There’s no question ‘suburbia’ gets a pretty negative rap around the place and yet for all of that the vast majority of us live there. There has to be something that we like about it, or some advantage to suburban living… you’d think… Right?…

Its easy to throw mud at suburbia for its blandness and uniformity but is there something latently attractive about it that actually lures us in? Or have we just sold our soul to convenience, security and beige?…

However its a complex question because when we are speaking of suburbia we need to delineate between types of suburbs also. Just to name a few categories in my part of the world, there are:

– the wealthy western suburbs of Perth with lots of ‘old money’ (think Cottesloe & Floreat)

– the inner east where houses are older, cheaper and there is a legacy of being a homeswest ghetto (think Koondoola, Lockridge),

– the ‘new estates’ where aspirational families build, sell, build, sell and climb the ladder to wealth and true happiness… (think Butler, Canning Vale)

– the hills where large blocks still abound and where alternative living is more prevalent (think Kalamunda, Chidlow etc)

Chances are your suburb won’t fit any of the four categories above. How would you describe it?

When we speak of ‘suburbia’ we inevitably need to speak in generalities and perhaps even caricatures for a meaningful conversation to occur. Otherwise we will be forever qualifying and defining what we mean.

Certainly in our part of the world suburbia is so diverse (as shown from the 4 examples above) that it is impossible to describe it uniformly.

So what do you think actually constitutes ‘suburbia’?

Can we even speak that generically?