These boring anti-terror bollards were secretly given a colourful makeover
In the last week, Melbourne, Australia, has had more than 100 newly installed concrete bollards pop up around the city's walkways and roads.
It's to protect pedestrians from terrorist attacks in light of Nice and London, and also because of a car attack on the city's Bourke Street where six people died in January.
Like anything with safety at the forefront, they're pretty ugly, and predictably the city's inhabitants haven't been big fans of them. They've been described as "absolutely hideous" by a city worker only named Jean, who spoke to The Age.
Here's what the bollards look like, and yes, they're pretty uninspiring.
But fortunately there's a hero out there. They've been dubbed the "Bollard Bandit," giving these grey bits of concrete a bit more colour and festivity in the past few days.
It's like yarn bombing, but for concrete instead of trees. Like this one bollard outside the city's Southern Cross Station.
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It turns out the "Bollard Bandit" is a man named David Gray, who told ABC News he hoped the bollards would be used for art instead of advertising.
"The City of Melbourne could turn this into a fantastic art space, there's five panels which artists could just cover with amazing temporary stuff," he told the news outlet.
Gray hand-sewed these covers, "surreptitiously" measuring the size of them one day. His hope is that other artists will follow his lead, and create similar colourful designs for the bollards.
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If you've got to have them, at least make them look pretty, hey.
