SPRING EQUINOX LONG LUNCH AT MOTEL OPTIMISMO

SPRING EQUINOX LONG LUNCH AT MOTEL OPTIMISMO

PRESENTED BY FINDING INFINITY

Saturday 19 September 2026 ● Boyd Baker House, Long Forest ● on Wurundjeri Country

Motel Optimismo invites you to a long lunch at Boyd Baker House in Long Forest, on Wurundjeri Country.

This celebration will kick off the start of an annual program that brings together leading architects and creative practitioners to consider, interrogate and celebrate ambitious models that accelerate the transformation of our cities into self-sufficient ones.

Join us for a three-course lunch cooked over fire and solar cookers by Long Prawn, a live solo piano performance by Grace Ferguson (Cold Hands Warm Heart), and a book sale and exhibition by First Editions Library. 

OFF FORM, OFF MODERN
WITH ALAN PERT

Alan Pert is an academic, architect, curator, and writer whose career has straddled academia, professional practice, and exhibition-making. Based in Melbourne, he is Dean of the Faculty of Architecture, Building and Planning at the University of Melbourne, where he previously served as Director of the Melbourne School of Design (2012–2021). For more than a decade he has led the School’s curatorial Masters subject for architects, exploring the relationship between exhibitions, archives, and design practice, while connecting students directly with museums, collections, and cultural institutions.

Originally trained in Scotland, Pert was Design Director of NORD Architecture, the award-winning practice recognised as Young British Architect of the Year in 2006. The practice’s South Block Artist Studios won the Doolan Prize in 2013, while the Primary Substation for the London 2012 Olympics was longlisted for the Stirling Prize. During this period he also led the design of the permanent Furniture Galleries at the Victoria and Albert Museum, pioneering new approaches to exhibition design, interpretation, and curatorial technology.

Alongside practice, Pert has developed an extensive body of curatorial and exhibition work that connects architecture to broader cultural and civic debates. His projects include Landforms at the 2006 Venice Architecture Biennale, Cedric Price: Think the Unthinkable (Glasgow, 2011), The Invisible College (2010), The House Talks Back (2016), X-Ray The City (2016), and The Endless Interior at Glen Eira Gallery (2023). His recent exhibition OFF FORM, OFF MODERN: A Brutalist Archaeology at Hamilton Gallery (2025) explored the relationship between modernism, landscape, and regional archives and forms the basis of his current talks on Merchant Builders and suburban housing cultures.

Pert’s research and writing examine housing, suburbia, modernism, and the cultural life of architecture. He chairs the University of Melbourne’s Housing research Initiative and convened The Housing Assembly (2021), an international symposium bringing together architects, housing providers, health experts, government, and communities around questions of housing futures. His forthcoming book, This is Not Subtopia! (Melbourne University Press, 2025), examines Merchant Builders as a radical force that reshaped suburban Australia.

OFF FORM, OFF MODERN - traces a personal and architectural journey across a series of landscapes that have shaped Alan Pert’s work across practice, exhibitions, and research. Beginning with the ruins of St Peter’s Seminary in the west of Scotland and the civic density of Glasgow’s tenements, the talk moves through Berlin and Dresden, including early work on the Hellerau Theatre and its vision of landscape, performance, and collective life. Arriving in Melbourne, the lecture explores how these European experiences reframed the Australian suburban condition - from Robin Boyd and Merchant Builders to Graeme Gunn’s geophonic landscapes and the volcanic terrains of the Grampians (Gariwerd). Drawing on Pert’s recent exhibition OFF FORM, OFF MODERN: A Brutalist Archaeology, the talk considers suburbia not as “subtopia,” but as an unfinished cultural and ecological project shaped by landscape, modernism, memory, and civic aspiration.

AN EXPERIMENTAL MUSIC PERFORMANCE BY GRACE FERGUSON

Grace Ferguson is an instrumentalist, composer, and educator based in Naarm/Melbourne. Her practice draws from encounters ranging from the ordinary to the mythic, engaging with historic and contemporary music traditions to explore memory, interruption, and the tension between the planned and what remains beyond control. 

BOOK EXHIBITION AND SALE BY FIRST EDITION LIBRARY

First Edition Library is a home for inquisitive minds to find inspiration. Part book store, part research archive, First Edition was created to bring rare and less known print material into the hands of Australian creatives. Specialising in Photography, Furniture Design, Architecture and Fashion-related books, First edition offers something for just about everyone.

A LONG LUNCH BY LONG PRAWN

Long Prawn is an artistic food practice that delivers rigorously researched food expertise heavily seasoned with creative event design. Food enveloped in community, props and performance from buffet tables to nouveau-haute cuisine. Responsive, rewarding and resourceful eating, ideas, events and workshops.

THE EVENT OVERVIEW

The afternoon will include:

• A long 3-course lunch prepared by Long Prawn featuring seasonal, locally sourced ingredients, including wine and non-alcoholic beverages 

• A talk by Alan Pert 

• A live performance by Grace Ferguson (Cold Hands Warm Heart)

• First Editions Library exhibition & sale  

• Bonfire gathering at sunset

DETAILS

DATE Saturday 19 September, 2026

DEPARTURE 12:00 pm from Melbourne CBD via Melton Train Station 

RETURN 7:30 pm arrival back to Melbourne CBD via Melton Train Station

LOCATION Boyd Baker House, Long Forest, Wurundjeri Country

PRICE $250 per person

Please note that there is strictly no parking available on site.

ADMISSION INCLUDES:

• Return electric bus transport from Melbourne CBD

• Long Lunch by Long Prawn (vegetarian, seasonal menu)

• Talk by Alan Pert

• Live music performance by Grace Ferguson

• First Editions book exhibition & sale

• Access to the Boyd Baker House estate and grounds

All proceeds go to the continued restoration of the Boyd Baker House. 

If you are facing financial hardship, please write to us, as we have a very limited number of subsidised tickets available. 

WHAT TO BRING

• Warm clothing suitable for an outdoor evening event

• Comfortable shoes for bushland terrain

ACCESSIBILITY

• Boyd Baker House is wheelchair accessible with no internal stairs. The surrounding terrain is natural bushland with uneven ground.

• Infants and children are welcome when accompanied by an adult – Please email in advance to discuss access and lunch requirements

• A quiet space is available if needed during the day.

• For specific accessibility or dietary requirements, please contact us at mary@findinginfinity.com

For more information: mary@findinginfinity.com

Motel Optimismo
Boyd Baker House, Long Forest

Motel Optimismo and Finding Infinity works and gathers on the unceded lands of the Wurundjeri People of the Kulin Nation. We pay our respects to their Elders, past and present.