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Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology |
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| RMIT University | |
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| Latin: Universitas Technicus Melburnensis Regia | |
| Motto | perita manus mens exculta (Latin) |
| Motto in English | "a skilled hand, a cultivated mind" (Non-literal translation) |
| Established | 1887 |
| Type | public |
| Endowment | AU$1.107b (2007)[1] |
| Chancellor | Emeritus Professor R. Dennis Gibson, AO |
| Vice-Chancellor | Professor Margaret Gardner, AO |
| Faculty | 3,604 (2008)[2] |
| Students | 49,476 (2008) (inc. TAFE) |
| Undergraduates | 33,603 (2008) |
| Postgraduates | 10,371 (2008) |
| Location | RMIT City campus, Melbourne, Victoria, Australia 37°48′28″S 144°57′48″E / 37.80778°S 144.96333°ECoordinates: 37°48′28″S 144°57′48″E / 37.80778°S 144.96333°E |
| Campus | urban |
| Former names | The Working Men's College (1887-1933) Melbourne Technical College (1934-1959) |
| Sports mascot | RMIT Redbacks |
| Colours | red, black, white |
| Affiliations | ASAIHL, ATN, GU8, OUA |
| Website | rmit.edu.au |
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The Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology (commonly referred to by the acronym "RMIT" - and also used in its post-nominal letters) is an Australian public university and provider of vocational education located in Melbourne, Victoria. It has two main branches: RMIT University (encompassing RMIT TAFE) and RMIT International University.
Founded in 1887 by prominent grazier and philanthropist, The Hon. Francis Ormond, RMIT is the third-oldest higher education provider in the state of Victoria and the seventh-oldest in Australia. Its foundation campus "RMIT City" is located at the northern end of the Melbourne CBD. RMIT was awarded royal patronage in 1954, and is the only Australian university to date to have received the honour.
RMIT is considered to be a selective university, ranked third in the state of Victoria and tenth in Australia - in reference to its research output. According to the THES - QS World University Rankings it is ranked as one of the top five internationalised universities; top 100 universities for producing work-ready graduates; and amongst its annual list of "Top 200 World Universities" - one of 20 institutes of technology that regularly feature in the listing. It has an internationally-recognised reputation for art, design, engineering and technology; and its industry-relevant ethos.
RMIT pioneered the dual sector education system in Australia during the mid-20th century.[3] It is now the largest institution of its type in the country, and offers every level of award available in the Australian Qualifications Framework.[4] Academically, the university focuses on higher education and research while its TAFE division focuses on vocational education and training.
It is a founding member of the Australian Technology Network and the Global U8 Consortium.
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The Working Men’s College of Melbourne was founded in 1887 by a prominent grazier and philanthropist, The Hon. Francis Ormond MLC, who donated £5000 toward the establishment of the college.[3][5] The Council of the Melbourne Trades Hall then matched Ormond's initial donation through rallying its members.[3][5] On June 4, the college opened in a purpose-built building on the corners of Bowen Street and La Trobe Street in Melbourne, with a gala ceremony,[3][5] becoming the third official provider of higher education in the Colony of Victoria (the Melbourne Athenaeum was founded in 1839 and the University of Melbourne in 1853). In 1904, the college was incorporated under the Companies Act as a private institution.[3][5]
Between the turn of the 20th century and 1930s, the college expanded dramatically over the former Melbourne Gaol site with the establishment of an art school, an engineering school and a radio school. In 1934, it then changed its name to the Melbourne Technical College.[3][5] During the 1940s, over the course of World War II, it trained a sixth of Australia’s service personnel (mainly Royal Australian Air Force radio communication officers), 2000 civilians in munitions manufacturing and was commissioned by the Government of Australia to manufacture parts for the DAP Beaufort Bomber.[3][5] In 1954, it was awarded royal patronage by Queen Elizabeth II for its service to the war effort – becoming the only Australian university to receive the honour – and it was renamed the Royal Melbourne Technical College.[3][5]
In 1960, the college changed its name to the Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology (RMIT) and began to reconstitute itself as a tertiary institution.[3][5] The college was incorporated into the institute as a vocational school (TAFE) and, during the 1970s and 1980s, the institute developed a reputation in art and aeronautical engineering.[3][5] In 1979, it amalgamated with the neighbouring exclusive women’s Emily McPherson College of Domestic Economy, which brought with it a reputation in fashion design and food technology.[3][5] In 1992, it was granted public university status by the Government of Victoria under the Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology Act, and adopted the name RMIT University for it tertiary arm and RMIT TAFE for its vocational arm.[5][6]
During the 1990s, the university underwent a rapid expansion and amalgamated a number of neighbouring institutes.[5] In 1995, it developed a “country campus” in Bundoora and acquired the heritage-listed Former Melbourne Magistrates' Court.[5] In 1999, it developed a “design campus” in Brunswick and acquired the heritage-listed Capitol Theatre.[5] During this time, it also developed a reputation in eco-friendly design. At the turn of the 21st century, it was invited by the Government of Vietnam to develop the country's first foreign owned university.[5] It opened its first campus in Ho Chi Minh City in 2001, and a second campus in Hanoi in 2004.
