The Watson Community Association produces a quarterly newsletter which is delivered by volunteers to every street address in Watson.
From Edition 124 (Winter 2025) this newsletter has moved to a hybrid version, with the traditional printed Watzon complemented by an online version. Scroll down for the latest edition, or skip to the bottom of the page for an archive of over 10 years of the Watzon.
Watzon 128
Winter 2026
The Watson Community Association Inc. acknowledges the Traditional Custodians of Canberra and pays respect to their Elders past, present and emerging. We recognise that many Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples from across Australia now call Canberra home, and we celebrate their cultures, diversity and contributions to the ACT and region.
What's in the online version of Watzon this season?
In this online edition we have what's in the printed version in your letterbox, plus:
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A small selection of photos from Watson Day
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An article from our distribution coordinator Simone about Watzon from the Friends of the National Library newsletter
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Property sales for the last three months
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Additional poems and photos
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More Colour!
If there's something else you'd like us to include, please let us know.
Here's what's in this edition (click to go directly to a section):
The Watson Art Scene - Get Ready for Fired Up!
The Archive - 10+ Years of Watzon
We've spread our sponsors' ads through the page, so there is no single link. Thank you all for your support.
Please note that the views expressed in this Newsletter are those of the authors and
do not necessarily reflect the views of the Watson Community Association.
WATZON at the National Library of Australia
Did you know that every past edition of the Watzon is stored at the National Library of Australia? Former Watzon editor (and current WCA committee member and Watzon distribution coordinator) Simone Abbot recently wrote about her Watzon experience in the newsletter of the Friends of the National Library. We've taken the liberty of reproducing it here:
My boyfriend and I moved to Watson in 1997, renting a place behind the Majura Primary School. Our rental witnessed life — a rescue (Stuart Diver’s), a death (Princess Diana’s), an engagement (ours) and a wedding (also ours) — but I recall it feeling lonely. In 2000 we bought a place, and moving day involved a TV in our rental blasting life: the Sydney Olympics opening ceremony, the same program also blasting in our new place 500 metres away.
The Watson Community Association’s life was also grounded in place when a group was formed in 1993 to lobby over a local site’s proposed change of land use from native woodland to housing, eventually becoming Justice Robert Hope Park. The association birthed a newsletter, originally with a functional name, What’s On In Watson, delivering reports on various sub-committees. It’s name changed in 2005 to The WATZON. (By me, funnily enough, as editor, after having birthed two kids).
As Watsonians began contributing snippets beyond advertisements, our newsletter grew into a rambunctious toddler.
I stopped editing when life ramped up, a promotion coinciding with school drop-offs and pick-ups. But The WATZON shot up through its own gangly teenage years, adding poems, bee-inspired tales, ‘Welcome to Watson’ invitations.
In 2023, I stopped working just as one kid started. Realising I’d existed in Watson without really living, I began coordinating The WATZON’s distribution.
I believe Watson is the final Canberra suburb still printing a community newsletter: 3,200 copies are delivered every Autumn, Winter, Spring and Summer. My kids give me a funny smile when each new delivery of boxes of WATZON arrives, but I know that behind each delivery sits a great delivery squad ready to chip in.
The NLA’s catalogue contains an entry for the hard copies, and I’m hoping to fill the gaps. An online WATZON now supplements the hard copies, providing space to tell stories of working bees, playground openings, Watson’s annual Community Day.
If only I had a dollar for every time someone said: ‘Oooo, I love The WATZON!’
Watson Buzz - Manuka Honey!
By Aileen Conroy
🐝 Manuka honey is used as medicine for people and animals and advocates credit it with many healing and health promoting properties. It is expensive, viscous and less sweet than the honey from your neighbourhood beekeeper.
🐝 Manuka honey suppliers claim both anti-bacterial and anti-inflammatory properties. Published research demonstrates that it enhances wound healing and tissue regeneration after burns. Pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov
🐝 Bees produce Manuka honey from the nectar and pollen of only one bush - Leptospemum - which is commonly called Tea tree (Manuka is the Mãori name for the bush). One species is native to New Zealand and Australia boasts at least 80 species. The fact that it only flowers for 4 to 6 weeks per year is the primary reason Manuka honey is so expensive. In the ACT this is in Spring and early summer.
🐝 Image of a honeybee foraging on Leptospermum is from gatherbymanuka.com which is an Australian family business in northern NSW marketing high potency (MGO) honey. Between 2015 and 2023 there was an extensive multi-nation trademark dispute over the use of the name Manuka. Their website is a helpful source of information, especially regarding the outcome that Australia as well as New Zealand can legally use the name Manuka for their Tea tree honey. There are also links to a range of scientific evidence for the benefits of Manuka honey.
🐝 MGO (Methylglyoxal) level is a measure of the potency of this natural compound in milligrams per kilogram and therefore bacteriostatic potency of any jar. It allows comparison to inform ‘value for money’ decisions.
