Evelyn Reynolds

The Alastair Swayn Foundation has launched a second round of research grants for 2020, with more than $20,000 on offer. More

Star Casino’s rejected 51-storey tower has been resurrected with the publication of a draft 20-year strategy for the development of Pyrmont, says Sydney mayor Clover Moore.
The NSW government released its draft planning strategy for the area on Thursday 30 July, heralding it as a vision for Pyrmont “as a home for innovation, employment and entertainment” that would still retain its unique character.
The strategy would allow for buildings up to 180 metres tall on the site of The Star, along with a potential new metro station as part of the Sydney Metro West project, a new indoor sports and entertainment venue “like our own Madison Square Garden” (an indoor arena in New York City), and more public spaces, including the return of Wentworth Park as local parkland.

In a statement, Moore said that while the council shared the state government’s goal of shaping the Pyrmont peninsular as an innovation hub, the controversial Star tower must not be able to proceed.

“We will take our time to consider the government’s proposed strategy for the future of the Pyrmont Peninsula, but it is deeply disappointing to see The Star’s zombie tower rise from the dead,” she said.
The proposed $530 million hotel and residential tower, designed by FJMT, was recommended for rejection by the planning department and was ultimately axed by the Independent Planning Commission.

Concerns were raised that the government was looking for ways to get around the ruling when it announced the review into planning rules as part of this 20-year strategy.

“The Pyrmont Peninsula Place Strategy must not become an exercise in retrofitting controls to justify the Star Casino’s inappropriate tower,” Moore said.
NSW treasurer Dom Perrottet said the strategy would provide for up to 800,000 square metres of new commercial and office space that would support a mix of hi-tech, tourism, media and information industries.

“Great cities evolve, grow and continue to improve all the time, and our vision is to ensure Pyrmont leads Sydney as a home for innovation, employment and entertainment as well as retaining its unique character,” he said.
The revitalization efforts will focus on key sites such as the existing Sydney Fish Market site at Blackwattle Bay, The Star site at Darling Island, the Harbourside Shopping Centre, and the UTS Haymarket campus.
“These sites have been identified for revitalization over the next 20 years and we are keen to ensure that parks, public spaces and the unique character of Pyrmont is protected,” said planning minister Rob Stokes.
“Delivering public benefit is also vitally important which is why part of our vision is to return Wentworth Park to the people as beautiful, high-quality green open space.”
The Pyrmont Peninsula Place Strategy and Economic Development Strategy are on public exhibition until 13 September. More

BVN has won the design competition to develop the airspace above Sydney’s City Tattersalls Club, impressing the judging panel with an efficient floor plan and “elegant” and “calm” facade.
The winning design calls for a 49-storey tower that will include 246 residential apartments and a 100-room boutique hotel.
An intermediate podium will work to integrate the heritage building at 194–204 Pitt Street with the tower above, while the floorplan will aim to maximize the views of the apartments and common spaces, drawing natural light deep into the tower.

City Tatts chairman Patrick Campion said that BVN will work closely with FJMT, the architect overseeing the redevelopment of the heritage components of the original club buildings, to ensure continuity.
“Our Club has been part of the fabric of the city for 125 years, and this world class design will underpin its ongoing success as the CBD’s most welcoming social, cultural, sporting and business hub,” he said in a statement to members.

“The tower’s façade is contemporary and calm, and will add an elegant, landmark structure to the iconic Sydney skyline.”

Built in 1891 and designed by Sheerin and Hennessy, the City Tattersalls Club is state heritage listed as one of the few surviving city clubs of the late nineteenth century.
The other design teams competing for the airspace project included four Australian practices, Hassell, Bates Smart, SJB and Candalepas Associates, and international practice DP Architects working in collaboration with Scott Carver Architects.
City Tattersalls Club and joint venture partners ICD Property and First Sponsor Group expect to submit a Stage 2 Development Application later this year, with construction to begin in 2022 and completion slated for early 2026.

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The north tower of Sydney’s Pitt Street over-station development, designed by Foster and Partners with Cox Architecture, has been submitted for planning assessment.
Rising to 39 storeys, the tower will house 47,800 square metres of offices, along with 1,290 square metres of retail and hospitality space.
It is one of two towers being built above the Metro station. The other being a build-to-rent apartment tower design by Bates Smart, also 39 storeys.
The design approach for the office tower, according to planning documents, was to to reset the tower massing and roof volume to its simplest form.