In Australia, RMIT is considered to be a selective university;[7] and is ranked third in the state of Victoria and 10th in the nation, in reference to its research output.[8] In a global survey of employers, it was ranked 60th in the World for producing work-ready graduates.[9][10] Like all universities in Australia, entry to all RMIT's tertiary programs (and some TAFE programs) are determined by the Equivalent National Tertiary Entrance Rank (ENTER) scoring system. Those without a sufficient ENTER score may also sit the Special Tertiary Admissions Test (STAT) to gain entry to RMIT.[11] Prospective students make their applications through the Victorian Tertiary Admissions Centre (VTAC) and sometimes directly to RMIT via a portfolio submission.
In 2008, RMIT was ranked 206th in the World by the THES - QS World University Rankings, down six places, which is the first time it has not ranked in the 'Top 200 World Universities'.[12] RMIT's Vice-Chancellor, Prof. Margaret Gardner, said the university's lower ranking was "in common with many Australian universities".[10] Separately, it is ranked 94th in Engineering & IT, 149th in Arts & Humanities and 196th in both Life Sciences & Biomedicine and Social Sciences.[12] In 2009, RMIT was ranked 223 in the World.[13] However, it still ranks as one of the top ten Australian universities according to the list.[14]
THES-QS also ranked RMIT as the fourth most internationalised university in the World (behind the University of London's School of Economics and School of Oriental and African Studies; and Cranfield University) according to students, and 15th in the World according to faculty/staff.[15][16] RMIT is also ranked as the top entrepreneurial university in Australia, and 12th in the World, according to the GSEA annual Top Entrepreneurial Universities List.[17]
The following publications ranked universities worldwide. RMIT ranked:
| Publications | Ave. | 1999 | 2000 | 2001 | 2002 | 2003 | 2004 | 2005 | 2006 | 2007 | 2008 | 2009 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Times Higher Education Supplement[18] | 152 | 55 | 82 | 146 | 200 | 206 | 223 | |||||
| Shanghai Jiao Tong University[19] | u/r1 | u/r | u/r | u/r | u/r | u/r | u/r | u/r | ||||
| Newsweek[20] | ||||||||||||
| The Economist | ||||||||||||
| Financial Times MBA rank[21] | ||||||||||||
| Economist Intelligence Unit's MBA rank[22] | ||||||||||||
| Webometrics:[23] | 376 | 299 | 360 | 379 | 466 |
1u/r = unranked.
The Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology is a public university created under the Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology Act of 1992 by the Government of Victoria.[6] It has two main branches known as RMIT University (encompassing RMIT TAFE) and RMIT International University - which are registered trading names.[24] Before its creation as a public university, RMIT was a private institution for 105 years.[3]
The greater RMIT is governed by a council of 22 members known as the "RMIT Council".[25] The current Chair of the Council is RMIT Chancellor, Emeritus Professor Dennis Gibson. The Council is responsible for the "direction and superintendence" of RMIT University, and the administration of RMIT International University Holdings Pty. Ltd. – a wholly-owned subsidiary of RMIT. The day-to-day operations of the greater RMIT are managed by RMIT Vice-Chancellor, Professor Margaret Gardner, who is also the President of RMIT University in Australia. The President of RMIT International University in Vietnam is Professor Merilyn Liddell.