🐝 Leptospermum are hardy shrubs which thrive in the ACT. There are several native species which include Leptospermum scoparium from which bees produce Manuka Honey and Leptospermum namadgiense (Namadgi Tea tree). Tea tree cultivars are available for purchase at nurseries.
🐝 My daughter believes it assisted the healing of a nasty leg wound………..of her horse
AED at the Watson Shops
As part of the StreetBeat campaign, a publicly accessible Automated External Defibrillator (AED) is now available outside Capital Chemist at Watson Shops. AEDs are designed to be used by anyone in the event of a sudden cardiac arrest. Having one readily accessible in the community can make a critical difference while waiting for emergency services to arrive.
We thank Capital Chemist for supporting this important initiative, helping make our community safer and better prepared in an emergency
Majura Café Poets
Gather
The trolley stands empty,
Its key chain dangles.
He gathers his possessions
With smoke-stained hands,
Arranges them with care,
One by one, in his new home.
Six cardboard boxes, neatly stacked,
Blue tarp roof instead of tiles.
Torn sleeping bag floor,
Two stained lumpy pillows,
Blue plastic plate, chipped red mug,
Old army coat, epaulettes flap.
Green garbage bag bulges,
Checked shirt peers out,
Holey socks neatly rest
On worn-out shoes.
At the entrance,
A rusty dog bowl
And skinny Kelpie
Stand guard.
Bourgeoise woman, I recoil,
My senses offended
By the grime & stench.
Then guilt glides over.
What is his past?
I enter Woolies,
Ignore my own list.
Gather milk, ham &cheese,
Fresh bread rolls,
Half a hot chicken,
Thick woollen red socks.
I knock on his curtain,
Slim shape curled up,
Bare blue feet.
No face, just a hand protrudes.
Thank you, lady.
Jenny Burgess
After the Harvest
The wheat has gone,
Stubble remains.
Pale cream
Soft straw-yellow
Swaddles the slopes
And paints the gentle arcs
Against a pale-blue
Summer sky.
Judy Smith
HOPE
I say hope a lot
hoping
it’s not hopeless
hoping
against hope
that’s not
hopefully
what you meant.
Belinda Ketley
Community Safety Update
By Michael Cook | WCA Community Safety Sub-group
There are some important public safety issues for Watson and the surrounding suburbs that have arisen recently.
Over the past two months there have been several motor vehicle, bicycle and number plate thefts in the suburb. This represents a shift from mostly cases of property damage earlier in the year.
Concerningly, in late May Majura Primary School reported to parents that used syringes have been found on school grounds. We are raising the issue with Police and social services to try to stop this happening. Please remind your children to stay away from anything that looks dangerous and let a parent, carer or teacher know immediately. If on school grounds, please report to the front office on 6142 3140, or if found anywhere in the suburb to 13 22 81 (Sharps Hotline) for urgent removal.
Our neighbours in Hackett experienced a mini crime spree along Mackenzie and Rivett streets in mid-June, involving a gang searching cars, and testing door and window locks, in the early morning. They were not deterred by sensor lights and CCTV cameras. So a reminder to always lock your cars, and check your windows and doors before bed – especially if you back onto one of our reserves or green spaces.
The community safety sub-group has reached out to ACT Policing to establish a regular meeting with a senior officer responsible for the Inner North, to discuss patrol schedules and any trends in offending. We have also approached the ACT Government about commissioning street artworks around the shops and other public spaces, to deter tagging. We’ll work with shop and business owners to see if they want to apply.
The next meeting of the community safety group will take place on a Sunday morning in coming weeks - please reach out to me if you’d like to be involved. If you see an emergency or a crime being committed, please call 000 immediately. If you have concerns or suspicions about behaviour, property damage or other non-emergency matters, you can call the Police Assistance Line on 131444
Majura Café Poets (continued)
Sculpting our words
Where is the line
between a sculpture
and a pot? Between
pottery and poetry?
3D circles are spheres
rectangles can be cubes
can what we say
be made of clay
smooth the endings
join the dots
between the lines
say what we intend
do we sculpt our words
to create a poem
stoke the stanza
till it says what we mean
can a metaphor
be stroked till it squats
sits pretty in the centre
of a puddle of words
if a poem can catch
the moment
it can stir the curds
of the soul
Fiona McIlroy
Bare
Home made bare
now a house
artifacts, full of stories
carried away
books full of meaning
lining walls, reassuring
no longer there
walls left bare
empty, stark
suddenly devoid
of paintings
of connection
years of memories
packed away
stored in cardboard boxes
lives left bare.
David Turbayne
What's Happening in the Watson Art Scene?
