Biripi man and comedian Andy Saunders takes broadcaster and design connoisseur, Tim Ross on a tour of Saltwater Reserve in the new video series, Summer Night Walks, part of The Festival of Place.
Subscribe now for unlimited access.
$0/
(min cost $0)
or signup to continue reading
The festival has been created to celebrate the best of summer in our public spaces. Andy is one of several public figures sharing their favourite public spaces with Tim Ross.
The films are created by the Department of Planning, Industry and Environment, showing how access to quality public space is vital for the health of our community.
Andy is joined by his mum Aunty Pam Saunders who helps explain the significance of Saltwater to the Biripi people.
"Saltwater was a place of dreaming for us, a place of freedom," Pam says.
Executive Director, Place, Design and Public Spaces, Caroline Butler-Bowdon said international research, and experience during the 2020 pandemic shows how valuable public space is for our physical and mental wellbeing.
"A public space is so much more than what it can do for us or the space it occupies; it is what people, stories and connections bring to it that give it life and meaning," she said.
Summer Night Walks features Ross, the host of ABC TV series' Designing a Legacy and Streets of Your Town, interviewing public figures in their special, impactful places.
"What a privilege to ask a bunch of diverse people to slow down and tell me about their favourite places," Mr Ross said. "We take public spaces for granted yet they bind us, nourish us and enhance our lives, as you'll see in this beautiful series."
Ross walks through his own favourite space, Kelly's Bush Park, a remnant of natural bushland located on the foreshores of the Parramatta River in Hunters Hill.
The series includes: .
- Journalist and author of the best-selling book Phosphorescence, Julia Baird, in Manly's Cabbage Tree Bay
- Triple Paralympic gold medallist, Kurt Fearnley, at Newcastle's Fernleigh Track
- Wendy Whiteley at her secret garden in Lavender Bay
- Comedian Andy Saunders at the Mid North Coast's Saltwater Reserve National Park
- Sara Mansour, co-founder and director of Bankstown Poetry Slam, in Bankstown Arts Centre
The series is part of The Festival of Place, a celebration of public and open spaces across NSW.