning desire to work in fashion.
But it wasn’t easy completing her placement in an oncology ward when her grandfather had passed away from cancer. Realising “it probably wasn’t really me anyway”, Rebecca switched her major to commerce, saw a gap in the market for unique home wares and “jumped in”. S&R Homewares was born.
“When I started (S&R Homewares’ first store location) Highton I was so young. I kind of just jumped in and did it, which, I dunno, is that really naïve?
“I absolutely believed in it though. I guess if you believe in it just jump in and do it because you’re never going to know and I’m not going to sit back with a whole lot of what ifs…”
But for Rebecca, “jumping in” has paid off. She now owns and manages three boutiques under the S&R branding: a home wares store in Highton, Barwon Heads’ clothing store, and Torquay which stocks a mix of both. Rebecca says both the decision to open the Highton store nine years ago and the expansion into fashion has been “organic”.
“I always wanted to work for myself and I’ve always loved beautiful things in the home and I loved giving gifts for people. That’s how [Highton and Torquay] started and the clothing just evolved… and [Barwon Heads] is the standalone [clothing] store.”
Rebecca remembers the beginning of S&R where she worked solo in-store while building her brand. And yet, almost a decade and seven staff hires later, she has come full-circle – perhaps not in the way she’d like.
“I could honestly say at the moment, I’m probably working too much [in-store]. I’m hoping to step back a little bit from being in-store and get a little bit more time.”
Luckily, Rebecca declares, her “beautiful” husband Simon – the full-time carer of their sons Charlie and Xavier – has been her “number one” supporter.
“He’s a stay-at-home dad and it’s pretty special. He does a lot of home stuff and he does running around behind the scenes [for the business].”
Rebecca reveals Simon’s handiwork was behind the eclectic beach-inspired interior fit-out of the Barwon Heads store GC visited.
She bustles around the store, excusing herself to answer multiple calls – “Yes we’re open”, “Of course, come in and try it on” – before coming back to our chat where she praises her parents for supporting her dreams.
“They’ve had family businesses for years and they gave me the background [knowledge] to do my own thing.”
Though Rebecca plays down acknowledging her success during our interview, its obvious customers appreciate her friendliness and eye for detail.
“I’ve got a vision and branding concept in mind. I want products that you can’t get in other places.”
She’s clued in to the concept that the region’s shoppers like to buy local, but says even visitors to the region have recognised her unique collections.
“[Visiting customers say] ‘there’s nothing like this in Melbourne’. I feel like, Melbourne, you’ve got the pick of everything there and then they’re walking in here saying ‘this is amazing’; it’s like little pats on the back.”
But she’s got no immediate plans to expand there, at least not while she’s building a plan to sell products online. Rebecca admits though, online will present a challenge for her.
“I’m not really great with computers, it’s a different language sometimes,” she laughs. “But I’m looking forward to it.”
Social media, Rebecca asserts, has helped build her brand.
“Instagram’s been working well. There are girls commenting, saying ‘where’s your store located?’ Others ring up and say ‘I want that whole outfit’.
Fashion advocates are “engaged users”, Rebecca says, but linking in brands has also helped expand her potential customer base.
“We follow, say, [Australian boutique footwear brand] Senso, and so I did a post and they’ve reposted it which is so exciting because it goes to all their [followers]. I think that’s how we’re going to build our audience really quickly, especially when we’ve got suppliers backing us. You’re working together.”
Rebecca expects a refurbishment of her first store in Highton will take her brand to new places. When reflecting on the past decade of owning and building a brand, Rebecca humbly marvels at opening a store, herself barley out of university, and then expanding her brand when her son Xavier – just three months old at the time – was having difficulty sleeping through the night.
“I look back and go ‘how the hell did I do that?’ I guess you just adapt,” she laughs, running to answer the phone again.
MEGAN Somerville humbly denies she built Belmont-based medical super clinic Kardinia Health from the ground up, but does admit “I’ve been here since it was dirt”.
She spearheaded the development process of Geelong’s – and one of Australia’s – first “super clinics”, the federally-funded practices offering “one-stop shops” for medical services.
She doesn’t flinch while mentioning the $7 million of Federal Government funding she was responsible for managing to open the clinic. Nor does she baulk at recalling the 18 months of long work days.
She established a solid team of staff and reported spending to various government bodies and the clinic’s board of directors. Despite inaugurating Kardinia Health, Megan was prepared to hand over the fruits of her labour to an incoming chief executive officer just three months after the clinic opened. But the board had other ideas for the then 27-year-old.
“They did the interviews (to find a CEO) and then they came back to me and said ‘we would really like it if you could stay’ so I did and I’ve been here ever since,” she laughs.
Only 30 years old, Megan has held coveted positions around the country, but in speaking to her for just a few minutes it’s easy to see how she has risen to the top so quickly. She began her career working as a nurse and psychiatric nurse in Mildura and Darwin, before finding her niche managing 350 doctors at Royal Melbourne Hospital.
“Doctors and HR (human resources) don’t speak the same language so I was the person in the middle. I interpreted each way.”
