Robin Boyd Foundation to release Manning Clark House 3D tour

The Robin Boyd Foundation is set to release an in-depth 3D tour of Manning Clark House this week, complete with about 30 interviews with those connected to the home, including family members, academics, historians, architecture and heritage experts and volunteers.

Built for the late historian Professor Manning Clark and Dymphna Clark and completed in 1952, Manning Clark House in Forrest reflects core characteristics of Robin Boyd's modernist domestic architecture.

The decision to capture the house came from a COVID problem the Robin Boyd Foundation had to overcome. At the beginning of the pandemic, they started to work out how they could engage with people, in particular for their headquarters, Robin Boyd House.

With some of the volunteers interested in technology and 3D tours in particular it was decided to capture the Melbourne premise using 3D technology, which was received.

"We thought, 'Let's try and do a few more'. And we thought, 'Why not do Robin Boyd houses or significant houses of the same period elsewhere that people haven't seen before and don't access'," Robin Boyd House chair Tony Isaacson said.

"Manning Clark House ticked a few boxes from our point of view. It's an early and significant Robin Boyd house, it's got a unique wonderful story of the family that lived there - the Clarks - and the connection to Canberra.

"It was a very big step for us in terms of using the 3D technology and exploring its capabilities in terms of storytelling. And what we discovered with 3D tours, it's important to tell a story with it. And the Clark family and that house is such a great story in itself."

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Foundation volunteers Jonathan Russell and Tim Isaacson travelled from Melbourne to Canberra last April to immerse themselves in the Clark family home for a week.

During their stay, they scanned the house with a Matterport provided by design company Arup and conducted more than 20 hours of video interviews to fill the virtual house with stories from the Clarks' life.

After returning to Melbourne - where the foundation is built - augmented reality specialists Phoria provided user interface support to bring the iconic home to life.

The project was also supported by the Alastair Swayn Foundation, which celebrates design and is dedicated to the knowledge, research and education of all things Australian design.

"It's setting a high standard of storytelling and communicating, a sort of multifaceted story. It's a story of family, a story of Canberra and a story of Robin Boyd of architecture and housing," Isaacson said.

"It's a wonderful example of how people were trying to live after the Second World War and probably in the era of mansions that have been forgotten."

The tour will be released on the Robin Boyd website on Thursday, which would have been Professor Clark's 107th birthday.

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