Save the date! Get ready for Fired Up 2026
Canberra Potters
15th August 2026 , 3pm- 8pm
1 Aspinall Street, Watson, ACT
Canberra Potters is excited to announce the return of Fired Up, a winter festival celebrating Canberra’s vibrant ceramics community. This major event in the Canberra Potters calendar invites the public to join for an enchanted evening under the winter night sky and for visitors to immerse themselves in the world of ceramic making, creativity and community
Gallery of Small Things
27 Wade Street
GOST is having a winter hiatus for a few months. You can still visit them online, where there are some wonderful new works for sale.
Watson Community Day 2026
Did you make it to our 3rd annual Watson Community Day? Watson Community Association has put on an event each year on World Neighbour Day at the end of March to bring together Watson residents, businesses and community groups for a day to celebrate and build our community and sense of neighbourhood.
We're already thinking about next year. If you're a Watsonian interested in helping out, showcasing your talents or running a stall, please let us know.
After two wet years in a row, the weather this year was perfect and the event was our biggest yet.
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Watson Property Sales
Kindly Provided by Home by Holly
Exchange (sold date) | Address | Price |
|---|---|---|
26/05/2026 | 80 A'Beckett Street | $2,100,000 |
10/07/2026 | 7 Blair Street | $1,880,000 |
08/07/2026 | 95 Irvine Street | $1,850,000 |
09/06/2026 | 98 Irvine Street | $1,365,000 |
21/04/2026 | 15 McClemans Street | $1,340,000 |
19/06/2026 | 5 Shewcroft Street | $1,310,000 |
28/04/2026 | 19 Kilduff Street | $1,300,000 |
13/04/2026 | 101 Irvine Street | $1,285,000 |
04/06/2026 | 38 Wade Street | $1,260,000 |
10/07/2026 | 19 Flos Greig Street | $1,260,000 |
26/06/2026 | 26 Mary Kitson Street | $1,258,000 |
16/04/2026 | 6 Dobbie Place | $1,200,000 |
16/05/2026 | 33 Dickinson Street | $1,175,000 |
26/06/2026 | 1 Harding Street | $1,170,000 |
11/07/2026 | 25 Kilduff Street | $1,155,000 |
02/05/2026 | 4 Dodds Place | $1,150,000 |
30/04/2026 | 102 Irvine Street | $1,130,000 |
13/05/2026 | 32 Irvine Street | $1,125,000 |
06/07/2026 | 111 Irvine Street | $1,125,000 |
01/05/2026 | 70/215 Aspinall Street | $1,070,000 |
22/04/2026 | 81 Higinbotham Street | $1,050,000 |
20/06/2026 | 30 Manning Street | $1,030,000 |
13/04/2026 | 9 Dickinson Street | $1,030,000 |
24/04/2026 | 67 Williams Street | $1,010,000 |
17/04/2026 | 51 Piddington Street | $970,000 |
28/05/2026 | 273 Antill Street | $935,000 |
21/05/2026 | 68/67 Negus Crescent | $870,000 |
22/05/2026 | 7/28 Beechworth Street | $860,000 |
25/05/2026 | 13 Willunga Court | $860,000 |
13/07/2026 | 9 Hanson Place | $860,000 |
11/05/2026 | 73/45 Negus Crescent | $855,000 |
25/05/2026 | 2/25 Aspinall Street | $850,000 |
29/04/2026 | 18/79 Beechworth Street | $835,000 |
28/05/2026 | 12 Whitmore Crescent | $805,000 |
06/05/2026 | 4/25 Aspinall Street | $755,000 |
01/05/2026 | 13/7 Buninyong Street | $754,900 |
29/05/2026 | 33/15 Aspinall Street | $690,000 |
29/06/2026 | 98 Beechworth Street | $690,000 |
29/05/2026 | 68/1 Nanango Way | $632,000 |
29/05/2026 | 142/395 Antill Street | $590,000 |
16/04/2026 | 39/23 Aspinall Street | $570,000 |
20/04/2026 | 38/1 Buninyong Street | $559,900 |
07/05/2026 | 78/1 Nanango Way | $535,000 |
19/05/2026 | 1/1 Nanango Way | $495,500 |
23/05/2026 | 15/35 Tay Street | $474,000 |
18/05/2026 | 11/27 Whitmore Crescent | $461,000 |
22/05/2026 | 110/20 Federal Highway | $450,000 |
29/05/2026 | 9/1 Nanango Way | $449,000 |
07/05/2026 | 114/20 Federal Highway | $420,000 |
25/05/2026 | 13/20 Federal Highway | $420,000 |
29/05/2026 | 32/1 Nanango Way | $414,900 |
25/05/2026 | 10C/6 Irvine Street | $360,000 |
19/05/2026 | 38/111 Knox Street | $360,000 |
14/05/2026 | 5/64 Knox Street | $287,000 |
20/05/2026 | 7/156 Knox Street | $285,000 |