I want to be an architect! Education and teaching as an architectural obsession
For Don Watson, architecture was a fascination, a skill learnt early and a lifetime addiction. Long-term friend, architect and erstwhile collaborator Russell Hall jokingly explains that most babies enter the world with a cry, but baby Donald exited the womb squealing, “I want to be an architect!” Don is not embarrassed that his early childhood building blocks (the English construction toy Bayko1 ) may have been responsible for a discipline that his lecturer Ian Sinnamon (mis?)interpreted as being toilet-trained too early. Blessed with architectural stimulation from an early age, he later discovered that this was not unusual: many of his students at The University of Queensland (UQ) in the 1980s had had an influential early experience, such as a new house, a renovation or a relative in the business.2
When Don’s parents purchased land for a holiday house, their excitement rubbed off as they compiled a dossier of design ideas. But first, Searl and Tannett – an emerging practice – renovated their Brisbane house, Totnes. Responding to Don’s interest, Des Searl (1915–95) presented the budding architect with a portfolio of the
