Not just an Australian phenomenon?

This extract of an interview by Tim Milfull with Adam Elliot (Max & Mary film) sheds a little mysterious light on the history of the tyre swan.

TM: It’s quite extraordinary watching the opening sequences—you chose a lot of iconic images of Australian suburbia that are so beautifully rendered.

AE: Look, I really wanted to get all that stuff in, and there was the danger of it becoming a big cliché, which is why we didn’t have kangaroos jumping down the street. But there was a koala letterbox, and a tyre swan, and I thought they were very Australian. But I actually found out showing the film at Sundance and in Germany that they all said, “Ah, yes, very German suburbia.” I said, “Really?” And the Americans said, “Oh, yes. We have tyre swans too, and totem tennis poles .”