Innehållsförteckning för Issue 127- Sep/Oct 2025 från frankie Magazine

Our art director Kate describes her high school dodgeball experience as “nightmare fuel”. Our marketing coordinator Iris’s most embarrassing moment took place during a school camp game that involved rotating your head on an upturned baseball bat (??) and attempting to run. She did run – straight into the wall. And when I was seven, I attempted to go to my first soccer training, with intentions of joining the team. I was so mortified that halfway through the session, I burst into tears and ran across the field into the arms of my baffled mum, never to return. All this to say, it’s amusing that we have a few sport-adjacent stories in this issue. There’s an article on the rise of pickleball – a sport that’s typically favoured by retirees…

There’s a work of art that takes pride of place on the wall of our family’s home. It tells the story of a couple sailing on board a fishing boat, whiling away the day in utmost bliss. My husband and I were recently married when we purchased this work of Shirin Sahba’s. Of all her pieces, it resonated – the vivid colour palette, the ode to our new beginning, Shirin’s signature miniature patterns – in its depiction of a school of rainbow fish converging to the middle of the sea that captivates the viewer in a dreamlike trance. During a time when we had set sail on a new chapter, under our own turquoise sky, Shirin had put the story of our maiden voyage to canvas. “The stories usually form…

It was about six years ago that Allen Durbidge tried his hand at pickleball. “I’m a table tennis player, and some of the girls who were playing pickleball kept asking me to come and have a look,” the 94-year-old Ballarat/Ballaarat resident says. “It went on for about 12 months and then finally I did come and I played the first day, and then the second day I was hooked. I’ve played since then.” It was only a matter of time before Allen persuaded his wife Carmel, now 87, to join in the frivolities. Carmel recently suffered a stroke, and while she wasn’t able to return to playing tennis, she could continue with pickleball because of its lightweight equipment. “It’s really good. I love it,” she says. First invented in the…

HEAVENLY CREATURES (1994) A “sea urchin who got lucky” is how Kate Winslet describes landing her debut movie role in the genre-hopping and eerily beautiful Heavenly Creatures. It’s a queer love story for the ages. Kate’s deliciously batshit, bubbly and wild as the affluent English rose, Juliet Hulme. It’s 1954 and her family has just moved to New Zealand. She befriends brooding, working-class, fantasy lover Pauline Parker (Melanie Lynskey), and they bond over their shared experiences of debilitating, isolating illness and love of magical writing. Blatant ’50s parental homophobia threatens to tear the girls apart, and so they do the obvious thing and… hatch a plan to kill Pauline’s mum. Peter Jackson used all his mastery of fantastical visual effects to bring to life their secret, inner world, based on…

I was inspired to start fostering because I work in the social work industry; my first role was supporting foster carers and foster children. It was a pretty big reality, seeing the need and the number of children who are in out-of-home care. I thought, “One day I’ll be a foster carer.” I could see the demand and wanted to provide young people with some safe homes and positive opportunities. Here I was, encouraging everyone around me to learn more about foster care and becoming a foster carer, so I thought, “I better lead by example and do it myself!” My amazing mum also inspired me. So much of who I am comes from my mum. She taught me how to look after myself and how to care for others…

Goofy, relatable and a truly terrible dancer: meet Elaine Benes of hit ’90s sitcom Seinfeld – my favourite dork in TV history and style icon for eternity – played by Julia Louis-Dreyfus. As the only female main cast member of the program, Louis-Dreyfus broke ground with her unabashedly confident, funny and authentic portrayal of an independent woman in a man’s world. Elaine controversially talked sex, contraception, dating and even masturbation as freely as her male counterparts Jerry, George and Kramer did – and she looked damn cool while she did it. I don’t know if it’s just me, but my TikTok feed is flooded with people saying I need to find my ‘personal style’. Elaine’s unforgettably grungy yet chic wardrobe gives me the extra inspiration I need to get dressed.…

I never felt pressured to buy a home in my 20s. I was living in New York at the time, chasing big dreams and barely making enough to cover rent. Home ownership wasn’t even on my radar. It just didn’t feel possible back then. Since entering my 30s, returning to Australia and becoming a mum, I’ve suddenly felt the urge to put down roots. And when the owners of the home my partner and I rent recently decided to sell, it really hit me how precarious our situation was – so we started to look into buying. We’d moved from Melbourne/Naarm to Geelong/Djilang for cheaper rent, more space and the hope of eventually finding something affordable enough to buy. But when you’re just making ends meet, even the ‘affordable’ homes…

Do you have a most treasured dress? One that holds a memory, tells a story, or just makes you feel like yourself? This October, those stories take on new meaning thanks to Frocktober – the Ovarian Cancer Research Foundation’s (OCRF) fashionable fundraiser that encourages people to wear their favourite outfits to raise funds (and awareness) for medical ovarian cancer research. Despite how serious and common it is, ovarian cancer still has no early detection test (nope! A cervical screening won’t detect it) and not enough targeted and effective treatments. Unfortunately, the five-year survival rate is just 49 per cent. It can affect anyone with ovaries, at any age, and we reckon it deserves far more attention than it gets. In 2025, the OCRF is celebrating 25 years of progress and…