Then, after a Royal Melbourne medical director encouraged Megan to pursue her management talent, she landed one of six coveted places with the Australian College of Health Service Executives. The course was her “big break”.
“My first job [while studying with ACHSE] was negotiating a contract for Peter Mac oncology. I had to do the footwork on negotiating the service agreement and stuff like that… and I think that’s the whole point of the college – you’re supported the whole time, you know, you’re given a mentor – but that’s how you develop those skills.”
She has also earned her Masters of Business Administration and has this year resumed a law degree she began studying while working in Darwin as a psychiatric nurse. It’s a wonder she manages to find the time to compete at state and national level in show riding horses. But the crazy schedule doesn’t faze her.
“I think I’m a kind of manic type of person,” she laughs. “It’s funny isn’t it? When I stop something I just fill it (the time) with something else”. Megan believes she’s “pretty lucky” that her partner – a doctor at Barwon Health – understands her “busy lifestyle”. “It works,” she laughs.
But luck doesn’t factor into the career success she’s had, and there have been challenges, she admits.
“I guess my physical appearance, you know… yeah… and because I’m young and female… does make it harder. I find you just have to work that extra bit harder to get, oh, respect really.”
Being an attractive, under-35 boss is something Megan doesn’t keep at the forefront of her mind, though. “I just keep moving forward.”
And that she does. With her sights set on completing her law degree and further developing Kardinia’s Health range of primary care services, Megan says “the sky’s the limit”.
DIANA Taylor attributes her success as a corporate lawyer and a director or chairperson of at least seven boards to her belief in community and teamwork.
“I’ve always clearly understood that I’ve been a part of a team. The wonderful thing about the businesses I’ve been a part of, is that it’s never just been a group of individuals so you understand that your place, your role, is critically important.”
That very statement oozes through the subtext of her resume; Diana’s worked pro-bono for community organisations like The Big Issue and disability legal service Villamanta. She sits on the board of directors for Doutta Gala Aged Care Services. Her main role as a director of CT Management Group is enabling the consultancy to help local government make effective and financially-sound decisions.
She speaks passionately of every role she’s earned but there’s one team she was part of long before she sat at its boardroom table: Geelong Football Club.
“I’ve been a Cats supporter since I was a little girl. The Cats have always had a special place in my heart. They’ve been a very big part of my family life and growing up in Geelong, a huge part of the community.”
Diana remembers her “dream come true” moment speaking with then-Cats president Frank Costa, CEO Brian Cook and director Colin Carter over the phone about a board opening after Doug Wade stepped down from his position. But being a calculated and strategic thinker, Diana admits not taking the role immediately.
“In any role, whether it be a business role or a football role, you need to understand what your responsibilities are and what contribution you’re going to be able to make.
“We had those discussions before I joined and it was decided at that point that with my background as a lawyer, with my business background and with my community football background, that was a good synergy.”
Until then Diana had been making waves in community and state level football leagues. She had been involved with the Western Region Football League for some time and founded the WRFL Women’s Football Foundation.
WFF was established to support female involvement in sport. Diana believes women often shy away from opportunities, thinking about the formerly male-dominated culture.
“There are a lot of fantastic women who’ve been involved in football for a long time and perhaps aren’t seeing opportunities and options beyond their own club, and what I would say to them, based on my experience, is: talk to people around you, there’s always an opportunity.”
She also spearheaded a strategy to remove the alcohol-fuelled culture “creating issues” during finals for 7000 players in the WRFL. Her ‘light alcohol policy’ campaign was consequently adopted by Australian Football League Victoria.
“It was an achievement I was proud of,” Diana beams.
Since joining the Cats, she has also established its female-based group, Nine Lives which “has become one of the key voices for women at the Geelong Football Club”.
Diana doesn’t mention that she’s the only female on the Cats’ board of directors, but she does believe women bring a unique “insight and perspective” to the game.
“That may be because of a playing and a non-playing role, it may be because of a life experience, it might be because of professional experience. The important thing that whenever you’re sitting around a table engaging people in football, they understand the basis upon which you’re making the statement that you’re making and the experience that you’re bringing to the table. The Geelong environment has always been incredibly supportive.”
Like Megan, Diana attributes some of her success to mentors and executive coaches.
“They’re people with whom you develop a quiet but supportive relationship where they’re able to guide, support, lead you and open your mind up to opportunities and perhaps identify limitations that you’ve placed on yourself that shouldn’t otherwise be there,” Diana asserts.
She acknowledges her position to become a mentor for others now, too.
“I get a lot of questions asked of me and a lot of requests for coffees and time from younger men and women who wish to get involved in the industry and questions from young lawyers about how they can improve, how they can go about developing their own careers and I’m always more than happy to have those discussions with people because I know how important it is when you’re developing a career to know what those paths potentially look like and what the options are to get to where you want to get to.”
And yet, regardless of the numerous goals she has kicked in the boardroom, Diana doesn’t think of herself as being at the top of her game.
“I think I’ve got a whole lot more learning to do and I think that that never stops.”
