Melbourne is Australia's most architecturally attractive and interesting city. The genius of the Hoddle Grid blessed the city with good bones, and we have kept much of our inner-city heritage compared with other Australian capitals.

Collins Street: a mix of old and new. Credit:The Age

We have a city council that invests in great street design, including bluestone pavements, quality street furniture and beautiful trees and plantings.

In recent times we have even added some architecturally striking new buildings, buoyed by the resurgance in Melbourne design culture after the early 1990s crash. But unfortunately, we have also allowed far too much crap to be built.

This century has seen the biggest building boom central Melbourne has ever known – creating pressure to construct taller towers on ever-smaller lots and meaning design quality needs to be better than ever.