Over the summer break many tenants of the Nicholas Building, mostly long-term studio artists, have been forced into the difficult decision to vacate, as the Swanston Street building is made more “marketable” for sale. Rents increase (it’s what they do). But this dramatic driving up of the cost of working space in the city’s best-known creative hub has already smashed the delicate conditions that have seen the nine-floor building flourish as a real community for a variety of artists, gallerists—most committed to showing non-commercial work—and small businesses over the previous decades. As if it wasn’t already clear: Melbourne, Australia, has entered its real-estate era. The reality is, of course, that it has been this way since 1835.