“Our intent has been to visually integrate the station with the OSD,” the architects state. “We developed an aesthetic concept where the centreline of the station entrance is used to articulate the tower above.
“This evolved design uses the centreline to divide the tower and podium into two distinct volumes on Park Street – one inclined to open a view to Hyde Park and one inclined to open a view to Town Hall thereby responding to and seeking to reinforce the urban character of the Town Hall precinct.”

Lead developer for the development, Oxford Properties, says it hopes to complete both towers in 2023 before metro services begin 2024.
A development application for the Bates Smart build-to-rent tower is already under consideration.

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Architectural heritage and conservation organization Docomomo Australia has launched a petition to stop the proposed demolition of the North Sydney MLC building.
Designed by Bates Smart and McCutcheon and completed in 1956, the building was the first high-rise office block in North Sydney and the largest building of its type in Australia at the time of its construction.
It is listed as an item of local heritage, as well as on the Australian Institute of Architects’ Register of Nationally Significant 20th Century Buildings and on Docomomo’s own Australian and international registers.

A development application for the site proposes to demolish the building to make way for a new office building.
The petition calls for North Sydney Council to refuse the application and Heritage NSW to place an interim heritage order on the site. At the time of publication, the petition has attracted 820 signatures.

According to its local heritage listing, “The MLC Building in North Sydney is a seminal building on subsequent highrise design in Sydney and utilized construction and structural techniques not previously used in Australia.”
“[The building was] the first [to] use a curtain wall design and the first [to] use modular units in Australia. Its use of exceptional modernist building materials in the curtain wall facade and terracotta glazed bricks are representative of the Post-War International style of architecture that predominated in these early commercial high-rise buildings.”

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The existing North Sydney MLC building by Bates Smart and McCutcheon, completed in 1956.

Docomomo Australia argues the building should be considered as having at least state and possibly national significance.
In its submission to Heritage NSW, Docomomo Australia said, “The MLC Building is the most significant large office building dating from the 1950s in Australia.
“The ICI Building in Melbourne, also designed by Bates Smart and McCutcheon, is recognized as a building of importance to the people of Victoria and Australia by virtue of its listing on the Victorian State Heritage Register.

“The MLC Building at North Sydney, completed the year before the ICI Building is of at least equal importance to the ICI building in terms of its design and historical importance and should be listed on the NSW State Heritage Register. The importance of the building was recognized at the time of its completion by being opened by the Australian Prime Minister and its aesthetic significance, historical significance as well as its rarity is beyond question.”
Bates Smart is also the architect of North Sydney MLC’s planned replacement. In documents submitted to the council, Bates Smart stated that it had worked with the building’s owners for more than a decade to find a way to refurbish it, but the plan was eventually deemed unviable because of an “unsympathetic relationship to the heritage of MLC [and] overshadowing of [the adjacent] Brett Whiteley Place.”

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Proposed North Sydney tower designed by Bates Smart.

It also argued that the design of the building was flawed because of its east–west orientation, which led to Sir Osborn McCutcheon issuing an edict that no Bates, Smart and McCutcheon building was, from then on, to be oriented east–west.
However, Docomomo Australia argued, “The evidence presented in the development application for the replacement of the MLC Building does not demonstrate in any detail that alternative strategies to demolition have been pursued with any rigor.”
The development application is on exhibition until 7 August. More

Western Sydney University student and Campbelltown resident Sarah Abudareb has been named as the inaugural recipient of a $60,000 scholarship aimed at encouraging women’s participation in architecture.
First announced in February 2020, the scholarship was established to fund two years of study in the university’s Master of Architecture (Urban Transformation) program, which is taught in a small cohort of 25 candidates, with a year-long thesis a central part of the two-year course.

“I am so proud to be the first to receive this important scholarship – I really hope I am one of many women from Western Sydney University’s architecture program who will go on to change our region for the better,” said Abudareb.
Abudareb completed a Bachelor of Architecture and Environments at the University of Sydney between 2017 and 2019 and acted as a student mentor for first-year students in that course at the beginning of 2020.

She told media that she was inspired to pursue a career in architecture by the example of British-Iraqi architect Zaha Hadid. Abudareb is also from an Iraqi background.

Kerry London, dean of the School of Built Environment, said the scholarship was just one example of the transformative work the architecture program is undertaking in the region.

