Kenilworth now has a loo that is a view

Division 10 councillor Greg Rogerson and members of the committee flew the loo paper at the launch.

By Janine Hill

THE designer dunny devised to put Kenilworth on the tourist itinerary is now officially open for business.

The sometimes controversial dunny in Isaac Moore Park, on the Eumundi-Kenilworth Road approach to town, has been a four-year, $580,000 project.

Designed to resemble an unfinished indigenous fishing basket, it is the hinterland’s answer to the Loo with a View, a public art project with the combined purposes of amenity and attraction.

Division 10 councillor Greg Rogerson, who has been a firm advocate of the project from start to finish, said the dunny was now doing its bit to put Kenilworth on the tourist map.

“I believe that every RV guidebook will say the designer dunny has now been opened,” he said.

People will say, ‘You could go and have a look at that' and if they get to this place, then they’re going to go further. They’ll come to see the cheese factory, the famous bakery, maybe even get a kilogram donut.

“It’s about making Kenilworth sustainable and something different to every other town.”

Speaking at the opening ceremony, Mayor Mark Jamieson acknowledged that the project had drawn some criticism but the end product “makes the investment worthwhile.”

The designer dunny was conceived following a public meeting to discuss art projects for the town, where some locals raised the issue of public toilets for the park.

Mr Rogerson credited Regina Wagner for her idea to combine public art with a toilet block in an arty dunny.

Maleny architect/designer/illustrator Michael Lennie won a $10,000 competition for a dunny design with his creation, Canistrum – Latin for wicker basket.

The original design was higher, surrounded by a pool of water, topped with a water tank, and with a timber walkway coiled around it but modifications were made when the estimated building cost blew out beyond expectations.

The building has been built to the Q20 flood level, with an L-shaped walkway, a skylight dotted with Mary River cod crowns it instead of a water tank, and it is surrounded by modest landscaping.

Mr Rogers paid tribute to council project delivery manager Chris Sturgess, recreation project coordinator Peter Osborne and project inspector John Markwell for seeing the project through for the community.

Mr Lennie is happy with the finished product.

“It turned out to be quite a complicated thing in the end. I think it was a bit of a challenge for the builders,” he said.

Mr Lennie said it took a whole day to just arrange the “straws” which curl at the top of the basket in a random arrangement to give it an unfinished look.

He envisages the dunny will be becoming a meeting point for groups such as motorcyclists out for a ride.

Mr Jamieson, on a roll after the opening of a new amenities block at Conondale only the weekend prior, quipped that council was “flush with success”.

However, the line of the day belonged to Graeme White, one of the dunny committee members: “It can rightly be said, we put the art into fart.”