Evelyn Reynolds

The Archdiocese of Brisbane has unveiled ambitious plans to build an eight-storey office block next to the historic St Patrick’s Church on Morgan Street, Fortitude Valley.
With architectural design by BVN, the project is one of a number of recent proposals to build commercial buildings in close proximity to churches, including Candalepas Associates’ design for a tower above the mid-century St Peter Julian’s Catholic Church and FJMT’s cantilevered hotel above a Gothic former church building.
A development application submitted to council describes how the design has been configured to respond to the existing church while contributing to the Fortitude Valley urban fabric and public realm.
Located between the church and several two-storey ancillary office buildings, the tower will accommodate 11,550 square metres of office floor space. An activated three-level-high outdoor garden room at the ground plane will feature integrated landscaping and seating and an articulated soffit with a direct connection to the church. Urbis is landscape architect on the project.
“The proposal offers a contemporary, flexible and sustainable building designed for the 21st century, with interwoven community workplace and landscaped realms,” said BVN in a design statement.
“The building has a distinctive appearance provided through its facade types that respond to orientation and draw reference from the existing church.
“Each floor features living greenery and access to the outdoors overlooking the Church to the South-West and the Brisbane CBD beyond.”
Designed by Andrea Giovanni Stombuco and built from 1880 to 1882, St Patrick’s is a Gothic-style church that was listed on the Queensland Heritage Register in 1992.
It is significant for its association with the consolidation of the Catholic church in Queensland in the last quarter of the nineteenth century as well as for its architectural style and the “monumental and finely detailed quality of the exterior.”
BVN’s design aims to preserve views to the church from James and McLachlan streets.
A spokesman for the Archdiocese of Brisbane told The Urban Developer the project was about securing the future of the church.
“The driving force behind this application is the need to ensure the parish can financially support its ageing St Patrick’s Church, which has been part of the community for more than 140 years,” he said.
“The parish also maintains the historic St Stephen’s Cathedral, which requires ongoing maintenance.
“Both churches have long-standing roles in their communities and we want them to be places of gathering for another 150-plus years.” More

Architectus and Schmidt Hammer Lassen Architects’ redevelopment of the State Library Victoria has won the architecture category of the Victorian Premier’s Design Awards and a medical machine that creates 3D digital images of the human eye has won the top prize.
Announced during Melbourne Design Week, the premier’s awards aim to celebrate professional and student designers working across a variety of fields.
The redevelopment of the state library has been a years-long process, with the new design was fully opened to the public in December 2019. Reviewing the project in Architecture Australia, Conrad Hamann said it was marked by the architects’ willingness to go with the building’s idiosyncrasies and episodes.
“The work recognizes that large institutional buildings such as this carry inside them their own history and culture, and that refurbishment is as much a weaving, a negotiation, as an outright renewal,” he wrote.
The project is one seven category winners.
The overall winner, which also won the product design category, was designed by Cobalt Design and Cylite to help specialists treat vision impairment. It streamlines the diagnostic process by integrating the functions of five existing instruments into a single, automated platform.
“Cobalt Design and Cylite have shown us that great design can have a meaningful impact on people’s lives and not only spark creative thinking but shape our society for the better,” said Creative Industries minister Danny Pearson.
In the fashion category, HoMie won for the sustainability initiative Reborn, which transforms garments destined for landfill into desirable one-off pieces while raising money for charity.
Sebastian White won in communication design for a series of posters promoting the Isol-Aid Live Music Festival during isolation, and Transpire with Vodafone Foundation won in digital design for DreamLab, a mobile app that uses networked smartphones as a distributed supercomputer to process medical research data on cancer and COVID-19.
In the design strategy category, RMIT University, Public Journal and SBS won for Bundyi Girri for Business, a set of frameworks, skills and techniques that helps non-Indigenous people to “cultivate the self-awareness required to be in active relationships with Indigenous peoples and Country.”
The design firm Today won in the service design category for the Working with Children Checks for Indigenous Applicants program, which “expressed the WWCC framework with sensitivity to the needs, rights and culture of Indigenous Australians.”
Best in the student design category went to RMIT students Charlotte McCombe, Tanuj Kalra and Jui Deepak Apte for Aegis, a bio-constructed hospital PPE made from marine weeds, and to VCE student Hanna Gough for a craft kit that serves as an emergency economic tool and transforms recyclable waste.
This year’s winners were selected from a field of 97 finalists. More

