Reflections from the 2025 Melbourne Design Week Film Festival

Until recently, Arthur Erickson was a name I only knew in passing. It was just six months ago that I properly encountered his work—and what caught me immediately wasn’t the scale or form, but the light. Or rather, the contrast of it: the deliberate play of light and shadow, the sense of quiet drama. Erickson knew how to make a space breathe—how to create calm through control, and warmth through restraint.

So when Beauty Between the Lines screened as part of this year’s Melbourne Design Week Film Festival, I made sure to see it. What followed was more than a biography; it was a meditation. The film traces his career with patience and clarity, revealing not just the celebrated projects and public acclaim, but the inner world of a man who lived for architecture—and, at times, despite it.

What struck me most was the consistency of vision across his work. Whether designing monumental civic buildings or private residences, Erickson’s sensitivity to landscape, structure, and silence never wavered. The film captures this beautifully. It also delves into his relationships—with collaborators, clients, friends—many of which were close, sometimes complicated, always deeply human.

One scene near the end of the film stays with me. Erickson, by that point bankrupt and largely overlooked by the profession, is working on a coastal house. Just before a concrete pour, a serious issue arises. There’s tension, pressure. And then—he picks up a pencil. With quiet confidence, he sketches a solution, seemingly without hesitation. It’s resolved. Elegantly, effortlessly. The pour goes ahead.

Watching that moment, I felt a kind of reverence. It was mastery, distilled. The kind of clarity that only comes after a lifetime of drawing, thinking, making.

Beauty Between the Lines is not a loud film. It moves softly, just as Erickson did. But it leaves a lasting impression. It reminds us that architecture is not just a profession—it’s a life. It demands everything. And if you’re paying attention, it gives something back: a way of seeing, of shaping, of being. Erickson lived that truth completely. And through this film, we get to witness it.

See Arthur Erickson’s most significant works here.