Newstead is the most consistent building stock we work on. Nearly everything around Gasworks, Skyring Terrace and Longland Street was built between 2012 and 2020 to a similar brief: 8 to 15 storeys, glass balustrades, aluminium framed windows, rendered blade walls and a podium car park with planting on top. A lot of these buildings have green walls or planter boxes built into the facade, which is why we are often here for the gardens rather than the glass.

Access is easy by Brisbane standards. Anchors are certified because the buildings are new enough to have been designed with them, parapets are clear, and there is usually somewhere to park that is not a main road. The catch is Breakfast Creek. Buildings on the northern edge pick up more salt and more wind than their neighbours two streets back, and it shows first on the anchor hardware and the balustrade fixings rather than on the glass.

Newstead at a glance

Building types

8 to 15 storey apartment towers built between 2012 and 2020

Typical access

Certified roof anchors, clear parapets and easy street access

Usual frequency

Twice a year for glass, quarterly where there are green walls

What we watch for

Salt and wind off Breakfast Creek on the anchor hardware

Photos

On site in Newstead

Abseil Pro technician on rope washing a narrow textured facade between two buildings in Newstead — Washing down the narrow face between two buildings, where nothing else reaches.

Abseil Pro technician on rope washing a building soffit above an occupied balcony in Newstead — Working directly above an occupied balcony, with residents carrying on below.

Two Abseil Pro technicians on rope maintaining planted balcony gardens on a Newstead tower with green waste bags — Planted balconies trimmed from the rope, green waste bagged on the harness.

Abseil Pro technician on rope washing aluminium louvres and dark cladding on a Newstead building — Louvres and the wall behind them, washed on the same drop.

Abseil Pro technician on rope working inside a dense green wall on a Brisbane building — Inside the green wall, thinning growth and checking the dripper line behind it.

Abseil Pro technician on rope hand weeding a planted balustrade box on a Brisbane building facade — Hand weeding a facade planter box from the rope, waste bagged as we go.

Local work

On the ropes around Newstead

More of our Newstead work is vegetation than glass. The planter boxes and green walls built into these facades need four visits a year to stay inside the line they were designed to, and the same crew does the windows while the ropes are already up.

Because the buildings here are so similar, a quote for one is a fair guide to the next. If your building is within a few streets of one we already maintain, we can usually match the cycle and the day rate without a second mobilisation.

Buildings we have worked on in Newstead

Much of Newstead is planted, so pruning terrace and facade gardens is a big part of our work here, from quarterly rounds at 14 Stratton Street and Liv Anura to a full prune of every planter at Luminare. Alongside the gardens we run annual window and facade cleans at buildings like La Vida, Skyring and Gasworks, and certify their anchor systems each year.