It is structured as 25 semi-autonomous schools, offering over 700 programs at vocational (TAFE), undergraduate, postgraduate and research levels.[26][27] Each school is grouped into one of three academically-contextual colleges, which are known as "Business", "Design and Social Context" and "Science, Engineering and Health".[28] Most schools also maintain their own field-relevant research collections, which are in addition to the RMIT University Library network (see: Notable school collections). RMIT's 30+ centres of excellence are also grouped into a college according to their context, to allow for cross-field research.
College of Business
College of Design and Social Context
College of Science, Engineering and Health
RMIT has over 30 research institutes and centres, either based within its colleges and schools or operating autonomously within the university, and a large number of research clusters and groups. It is ranked as one of Australia’s top 10 research universities;[14] and focuses on applied research, outcome-related research and consultancy services – which area all in line with its industry-relevant ethos. It also has extensive partnerships and collaborations with government and industry.[29]
Its four top-ranked international research institutes include the RMIT Design Research Institute, RMIT Global Cities Research Institute, RMIT Platform Technologies Research Institute and RMIT Health Innovations Research Institute.[30] A number of top independent research institutes are also based at RMIT, including the Australian Housing and Urban Research Institute and the Australian branch of the US' Nautilus Institute for Security and Sustainability.[31][32]
Its notable research centres include the Australian Centre for Human Rights Education, RMIT Centre for Animation and Interactive Media, RMIT Centre for Design, RMIT Globalism Centre, International Centre for Environment and Bio Ethics, International Centre for Graphic Design, International Centre for Housing and Urban Research, Sir Lawrence Wackett Aerospace Centre and RMIT Spatial Information Architecture Laboratory.[33]
Major collaborative partners with RMIT include the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation in the Australian APEC Study Centre,[34] Australian Institute of Sport as its preferred partner in sports technology research, Boeing Company in an systems development centre called the Boeing-RMIT Phantom Works,[35] Government of Australia in eight Cooperative Research Centres and Government of Victoria in a design industry advancement centre called DesignVictoria.[36][37] RMIT is also partnered with Fujitsu, as well as Victoria's two other top-ranked universities - the University of Melbourne and Monash University, in Australia's first low carbon emission and energy-efficient technology data centre.[38][39][40]
In addition, many organisations are permanently partnered with RMIT's institutes, centres and schools for research. Notable partners include Airbus, Australian Defence Force, BHP Billiton, BMW AG, Country Road, CSIRO, Deloitte, Ernst&Young, Ford Motor Company, GUESS, GM Holden, IBM, Luxottica, Pacific Brands, Siemens, Subaru, Telstra, Tenix, United Nations and Volkswagen Group.[41][42][43][44][45][46][47][48]
RMIT University maintains three campuses in Victoria, Australia - City, Bundoora and Brunswick. It also operates a number of specialised "sites" - in metropolitan Melbourne and in rural Victoria. RMIT International University maintains two campuses in Vietnam - Ho Chi Minh City and Hanoi. RMIT offers distance/online education through Open Universities Australia and is partnered with over 190 educational institutions around the World. In 2003, over 58,000 students studied at RMIT. Currently, prospective students of RMIT have a choice of over 700 higher education and TAFE programs located across all campuses, sites, by distance/online education and with partner institutions.[26]
The City campus is RMIT's original and flagship campus. It was established in 1887, as "The Working Men's College", in a single building on the corner of La Trobe and Bowen streets. It's currently the largest of RMIT's campuses, in both Australia and Vietnam, and occupies nearly four city blocks at the northern end of the Melbourne CBD; which is often referred to as the "RMIT Quarter" of the city.
It is the only university campus entirely located within the Melbourne CBD and spans an area loosely bordered to the north by Queensberry Street, the east by Lygon and Russell streets, the south by La Trobe Street and the west by Elizabeth Street.[49] It is divided into four precincts referred to as: the "Art Precinct", "Carlton Precinct", "Justice Precinct" and "Swanston Precinct". Some buildings are also not located on the campus, which include: the entire College of Business, located on nearby Bourke Street, and the Capitol Theatre on southern Swanston Street.