The University of Canberra plans to spend $5 billion on property development at its Bruce campus over the next 20 years, despite the economic headwinds facing the university sector with the loss of revenue from international students.
Included in the 20-year masterplan prepared by MGS Architects with Turf Design Studio are new light rail connections and a sports hub and indoor arena. The plan details several interconnected hubs designed to increase services available to the campus and Belconnen community.
The hubs will be focused on health, aged care, early learning and housing – with the aim being to create an “all-encompassing community-focused campus on which people can live, work, and study.”
In total, the plan envisions an increase in core university facilities of at least 60,000 square metres and a 210,000-square-metre increase in partnership and commercial buildings and/or tenancies.
This will support a campus population of 45,000, consisting of 12,000 residents, 15,000 students and an enterprise and business population of at least 18,000.
University of Canberra vice-chancellor Paddy Nixon said the plan was to bring together those who are already part of the university community with those in the greater Belconnen area.
“The Campus Master Plan will integrate our campus with community through a range of neighbourhoods where people can live, learn and work,” he said.
“The masterplan envisages Canberra’s public transport network strengthened with the city’s Light Rail service travelling from Civic, through the University campus, and onto the Belconnen Town Centre.”
The masterplan calls for a new arena and multi-court sports centre.
“We also want to expand the sporting facilities available to the community – welcoming our neighbours to use the grounds for their exercise and recreational activities,” said Nixon.
MGS Architects says the masterplan aims to reinforce the university’s distinctive bush character, linking key spaces to the region’s significant landscapes, and supporting existing ecology and biodiversity.
“Even as the campus increases in density, this character will be preserved, offering a recognizable point of difference and uniquely Australian experience for campus users,” the masterplan states. More

One-hundred-and-one luxury apartments will appear to float above the heritage David Jones department store building on Castlereagh Street, Sydney, under a scheme developed by FJMT.
Construction is underway for the 111 Castlereagh Street project, which will include a 34-storey tower with apartments from level 14 up and office space from levels seven to 12. The heritage podium, designed in the interwar functionalist tradition and completed in 1938, will continue to house retail space.
In a design statement, FJMT describes how the extant building’s distinctively curved form gives civic presence to the corner of Market and Castlereagh streets, while its sandstone and travertine facade appears as if it were carved from solid stone.
“The new architecture of 111 Castlereagh beautifully complements this historic sandstone context with a new bronze elliptical sculptural form that seems to hover above the heritage,” the architect states. “This curvilinear architecture appears to bear no load on the grounded heritage building – yet its impact is seen and felt through rippling layers of outdoor landscape featuring a swimming pool, social spaces and podium gardens.”
A central atrium will create a vertical flow through the core of the design, flooding the retail and commercial levels with light.
“Suspended above this atrium, the residences embrace grand living rooms alongside intimate spaces and refined detailing,” says FJMT. “The dominant elevation facing east will capture the city’s most coveted views: the lush canopies of Hyde Park and beyond to Sydney Harbour.”
The original department store was designed by Mackeller and Partridge, and was part of an ongoing tradition of centralized commercial, financial and professional dealings in the CBD with particular associations with that eminent Australian firm, according to its heritage listing.
That listing calls the building a fine example of the functionalist design tradition, “expressive of the department store use and well related to a strong townscape character at an important city corner.”
Adrian Pozzo, CEO of developer Cbus Property, said, “The Castlereagh site offers a prestigious address with rare historic character in the centre of Sydney. It provides the opportunity to offer the best of both worlds by both showcasing the heritage and also bringing it into the future, with new architecture and world-class commercial and residential assets.” More

