Spent the day with the thesis year students doing a blitz on the Thomaston Rural Heritage Centre project, a project by one of last year's thesis teams that's not yet finished. It's a pretty major building - the part refurb and part new build of a 5000 sq ft centre and community kitchen, and it's extraordinary to see what 5 (now reduced to 3) people can build with their bare hands - a really high quality of workmanship and design that is serious and professional. It's quite unlike the aesthetic of many of the well-known projects from the RS - much more polished and 'architectural' with glass, timber and metal - but also imaginative and fits its brief with style. And it's going to have a 100x30 ft long road sign donated by the Highways Authority above the building to signal its presence - so it's not entirely so serious.

We got a great lunch of barbeque and brownies made by the women who run the Heritage Centre - the best barbeque around, people say, and it was damn good, stoking us up for the afternoon's hard work in alternating downpours and sun, the fringes of Hurricane Frances.