The City campus is notable for its mix of modern and contemporary architecture as well as Victorian and gothic revival architecture.[50] As of 2007, the campus is also undergoing a AU$500 million redevelopment in accordance with RMIT's "2007 - 2010 Infrastructure Plan".[51]
RMIT City offers programs university-wide.[52]
Established in 1995, RMIT Bundoora is the award-winning "country campus" of RMIT.[53] It is RMIT's second oldest and second largest campus and is located in Bundoora, 20 km from the City campus. RMIT Bundoora is divided into two campuses by Plenty Road, known as East and West. The older West campus was the former site of the Phillip Institute of Technology, which amalgamated with RMIT in 1992.[5] The campuses have their own transport interchange which is served by a dedicated tram route (86/RMIT Bundoora-Docklands) and dedicated bus route (570/RMIT Bundoora-Thomastown). The nearest train station to RMIT Bundoora is Thomastown station.
Unlike the urban RMIT City campus in Melbourne, the West campus is set in 42 ha of parklands and designed to be eco-friendly and sustainable. RMIT has sought to preserve much of the natural heritage of both campuses, notably the "Keelbundoora Scarred Tree Trail" - a rare collection of 800+ year old red gum trees (lat: Eucalyptus tereticornis), located within the grounds of the West campus, with historical markings by Indigenous Australians.[54][55]
The smaller East campus has a specific focus on engineering, and is home to the RMIT Renewable Energy Park, RMIT Wind Tunnel testing facility and the RMIT Racing teams. The larger West campus has a general focus on sciences, and is home to RMIT's biosciences buildings and the Bundoora Netball and Sports Centre, an environmentally sustainable sport centre and facilities.[56][57] The West campus consists mainly of contemporary architecture and many of its buildings have gone on to win national awards for architectural and sustainable design.[53]
RMIT Bundoora offers programs in aerospace engineering, electrical engineering, mechanical engineering, medical sciences and social sciences.[58]
The Brunswick campus is RMIT's specialised design campus,[59] and is located 5 km from the City campus, in Brunswick. Situated on Dawson Street, the campus is near Sydney Road, one of outer Melbourne's most multicultural shopping strips and the site of many restaurants, pubs and markets, as well as large art and music festivals.[60] The campus is well serviced by train via the close by Jewell station and by a number of trams that travel along Sydney Road.
Established in 1999, it is RMIT's smallest and youngest campus, although the history of RMIT Brunswick can be dated back over 50 years prior to the former Melbourne Institute of Textiles - which amalgamated with RMIT in 1998, and originally occupied the site of the campus.[61] RMIT Brunswick is home to the International Centre for Graphic Technology, RMIT Printing Centre and RMIT Textile Centre, and the campus is a combination of industrial and contemporary architecture.[59]
RMIT Brunswick offers programs in fashion design, graphic design, printing, publishing and textiles.[62]
Royal Dental Hospital, Melbourne
RMIT operates levels 3 and 4 of the Royal Dental Hospital of
Melbourne - a collaboration between Dental Health Services
Victoria, RMIT and the University of Melbourne.[63][64] The
RMIT component consists of a primary care clinic, specialist
services unit, day surgery theatres and the emergency clinic.[65]
Fishermen's Bend, Port Melbourne
The Fishermen's Bend aerospace district, in Port Melbourne, is the site of
RMIT's award-winning
Sir Lawrence Wackett Aerospace Centre. It was established in
1991, and moved to new facilities at its current site in 2007.[66][67]
RAAF Base Williams, Point Cook
The Royal Australian Air Force
base "Williams"
at Point Cook is the site of RMIT's
Flight Training Facility.[68] The
base is the World's oldest operational military airfield and
birthpace of Australia's air force.[69] RMIT
has shared a historical association with the Royal Australian Air
Force, which dates back to World War II.