Without mentioning your job, tell us about yourself. I’m a bit of an introvert and much more of a listener than a talker. I value time on my own to daydream, reflect, and flip through inspiring books and stories about people. I love carving out space to play – creative time with no expectations – just to see where things go. I’m always up for a wander… travel, vintage stores, design markets. I’ve got a growing collection of art and design books, and I’m happiest in a gallery or around a table with great food and good company. I’m a mum of two and I treasure time with my family and closest people. I’m drawn to great design and how it helps us make sense of the world – it…

In the year 2000, I moved from where I and my young family lived in Melbourne/Naarm to Sydney/Warrane for the 18 months leading up to the Sydney Olympic Games. My job was to report on all the non-sporting aspects of the Olympics for a national media company. Part of my remit – or beat, as they call it – was the sponsors. That was how I came into these pins. The atmosphere in the country in the lead-up to the Olympics was crazy. It was a mixture of “Can we pull this off?” – mind you, there were a few stuff-ups along the way – and “This is going to be bigger than Ben Hur.” But no one understood just how big it would be. When the Olympics finally came…

A bewildered banana that won’t get forgotten at the bottom of your backpack. Bruised to your liking (or make it green if you’re that way inclined!). MATERIALS – tracing paper– pencil– scissors– yellow felt– needle– yellow thread– plastic eyes and washers– black thread– pink thread– a handful of stuffing– waxed string– pins– brown embroidery thread BLANKET STITCH: This is a very useful stitch! It creates a decorative, rounded edge, and has the practical purpose of preventing any stuffing from popping out. Pass your needle through the felt, pausing halfway to loop the thread underneath the tip of the needle before pulling it all the way through. LADDER STITCH: This stitch is very handy for invisibly closing seams from the outside of your trinket. Starting on the wrong side of the…

In the classic 1986 coming-of-age drama Stand by Me , a group of kids overcome personal trauma, neglectful families, knife play and leeches to forge deep bonds that can only be developed in dreadful situations. Leeches are pretty bad, but have you ever tried working in an office? One of my first ‘grown-up jobs’ (meaning: a job that didn’t involve me scooping ice-cream or selling t-shirts emblazoned with ‘EMO CAN’T DIE’) was at a trendy creative agency I had no business being at. I was in my early 20s and though I was ambitious, I was a baby in every way that mattered. I wore manky ballet flats every day and wondered why my knees hurt so much. Outside of peanut butter toast and two-minute noodles, I barely knew how…

George Evans and David Chatman really love board games. So much so that when David had an important question to ask, he knew exactly how to do it. “We were having wines on our deck, playing Kingdomino – a cute game, not too heavy – and I proposed to George,” David recalls. The Brisbane/Magandjin couple have since formed a game design studio, Bimini Board Games, and are creating their very own game, Cultured Swines. The game, designed by George and developed by David, was inspired by a social interaction. “I was out for drinks with a couple of friends and there was a couple at the table having a playful debate about something subjective,” George says. “This idea stuck with me – whether you could align with someone on something…

Lauren Henry loved to play shops and invent make-believe businesses as a kid. When she was in primary school, one of those businesses actually made it out of the playroom. “My mum would sew, so we were always at Lincraft and Spotlight. They used to have paper-making kits,” she says. “So I would make paper out of scrap paper in our laundry downstairs, and then out of the paper, I would make cards and stamp them and sign them myself, and then sell them in packs of six to whoever would buy them – mostly family and people around the neighbourhood.” It wasn’t the prospect of making a bit of extra pocket money that enticed Lauren; she was excited by the carefully crafted worlds that shops create. “Back in the…

FAVOURITE WAY TO BLOW OFF A DATE Once I went on a date that I didn’t really want to go on, and I just started playing the harmonica. I brought a harmonica in my pocket, and I just kept playing along to songs at the bar. He wanted to see me again, which was crazy, but then he unfollowed me on Instagram after I was like, “Hey, not feeling a huge romantic connection.” You’ve just gotta scare them off and make them think you’re insane by bringing a harmonica to the date. FAVOURITE THING ABOUT LIVING IN LOS ANGELES The people. I’ve met the best people in the entire world in LA. I feel like I’ve got a community. I feel like I’ve always been American, because I’m insufferable. I’ve…

EXTRA - PEPPERMINT I didn’t even need to buy and expense a pack of Wrigley’s Extra Peppermint for this review, because I keep this stuff on my person at all times. It is, as the young people say, my jam. My go-to chew. Want to know why? Well, according to Wrigley’s online marketing material, not only does this stuff “give you that fresh kiss confidence” – confidence my wife presumably appreciates – it also helps you focus and work better. It’s sugar-free, not overly pepperminty, and apparently endorsed by the Australian Dental Association. What more do you need? It has one additional perk, which is that, if you’re on your way to the dentist and you’ve forgotten to brush your teeth, you can chew this stuff to fish out any…