Victoria’s highest court has rejected an appeal from three consultants who were found to be liable for damages to a Docklands apartment building that caught ablaze in 2014.
The fire was sparked by an cigarette butt and subsequently raced up the building’s aluminium composite cladding. The specification, installation and assessment of the cladding material thus became a crucial issue in the legal proceedings brought on by the owners against the builder.
In 2019, the Victorian Civil and Administrative Tribunal ruled that the architect of the Lacrosse apartment building, Elenberg Fraser, the building surveyor and fire engineer had each breached their respective contracts with the builder, LU Simon, which in turn was liable to the building’s owners for the $12 million in current and anticipated future losses.
The tribunal apportioned 25 percent of the liability to the architect, 33 percent to the building surveyor and 39 percent to the fire engineer. The judge ordered $5.75 million to be paid by the builder initally, with the consultants to reimburse the builder and pay for the remainder of losses as they arose.
The three consultants appealed the tribunal’s decision, proposing 25 grounds for appeal and 11 issues that required resolution. However, the appeals court rejected all grounds for appeal made by the architect.
The court considered two issues relating directly to the architect. First, whether Elenberg Fraser had directed the builder to select, or permitted the builder to select, the product Alucobest “or any composite metal cladding product that was contrary to the Building Act 1993 and the Building Code of Australia”; and second, whether the Tribunal erred in finding that Elenberg Fraser was “negligent in respect of its inspection and approval of the Alucobest sample.”
The tribunal had originally found that Elenberg Fraser breached its contractual obligations to the builder when it specified a cladding material “indicative to Alucobond.”
Elenberg Fraser contended that the specification did not necessarily prescribe the use of an aluminium composite panel (ACP) with 100 percent polyethylene core; that the specification of an ACP product did not constitute a “failure to take care;” and, crucially, that “it was for LU Simon, in the implementation of the T2 Specification, to select materials that complied with applicable legal requirements.”
The court rejected Elenberg Fraser’s submissions. “Quite simply, Elenberg Fraser’s reliance on the terms and conditions of the D&C Contract [design and construct contract] (including the T2 Specification) to make good that submission is misplaced.
“To construe the T2 Specification as submitted by Elenberg Fraser would require us to ignore the obligations expressly imposed on Elenberg Fraser under the Elenberg Fraser Agreement and would have the unreasonable result of absolving Elenberg Fraser of its liability to LU Simon as a consequence of the contractual obligations owed by LU Simon to the developer.”
On the matter of negligence in the inspection and approval of the Alucobest sample, Elenberg Fraser had told the original tribunal hearing that “its obligation to inspect and approve samples [was related to] visual characteristics only and did not extend to approving a sample on the basis of its regulatory compliance.”
The appeals court found that “The proper construction of that obligation is the legal question underpinning the first of the ‘two distinct breaches’ determined by the Tribunal to flow from Elenberg Fraser’s ‘inadequate assessment of the Alucobest sample’.
“Significantly, Elenberg Fraser does not raise any ground of appeal in relation to the second of the two breaches, that is, the breach of its broader obligations as head design consultant. It leaves undisputed the findings underpinning that breach.”
“As a consequence, even if we found that the Tribunal erred in its construction of the Sample Approval Obligation, the Tribunal’s ultimate conclusion that Elenberg Fraser breached its broader obligation as head design consultant as a result of its inadequate assessment of the Alucobond sample, remains unchallenged.”
The court also considered issues raised by the three consultants regarding whether the builder LU Simon was a concurrent wrongdoer under the Wrongs Act 1958 and if it also failed to take reasonable care.
“Elenberg Fraser submitted that the Tribunal failed to consider the question of LU Simon’s selection of Alucobest in the context of its responsibilities as a builder. Elenberg Fraser submitted that there was a case in negligence advanced against LU Simon at trial that even if the T2 Specification permitted LU Simon to select Alucobest, as a builder, LU Simon was negligent because it selected a product that did not comply with the BCA.”
“We are unpersuaded by the submissions of Elenberg Fraser that the Tribunal somehow considered the selection process engaged in by LU Simon ‘in the context of a designer but not in the context of the responsibilities of a builder,’” the court said. “To the contrary, the Tribunal’s Reasons […] show that the issue of LU Simon’s selection of the ACPs was one that the Tribunal considered in the wider context — taking into account the terms of the D&C Contract and the terms of the consultants’ agreements.”
The original tribunal decision was labelled a “landmark” with “significant ramifications right across the building and construction sector” by then national president of the Australian Institute of Architects Clare Cousins.
Bronwyn Weir, a lawyer and author of the Building Confidence report, wrote, “This decision confirms that courts will expect architects to prepare documents that demonstrate BCA compliance. The involvement of other specialist consultants does not relieve the architect from its obligation to understand and apply the BCA to its design.” More