RMIT Hamilton, Southern Grampians
Hamilton is the site of RMIT's
Regional Education and Community Development Centre and is known as
"RMIT Hamilton" for short. It was established in 2000 and conducts
research into rural development, and partners with local farmers
and businesses to assist with the development of Victoria's western region.[70] RMIT
Hamilton also grants degrees in rural nursing and education, to
assist with dire regional requirements.[71]
Bullock Island, Lakes Entrance
Bullock Island is the site of RMIT's Marine Research and Education
Centre and the RMIT Aquaculture Research Facility, and is located
near Lakes Entrance. It was
established in 2004, and is contiguous with the South-East
Australia Maritime Centre.[72] RMIT
has provided training in Victoria's eastern region since
1994 (through its partner institutions), and continues to assist
with the development of the region.[73]
RMIT International University in Vietnam, also known as "RMIT Vietnam" for short, was established in Ho Chi Minh City in 2001.[74] It is Vietnam's first fully foreign-owned university and RMIT's second major international venture (a Malaysian site known as "RMIT Penang" operated between 1996 and 1999). In 2004, a second campus was established in the Vietnamese capital city of Hanoi. Currently, RMIT Vietnam campuses have a combined population of over 3,800 students from Vietnam, Australia as well as various other countries. RMIT Vietnam's degrees are recognised by the Vietnamese Ministry of Education and Training and are awarded by RMIT University in Australia.[74]
RMIT University Library is the central library network at RMIT.[75] It has six locations across RMIT's Australian campuses, each reflecting the academic focus of their respective campuses. The Swanston Library at the RMIT City campus is the university's largest library,[75] and is considered to be one of the top five libraries in Melbourne.[76] As a library of the Australian Technology Network,[75] RMIT University Library invests substantially in electronic resources and in online and A/V collections.[75] It also has access to over 400 global databases containing over a hundred thousand e-journals, reports, conference papers, e-books, etc.[75]
RMIT Research Repository
The Library also manages the RMIT Research Repository - an online
databank containing a number of electronic
records and full texts of peer-reviewed published articles and
conference papers, books and chapters; as well as other forms of
research, produced by RMIT staff. Access to the Repository is
available free of charge to anyone in the World, not just to RMIT
staff and students.[77] The
Repository was launched to the public in 2009. Records are
harvested by Google, OAIster and Australian Research
Online (formerly the Arrow Discovery Service).
AFI Research Collection
The AFI Research Collection is a specialist, non-lending film and television resource; opened in the mid-1970s by the Australian Film Institute (AFI) and Victorian Federation of Film Societies.[78] It also contains the valuable David Francis Collection and the notable Henry Mayer and the Wayne Royal Levy collections and became an auspice of the RMIT School of Media and Communication in 2002.[78]
Architecture and Art
RMIT holds considerable architecture and Australian art
collections. Many of its campuses' buildings are a part of its
architecture collection, along with substantial archives held by
the RMIT School of
Architecture and Design. RMIT's Australian art collection is
maintained by RMIT Gallery in Storey Hall (also part of its architecture
collection). The Australian art collection also includes the
valuable W.E. Macmillan Collection (gold and silver) and notable
Lindsay Edward Collection (fine art). The history of the collection is
documented in the publication: "A Skilled Hand and Cultivated
Mind".[79][80]
Fashion and Textiles
The RMIT fashion and textiles collection is held at the Francis
Burke Centre at RMIT Brunswick campus by the RMIT School of Fashion
and Textiles.[81]
It contains substantial costume, couture, fashion illustration and textile collections, and also
includes the Prue
Acton, Alfredo Bouret, Frances Burke, Louis Kahan, Hall Ludlow, Robert Maltus and
Bee Taplin collections.[81]
National Aerospace Resource Centre
The National Aerospace Resource Centre collection is a joint
initiative of the
RMIT School of Aerospace, Mechanical and Manufacturing
Engineering and the Royal Aeronautical Society.
It consists of approximately 100,000 volumes, including: technical
reports (from NASA, NACA, AMRL, DSTO, and
other aerospace organisations), conference proceedings, books,
videos, aircraft manuals and journals.[82]
RMIT is considered to be one of the most reputable art and design universities in Australia,[83][84][85] which is reflected in its ten permanent art galleries. Nine are located on the RMIT City campus and one at the RMIT Bundoora-West campus.
