For decades there has been a design-related radio show on ABC Radio National every Saturday at 9am. In recent years it’s broadened far beyond the built environment into a cheery Saturday morning magazine, with a growing emphasis on food and gardens. It’s not quite the must-listen show that it once was, and now has been relegated to the 1pm slot, when everyone is out at Bunnings. There are still some great interviews hosted by current host Jonathan Green.
By Design
Prior to Green, from 2006 the late Alan Saunders then Fenella Kernebone hosted By Design in the same slot. Most of these pages were removed in 2021 because (ironically) they were using templates that were inaccessible. After some serious digging I’ve found a few samples. I can’t host the MP3 files as they’ve copyright-restricted them, so access is a little complicated…
I do hope the ABC can gradually untangle this mess and don’t just delete everything. It’s a valuable archive, containing many interviews with Australian design luminaries. I have contacted them about the issue.
You can access these 2014 Kerneborne episodes by downloading each full half hour show as an mp3 from for this web archive page.
Allan Saunders had a full hour to luxuriate in.
Comfort Zone
Presented by Alan Saunders from May 1997 to January 2005, this magazine programme interviewed people about all things design. From late 2002 audio was published but these seem to be lost in the file system.