A community hub and library in Melbourne’s north could become the first community centre in Australia to achieve both Passive House and Living Building Challenge “Petal” certification, according to its architects.
Glenroy Community Hub, designed by Designinc, has begun construction with the structural frame and section of the roof erected since February. It is expected to be completed by December 2021, according to the Moreland City Council.
The $30 million project will bring together Glenroy Library, the Glenroy Memorial Kindergarten, maternal and community health services, as well as neighbourhood learning and childcare facilities.
Designinc director Stephen Webb said the project would be an exemplar for sustainability with biophilic design values embedded in the structure.
“The design of the building focuses on reconnecting people with nature and providing natural experiences,” he said.
Project leader Kieran Leong said both the council and community had stressed their commitment to sustainability throughout the planning and consultation processes.

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Glenroy Community Hub by Designinc.

“Every local council wants and should expect value for money from their projects, that is a given – but Moreland City Council set their sights higher, by expecting the project to be a catalyst for social change,” he said. “Through projects like this, Moreland City Council is showing true leadership in sustainable design.”
Passive House and Living Building Challenge are internationally recognized benchmarks that require the highest level of sustainable design, checked against stringent tests and auditing processes. The overall goal is that the centre will become self-sufficient within its site, for instance producing more energy than it uses.
Once complete, the community hub will have a focus on tackling disadvantage at the earliest age, offering positive pathways into education, health and wellbeing for residents, “especially those with the odds stacked against them.”
Although Glenroy is experiencing gentrification, it is still among the more socio-economically disadvantaged suburbs in Melbourne. Around a third of households are in the lowest income quartile, earning less than $624 per week and, according to Australian Early Development Census data, 30 per cent of children from Glenroy and adcacent Hadfield have some form of developmental delay when starting primary school.

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Glenroy Community Hub by Designinc.

Designinc says that at the new centre, maternal and child health services will help nurture infants and their parents and an integrated day care centre and kindergarten will strengthen children’s skills and nurture healthy growth.
“Parents will encounter their community at the health centre, neighbourhood learning activities on site and at the community garden,” Designinc said. “Meetings and celebrations held by local groups in multipurpose spaces and the adjacent parkland will create a lively sense of neighbourhood and opportunity to get involved. Over time it is hoped that Glenroy’s new heart will foster a healthier, more capable and more cohesive community.”
The centre will be located in a parkland setting off Weathsheaf Road, by the Bridget Shortell Reserve. A landscaped forecourt arbour will provide public activity space, identity and transition from the reserve. “The transition continues into the building with internal landscaping, natural light and views and access to nature and garden experiences,” said the architects. More

The Melbourne Airport Rail will run across the second tallest bridge in Melbourne – surpassed only by the West Gate Bridge – according to the first concept designs released by the Victorian and federal governments. The concept designs depict a new rail bridge over the Maribyrnong River and elevated twin tracks between Sunshine and Albion […] More