The university's largest gallery is RMIT Gallery, which is housed in the historic original section of Storey Hall at the City campus. RMIT Gallery is open to the public free of charge, and is considered to be one of Melbourne’s best contemporary art galleries.[86]
Other galleries are operated within the schools of RMIT, and include the Design Hub Gallery,[87] Field 36 Gallery,[88] The DrawingSpace (a Metasenta Gallery),[89] RMIT Virtual Reality Centre and Gallery,[90][91] Viscom Gallery,[92] and the RMIT School of Art Gallery and Project Space Gallery.[93] The RMIT Union also operates two galleries which are the First Site Gallery and PitSpace Gallery (the latter located at the RMIT Bundoora-West campus).
RMIT also has a number of temporary art spaces throughout the city of Melbourne, and conducts regular exhibitions in public spaces.[94] RMIT Gallery also curates the Fracture Gallery located in the atrium of Federation Square.[95][96]
Most activities, clubs and organisations for RMIT students are managed by either the RMIT Union or the RMIT Student Union. The two unions differ in that RMIT Union is an unincorporated subsidiary body owned by the university that's concerned with campus life and administers a wide range of arts, sporting and recreational activities and collectives for students[97]. Whereas RMIT Student Union is an independent, not-for-profit and student-run organisation that's concerned with student life, and administers clubs and services in support of students.[98] A number of other activities and clubs are also run independently of RMIT's unions, usually within a school of the university.
The purpose of the RMIT Union is to contribute positively and enhance the RMIT community by providing valuable learning, development and social opportinities in a co-curricular setting.[97] Its divided into branches, known as: Arts and Sports & Recreation, which administer a range of arts, sports and recreation activities and collectives.
Sports
Recreation
The RMIT Student Union operates as a not-for-profit organisation and is run entirely by students. It's responsible for RMIT's student media organisations, campus events, student support collectives and welfare groups as-well-as student administered academic and national-based general interest clubs and societies.[98]
Publication
Radio
Television
The RMIT Spiritual Centre is a historical building located on the City campus of RMIT. The centre provides a space for worship to all staff and students of RMIT, regardless of their faith and without showing favour to any one faith, and houses the RMIT Chaplaincy service.[104] However, in 2008 RMIT was accused of reneging on a promise to accommodate its significant Muslim student population[105] with appropriate prayer room facilities after the previous facility was closed due to a reconstruction.[106] The RMIT Islamic Society (RMITIS) protested by boycotting the multi-faith centre and holding weekly Friday prayers, with hundreds of Muslim students, in one of the university's main outdoor thoroughfares.[107]
RMIT has an internationally-recognised reputation for art, design, engineering and technology; and its industry-relevant ethos.[85][108][109][110][111] It has produced notable graduates in: Art, Business (with strength in Commerce), Communication studies (with strength in Media studies), Design (with strengths in Architecture, Fashion Design and Industrial Design; specifically sustainable design), Engineering (with strengths in Aerospace and Mechanical engineering), Health Sciences (with strengths in Bioscience and Traditional medicine), Social Sciences and Technology (with strengths in Information Technology and Nanotechnology).
A notable graduation tradition of RMIT is its annual graduation parade - a town and gown-style academic procession along the major Melbourne throughfare of Swanston Street. The parade members march 1 km in full academic dress from Bowen Street (in the RMIT City campus), down Swanston Street, and culminate at Federation Square (until 2002, the parade culminated outside the Melbourne Town Hall).[112] The parade receives a military escort from the central marching band of the Royal Australian Air Force, of which RMIT shares a historical association with, and graduands are accompanied by staff and alumni.
The parade is welcomed at Federation Square by the Lord Mayor of Melbourne, on behalf of the city and its citizens. The Lord Mayor then grants RMIT's Vice-Chancellor a "writ of passage" to proceed with the graduation ceremony, which takes place at the Docklands Stadium, and is the largest university graduation ceremony in Australia.[113][114]
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Official websites Student services |
Other resources |
Texts:
Murray-Smith, Stephen; Dare, Anthony J. (1987), The Tech: A Centenary History of the Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology (1st ed.), South Yarra (Melbourne): Hyland House, ISBN 0947062068
Edquist, Harriet; Grierson, Elizabeth (2008), A Skilled Hand and Cultivated Mind: A Guide to the Architecture and Art of RMIT, Melbourne: RMIT University Press, ISBN 9781921166914
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