“I am so pleased that Sarah is our inaugural recipient, and I can’t wait to see what happens next as she continues to achieve,” she said.
The scholarship is funded by Frasers Property. Ranna Alkadamani, Frasers’ General Manager People and Culture, said the scholarship was an important initiative to help bring about gender equity in the industry.
“Supporting the women who will become the next leaders of the industry is vitally important,” she said.
“We all have a responsibility to encourage and foster talent and it’s particularly delightful to see this scholarship go to such a worthy recipient, Sarah Abudareb, for whom it will make a welcome difference.” More

A 40-storey office and hotel tower designed by the Chicago office of Skidmore Owings and Merrill (SOM) and Fender Katsalidis will be built in central Melbourne’s legal precinct, having been given development approval.
With a design inspired by Melbourne’s legacy of terracotta and faience facades, the “stacked” tower at 600 Lonsdale Street will feature a 280-room boutique hotel sitting atop around 24,400 square meters of office space.
The building currently on the site, the 1920s industrial building Londsdale Court, will be demolished to make way for the tower.

Fender Katsalidis director James Pearce said the two uses of hotel and office would be well suited to the area.
“The legal precinct in Melbourne is undergoing enormous transformation as part of the city’s continual regeneration and we are excited to be working with lead architects SOM to deliver the project,” he said.
“There is a natural synergy between the two typologies with their growing number of overlapping facilities, even though the combination of these two uses in a single building is uncommon in Melbourne CBD.

“It’s an excellent way for the lower levels of the building to be activated given the distinct times that each use has its peak – office being during the week and hotel on the weekends.”

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600 Lonsdale Street by Skidmore Owings and Merrill (SOM) and Fender Katsalidis.

The ground plane is designed to be highly permeable, with operable storefront elements, inviting the public in and blurring the distinction between hotel, office and retail functions.
Four landscaped terraces informed by biophilic principles will be accessible from office spaces at every level to provide “an opportunity for moments of collaboration and interaction, as well as respite and connection with nature.”
Scott Duncan, SOM design partner, said that weaving the interior and exterior spaces together was a key aspect of the building’s biophilic design.

“Our concept for a ‘fine grain’ tower respects the historic scale of the neighbourhood and introduces a vertical network of ‘laneway-like’ outdoor spaces throughout, speaking to how the ability to spend time outdoors has such positive effects on our health and wellness,” he said.
The $500 million tower is a project of developer V-Leader; the compnay plans to retain ownership of the building.
SOM has made a number of marks on the Melbourne skyline, including the AMP Square (1969) on Bourke Street, designed by the San Francisco office with Bates Smart and McCutcheon. The Chicago office also had a hand in assisting Yuncken Freeman in the design of the former BHP House on William Street (1972). Both buildings are listed on the Victorian Heritage Register. More

The Australian Institute of Architects has appointed Tony Giannone as its 2021–22 national president.
Giannone is director of Tectvs and industry professor in the School of Architecture and Built Environment at the University of Adelaide. He is currently South Australian chapter president and has also served as an awards jury and chapter councillor.
“We are delighted to welcome Tony as the new President Elect,” said Institute CEO Julia Cambage. “Tony has been an integral and committed member of our community for years and has shown outstanding leadership in the South Australian Chapter. I know his passion for the profession will help drive the Institute to new heights and I look forward to working alongside him as President Elect.”

The Institute made the appointment at its annual general meeting on 22 July, which also marked the beginning of Alice Hampson’s term as national president.

“It’s been wonderful working with Alice as President Elect over the last year and I’m certain her enthusiasm for architecture, history and art will greatly benefit the Institute and our members,” Cambage said.
“The coming year may be a difficult one for many of us working in the built environment space as we experience the repercussions of the coronavirus pandemic. I have every confidence that Alice’s knowledge and leadership will help see the Australian architectural profession through these uncertain times.”

Helen Lochhead concludes her term as national president and will now transition to a new role as immediate past president.
“Helen has worked tirelessly during her fourteen months as National President, and I’d like to thank her for her incredibly valuable contribution,” Cambage said. I know her efforts working on sustainability and urban development, and the Institute’s response to both the bushfire and coronavirus crises, will have a long legacy.”
Two new national council elected directors were also appointed at the AGM: NSW chapter president Kathlyn Loseby, and nationally elected national councillor Andrew Broffman.

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