Developer Luxcon calling their new high-end development in the centre of Byron ‘Bohemian’ couldn’t be more on the nose.
Judging by the artist’s impression on the development’s website (no actual art was involved, it’s a computer program), the place looks about as un-bohemian as one can get. White-on-white (of course), a bit of beige, and dripping in luxury.
Calling this posh joint ‘Bohemian’ is as misguided as calling a five-star resort ‘Humility’, or a casino ‘Hunger’. A quick Wikipedia search is all it takes to find a description of Bohemian as ‘anti-establishment in political and social views, often expressed through art, frugality, simple living, van dwelling or voluntary poverty’. Hardly fitting for a complex of 44 luxe apartments and a retail plaza costing $200 million.
This development is an insult to a word I love, a word that better defines my musician friends living out of their cars, or my artist friend in her shack, surviving on tofu and farmgate broccolini. It’s a word that belongs to the poets living six-to-a-sharehouse who meet up on Friday nights to lament, in verse, the cost of living and housing insecurity.
Luxcon is living up to its name. A ‘luxury con’. Stealing words of rebellion against capitalism for their flagrant capitalist agenda. As always, the elite are so devoid of originality all they can do is ride the wave created by true mavericks and artists.