What's a Neighbourhood House anyway?
Stories from the grassroots
There are more than 400 neighbourhood houses scattered across Victoria.
Some are in old weatherboard houses. Some are in community centres, shopfronts and converted buildings. There are communal kitchens with cupboards full of mismatched mugs, gardens overflowing with produce, slightly dodgy heaters, second-hand furniture, noticeboards covered in flyers and rooms that somehow host yoga at 10, English class at 1 and an AA support group that night.
And they are full of people.
People learning to use an iPad at 98. People turning up because they’ve just moved to the area and don’t know anyone. People cooking together, painting, fixing bikes, learning English, looking for work, volunteering, getting food relief, making things, teaching things, organising things - or just having somewhere to go.
Neighbourhood houses are strange little beasts. They’re independent, local and often held together with tiny budgets, volunteers, ingenuity and people doing far more than anyone is paying them to do. That’s also what makes them different. They can shift with a community because they belong to that community.
In a world becoming increasingly digital, automated and disconnected, they might be one of the last genuinely grassroots spaces we have left.
And yet plenty of people have absolutely no idea what they are.
You can count enrolments, volunteer hours, meals, courses and participants. But those numbers don't tell you about the person whose neighbourhood house is the only place they go each week. The friendships formed over chipped cups of tea. The 90 year old who is still turning up to learn. The person who walked through the door knowing nobody and eventually became the person welcoming everybody else.
That’s the stuff we want to collect.
These stories attempt to document neighbourhood houses from the inside - not through annual reports, logos or polished case studies, but through the people who actually inhabit them.
We’re collecting stories, photographs and scenes from houses across Victoria: the extraordinary ones, the funny ones, the difficult ones and the beautifully ordinary ones.
Because maybe the best way to answer “What’s a neighbourhood house anyway?” isn’t to explain it at all.
Maybe you just need to meet the people inside.
Put your house on the map
We’re collecting stories from neighbourhood houses across Victoria - the people, characters and moments that show what these places really are.
Nominate someone from your house whose story should be told.
We’ll get in touch, have a chat and turn it into a story for the growing online collection, with selected stories forming part of the eventual book.
Know someone we should meet? Contact Keira at [email protected]
Stories from the grassroots
There are more than 400 neighbourhood houses scattered across Victoria.
Some are in old weatherboard houses. Some are in community centres, shopfronts and converted buildings. There are communal kitchens with cupboards full of mismatched mugs, gardens overflowing with produce, slightly dodgy heaters, second-hand furniture, noticeboards covered in flyers and rooms that somehow host yoga at 10, English class at 1 and an AA support group that night.
And they are full of people.
People learning to use an iPad at 98. People turning up because they’ve just moved to the area and don’t know anyone. People cooking together, painting, fixing bikes, learning English, looking for work, volunteering, getting food relief, making things, teaching things, organising things - or just having somewhere to go.
Neighbourhood houses are strange little beasts. They’re independent, local and often held together with tiny budgets, volunteers, ingenuity and people doing far more than anyone is paying them to do. That’s also what makes them different. They can shift with a community because they belong to that community.
In a world becoming increasingly digital, automated and disconnected, they might be one of the last genuinely grassroots spaces we have left.
And yet plenty of people have absolutely no idea what they are.
You can count enrolments, volunteer hours, meals, courses and participants. But those numbers don't tell you about the person whose neighbourhood house is the only place they go each week. The friendships formed over chipped cups of tea. The 90 year old who is still turning up to learn. The person who walked through the door knowing nobody and eventually became the person welcoming everybody else.
That’s the stuff we want to collect.
These stories attempt to document neighbourhood houses from the inside - not through annual reports, logos or polished case studies, but through the people who actually inhabit them.
We’re collecting stories, photographs and scenes from houses across Victoria: the extraordinary ones, the funny ones, the difficult ones and the beautifully ordinary ones.
Because maybe the best way to answer “What’s a neighbourhood house anyway?” isn’t to explain it at all.
Maybe you just need to meet the people inside.
Put your house on the map
We’re collecting stories from neighbourhood houses across Victoria - the people, characters and moments that show what these places really are.
Nominate someone from your house whose story should be told.
We’ll get in touch, have a chat and turn it into a story for the growing online collection, with selected stories forming part of the eventual book.
Know someone we should meet? Contact Keira at [email protected]
Stories from the grassroots
What actually happens inside a neighbourhood house? We asked the people who know.
Pick a house. Read their story.
What actually happens inside a neighbourhood house? We asked the people who know.
Pick a house. Read their story.
