2025’s top 10 bestsellers
It was a bumper year for Australian architecture and design releases, both from our publishing arm Uro Publications and other independents. We saw a lot of superb books find their way into the shop, but the following titles were our top 10 bestsellers—we’re thrilled to see all of them were either focused on local architecture and design, produced by local publishers, writers and editors, or all of the above...
1.
Paul Couch, Field Studies
Several years in the making, this book explores four houses by the elusive architect Paul Couch, whose work, despite going largely unpublished until now, has a near cultlike following in Melbourne. Couch’s profile has been steadily growing since Kennedy Nolan’s 2021 campaign to protect Carter Couch’s Fairfield canoe pavilion and this exquisite book was a passion project for its creators Stuart Geddes, Michael Roper, Tom Ross and James Mugavin. It has been eagerly awaited—as the fact that it’s our top selling book for 2025, despite only being released by our publishing arm in December, attests. Get yourself a copy while we still have copies left...
2.
Plantology: The Essential Guide to Better Gardens
The ‘plant Bible’—probably the most comprehensive garden design guidebook we’ve seen in recent years for Australia’s diverse conditions. Written and published by landscape designer Lisa Ellis and horticulturist Teena Crawford, Plantology is an extremely useful tool for anyone hoping to design and plant a thriving garden in this part of the world, no matter the scale or location. Per Paul Bangay, ‘The definitive guide to plant selection for Australian gardens’…
3.
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Thinking Space: Readings from a Life in Architecture
A subject very close to our hearts, this, so we’re thrilled to see this book from our publishing arm was so well received. Thinking Space is architect and educator Leon van Schaik’s exploration of how books, and book collecting, have framed his lifelong research into spatial intelligence—the ways in which our past experiences in physical space shape our mental space, which in turn informs how we act in the world. The ultimate architecture (and architecture adjacent) reading list, it was also Uro Publications’ first book to make the renowned Deutsches Architekturmuseum Architectural Book Award shortlist at the Frankfurt Book Fair…
4.
Roy Grounds: Experiments in Minimum Living
Written and published by Tony Lee, the founding director of the Robin Boyd Foundation, this is both a rigorously researched and handsomely produced book on the early apartment designs of Roy Grounds. While Grounds is best known for the monumental NGV, this is a timely look at his work developing compact, efficient and affordable housing —an important legacy, especially in the contemporary context of Australia’s seemingly endless housing crisis.
5.
Kerb 33: Appetite
Produced by a team of RMIT landscape architecture students and published annually by Uro Publications, Kerb Journal has been going from strength-to-strength in recent years (Kerb 32 also made our top 10 bestsellers list for 2025 and 2026, sneaking in at number five and number 7 respectively). The latest edition is a lateral exploration of food landscapes and how the principles of nurturing and maintenance bring to the act of designing. Juicy stuff…
6–10.
Grounds, Romberg & Boyd: Melbourne’s Midcentury Modernists
$65.00