Tom Forrest goes by the moniker ‘Outback Tom’, but we reckon ‘Everywhere Tom’ is more accurate. He’s on your phone screen, cooking up a storm and exploring the sunburnt country. He’s on your telly, appearing on Gardening Australia , Play School and Back Roads . He’s in your car, chatting away on triple j . And now, he’s infiltrating your bookshelves, too. He’s just released his first cookbook, Gone Bush, with his grandfather, Steve. It’s a love letter to family and the Australian landscape, and is filled with recipes for the kind of stuff you can easily whip up on a barbeque, bush stove or camp oven. Tom grew up in a little town called Wyndham, on Doolboong Country in Western Australia, where he lived an outdoorsy lifestyle. At the…

Hey Rosie! How’d you get into the fashion world? Hello Wembley. Thanks for asking. How did I get into the fashion world? ’Twas but a mere collision of circumstance and happenstance (are they the same thing?), not to mention my narrow unstable stance (I was doing a lot of standing on one leg at the time) and of course resistance. Vive la France. I was just minding my own business, working in a bookshop – questioning if I wasted four years at university reading Dickens and looking at paintings – and pondering how I might make my fortune in this big ol’ town, when bam! I was shelving a book about capitalism and the free markets and thought, “I know, I’ll start a fashion brand. That’s where the money is!”…

Hi Enon! What’s Dapper Notes all about? Dapper Notes is beautiful stationery to make every day special. It’s a collection of notebooks and other items I create by hand, from scratch, out of thick paper stocks, fabrics and other lovely materials. How did you learn to make notebooks? In university I studied art with a focus on painting, though other art classes were encouraged as well. I took up a course titled Artist Books 101 where I fell in love with sewing books and working with paper. I owe much of what I create to Professor Benjamin Rinehart, who taught me much of what I know and instilled in me a passion for bookmaking. Is there anything about the production process that people might find surprising? Creating every element of…

How did you end up in Japan? I travelled to Japan in April 2025 with my husband and daughter, Yoshi and Yuki. Yoshi is Japanese and his hometown is Takashima, which is a rice farming village in Shiga Prefecture. We were on holiday to catch up with friends and family. We went to see Yuki’s Obachan (grandma) in particular. At what point did you decide to get out your camera and start snapping photos? Japan is such a beautiful, culturally rich place and I knew that, as a photographer, I would be getting the itch to capture it all on film. I ordered my rolls of film while still in Australia in preparation for the trip. I also knew that we might be lucky enough to experience the cherry blossom…

The rise of working at home hit a peak in 2020 when the world turned upside down for a hot minute. Suddenly the dining table became a desk, homework station, and arts and crafts table. However, a space to work comfortably from home is not a new concept and a home office is often requested as part of a house design. The work-from-home space is just as important as any other room – especially as it can be where people spend the majority of their day. So, they need work surface space, a comfortable chair, appropriate height desk, and storage for books, paperwork, tech accessories and more. How you choose to allocate your decorating and design budget to your home office largely depends on how often you’ll use it and…

Were you a kid who grew up sipping on a babycino while you listened to your mum spill the juiciest tea with her friends? Or perhaps you’re a parent who lets their kids knock back a ’cino while you stare into the distance and contemplate your existence over a double-shot oat latte? No matter your experience with the espresso-sized cup of chocolate-dusted warm frothy milk aimed at the toddler-set, there’s no denying café culture starts early – sometimes even before the kids have the whole cup-to-mouth thing down pat. Like the pavlova, there’s some contention about whether they’re an Australian or New Zealand invention, but regardless, they started popping up in cafés in the 1990s to give kids a lil’ something to busy themselves with while parents got their caffeine…

I’ve always been a nosy neighbour. Not the kind who raises an eyebrow at your comings and goings or yells at you about your tree spilling leaves in my yard (though I will be aware of your comings and goings, and I will peek into your garden to get ideas for my own). No, my brand of nosy neighbour stems from a mix of anxiety over disruption and an exasperating need to be liked – even by neighbours I don’t particularly like back. Like most millennials, I spent my 20s and half of my 30s renting (before deciding to move to the country and being lucky enough to afford a house there). This has meant living in a dozen rentals and experiencing a smorgasbord of neighbours. My noise anxiety kept…

I grew up in Sydney’s Inner West with my mum, dad, little brother and our two pet dalmatians. I was a very shy, sensitive and introverted kid. I loved all things creative – drawing, painting, making things. And I loved reading. I loved all kinds of books, as long as it was a good story, but I was particularly obsessed with mystery books. Reading has always been important to me and it still is. My mum was a primary school and ESL (English as a Second Language) teacher, who absolutely adored books and believed they were one of the most formative parts of a child’s perception of the world. Our house was full of amazing picture books and I have vivid memories of sitting in the back of her classrooms…