Sydney and Melbourne may have streetfuls of glorious, Victorian terraces, but Canberra will always have the humble govie.
Or rather, ex-govie; most of these non-descript but utterly Canberran red-brick cottages have since been absorbed into the city's general housing stock. But back in the 1960s and 1970s, being assigned one of these was a rite of passage.
The 1960s was the capital's biggest decade yet, in which Canberra grew from country town to city in the space of barely 10 years.
The lake was filled in 1964, complete with two bridges linking north and south, and the Monaro Mall (later the Canberra Centre), Australia's first fully enclosed air-conditioned shopping mall, opened in 1963.
Anzac Parade was completed, marking the 50th anniversary of the Gallipoli landing, and the Shine Dome appeared on the (still low) horizon.
The population more than doubled, from 50,000 in 1960 to about 140,000 in 1970, and, most importantly, the Commonwealth public service was finally officially in the capital, with major departments making the definitive shift from Melbourne to Canberra.
And, as was the case in the 1940s and 50s, all those public servants needed houses, and fast.
The houses that rapidly began popping up in Canberra's streets, from Campbell to Red Hill and everywhere in between (not Forrest though) were inexpensive but, for the time at least, examples of good and efficient design.
There were 16 different versions of what was known in the 1960s as the "400 Series" - three- or four-bedroom homes with a similar rectangular shape and layout. They typically had a small bathroom, a kitchen with a separate laundry, good sized windows and a large backyard.
They were then and are still hopelessly suburban, but that was very much the ideal in 1960s Canberra.
Today we know these houses as ex-govies - perfectly serviceable family homes on decent-sized blocks that no one seems to feel too guilty about tearing down and building something bigger and more modern in its place.
But when newlyweds Alanna King and Fernando Pino, both architects, embarked on finding their first home in 2011, they needed a project.
They bought 150 Knox Street, a street full of such houses in Watson, as the ultimate fixer-upper
"We bought a renovator's delight," King says, archly. The place was in original condition, with everything that entailed. But it had a good, north-facing orientation; when the sun streams through the kitchen window, it shines right down the hallway to the bedrooms.
The houses, like most early Canberra homes, were poorly insulated and unsuited to Canberra's extremes, but the pair were determined to keep the bones intact. They replaced the insulation and wiring, double-glazed the windows, repainted and splashed out on fancy Spanish floor tiles in the living areas. But they didn't knock out any walls, and retained the 101 square metres in place.
"I don't know where that last one metre is," Pino says.
King says the structure is actually considered, and worth keeping.
"There was high-quality construction materials, and excellent quality control at the time," she says.
"It was very good value for money - you couldn't build something like this for what we paid."
Although the houses went up quickly - made with mainly locally sourced materials, and whole suburbs would have been built within two years - they were built to last, mostly by the same contractor, meaning quality and detailing stayed consistent. And many are worth keeping.
"The Canberra red bricks have been incredibly successful in terms of their longevity," King says.
"There's no wear and tear on them, and they haven't needed repointing."
King and Pino didn't move any internal walls or external openings, but they have since added a studio for their own practice, Atelier KIPU, out the back, the size of a double garage, and a large enclosed deck linking the two structures. It's an acknowledgement that the house is small, especially with the two children they've added along the way.
But that's the best thing about the Canberra ex-govie - they're endlessly adaptable. Their street has seemingly endless variations on the original 400 series theme, especially the one next door which is, as it happens, still a govie and virtually untouched.
