If bus shelter man Trevor Dickinson is in need of a protegee, he made have found one in Canberra teenager Nick Goncalves.
Fifteen-year-old Nick has not only visited and documented every bus shelter in Canberra, he also won his school's Book Week costume competition this year wearing - what else but? - an iconic Canberra bus shelter.
To top it off, Nick recently met Trevor in Canberra and was thrilled when the author and illustrator gave the year nine student a shout-out on Instagram.
"I think it's my most popular post of the year," Trevor said.
Nick, who loves all things Canberra, was inspired by Trevor's book, Beautiful Bus Shelters of Canberra, winning a Book Week costume competition at Calwell High.
He also set himself a mission to visit all the concrete bus shelters in Canberra, and some of the wooden ones in the older inner-suburbs.
His mum Sally Dalwood and grandparents Robyn and Ian Dalwood helped to ferry him from bus shelter to bus shelter.
"It was sort of a joint project," Sally said.
And he did visit every one.
"With the wooden ones, there's almost 500," he said.
"It took us about four or five months [to visit them all]. I used Trevor's book to make a reference map."
A bus shelter near Sulwood Drive was one of his favourites, because of the photograph he took of it, a moody night-time shot.
"I also came across one that had been turned into a food pantry at Ainslie," he said.
Nick was able to meet Newcastle-based Trevor at the recent Undercurrent Design Market at the National Portrait Gallery.
"He was lovely and signed one of Nick's books and a couple of other things," Sally said.
Nick was also thrilled that Trevor posted a photograph of his bus shelter costume. "It felt really good that all my hard work paid off," he said.
And the tenacious teenager is not finished yet. "At some stage I want to visit all the local shops in Canberra as well," he said.
