Objects of Substance - Classroom_furniture final

It’s only a desk and a chair – does it really matter? You do not have to look very far to find reminders of the past at Girls Grammar. Buildings and 140 year old fig trees are obvious signs but today it is more difficult to ascertain what went on inside classrooms. However, within the 2020 Elizabeth Jameson Resource Learning Centre, there are preserved two examples of very early student “accommodation”: the two -seater desk and bench. One sits comfortably beside 21 st century furniture in the Level 1 foyer. It still displays its stained dark colour and is decorated with the marks of generations of Grammar girls. On Level 3, at the end of a mezzanine level, a restored version provides a quiet and comfortable study space for one or two students. These pieces have proven to be popular places to work and the lovely irony about them is that they are the perfect angle for the 2020 laptop - and working with a friend. These heavy pieces made of solid silky oak and wrought iron were in use from the earliest days of the 20 th century and remained as student facilities in what were dubbed “the cottages” when I started at Grammar in Year 9 in 1964. That two room “temporary” building was situated right at the front of the School, only centimetres from the fence, and to the right of the fig tree [if you have your back to Gregory Terrace]. Between the cottages and the tree was a driveway infamously used by the sixth form Grammar boys who drove in and round and out to celebrate their final school day that year. My class, 9A, was in the classroom closest to the Main Building and inside were rows of these desks and benches. Under the desk top was a narrow shelf on which you could place your equipment and we also had a small wooden locker in the room because this shelf space was tiny. Over the years, these desks and benches were replaced by newer versions but, ever economical, the School authorities decided to have them painted green and repurposed as garden furniture around the campus. Later, some were even relocated to Marrapatta. It may have been a cost-effective and practical decision but, to my mind, it also revealed an acknowledgement of the past and an early example of thoughtful and responsible recycling. What do I see when I look at this quaint desk and seating configuration? Its very weight reminds me of solidity, of the idea that learning has always been important and that a sound educational foundation is vital for a positive and hopeful future. I also think about the way the configuration lead to interesting collaborations between students – both encouraged and not so encouraged. This idea of students working in teams is a strategy embraced by most teachers now and is a skill often mentioned by employers as vital to a successful modern workplace.

My next three years at Grammar were spent in different classrooms in the Western wing and the furniture there was considered “modern” in comparison. Students sat at individual wooden desks with a lift-up top for all of your books and writing equipment. The chairs were wooden too and, though they looked hard, they were really quite comfortable and certainly helped your posture. What was interesting was that, although these were individual desks, they were organised in pairs. A legacy of the older versions, perhaps? We had no lockers and no way to secure our books and other equipment but we did have hat hooks and bag racks. One past student from the 1950s remembers something Miss Lilley said to incoming students: “Girls who leave their names on desks never leave them on honour boards.” I wonder if the opposite is true: desks leave their mark on the students who sat at them all day, week after week. In those years when most of the lessons were taught in the same classroom, you had your own desk in the same place in the one room. The feel of that smooth wood, the knowledge that all your hard-won notebooks just under your hands, and even the indent for your pens and pencils were all comforting and familiar. Modern desks may look stylish and bright but sometimes they fail to stir that intimate connection to place that is much more than space.

Kristine Cooke [Harvey 1967] Director of Information Services

1971 garden furniture

Lorraine Williams, Kristine Harvey, Rachelle Mawhinney and Linda Groom of Form VIA in 1967 at their desks in W1.1.

1960 Miss Elliott in W2.1 Western Wing

Old fashioned graffiti on the two seater desk

The two-seater silky oak desk