Evelyn Reynolds

Australia’s most esteemed projects of the year have been named, following the Australian Institute of Architects 2024 National Architecture Awards ceremony on 7 November.
Residential projects fared exceptionally well in this year’s national awards, with 16 earning either an award or a commendation out of a total of 46 recognised architecture projects.
Burnt Earth Beach House by Wardle was a clear standout as the only residential project to receive more than one award, winning both the Emil Sodersten Award for Interior Architecture and the National Award for Residential Architecture – Houses (New).
Naples Street House by Edition Office won the prestigious Robin Boyd Award for Residential Architecture – Houses New, while High Street by Lineburg Wang received the Eleanor Cullis-Hill Award for Residential Architecture – Houses (Alterations and Additions).
The 2024 jury comprised Yun Nie Chong, Naomi Stead, Stuart Tanner, Jemima Retallack and Paul Owen. You can read the jury chair’s overview here.

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Interior Architecture
The Emil Sodersten Award
Burnt Earth Beach House – Wardle
Residential Architecture – Houses (New)
The Robin Boyd Award
Naples Street House – Edition Office
National Awards
Burnt Earth Beach House – Wardle
Six Ways House – Kennedy Nolan
National Commendation
Maitland Bay House – Studio Bright

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Residential Architecture – Houses (Alterations and Additions)
The Eleanor Cullis-Hill Award
High Street – Lineburg Wang
National Awards
Aru House – Curious Practice
Mansard House – Studio Bright
National Commendations
Lee House – Candalepas Associates
Six Chimney House – Vokes and Peters
Residential Architecture – Multiple Housing
The Frederick Romberg Award
Ferrars and York – Six Degrees Architects
National Awards
Maggie Street – Curious Practice
Nungalinya – Incidental Architecture
National Commendation
Mari-Mari-Ba – Affordable Housing – Deicke Richards

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Heritage Architecture
The Lachlan Macquarie Award
The Glass House – Cracknell and Lonergan Architects
Urban Design
National Commendation
Hope Street Housing – Officer Woods Architects and MDC Architects
Enduring Architecture
C House – Donovan Hill More

After more than a decade of design practice in Queensland, Carr has reinforced its Brisbane presence by opening a new office in Fortitude Valley.
Set within the grounds of historic neo-Gothic Holy Trinity Church, Carr’s new office is located inside the state heritage-listed rectory building, originally designed by former Queensland government colonial architect Francis Drummond Greville Stanley and completed in 1889.

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The restored rectory is also surrounded by award-winning architectural neighbours. The Fortitude Valley Methodist Church located opposite was the subject of the Brookes Street House by Russell With Co (formerly James Russell Architect), completed in 2006, and later renovated by Hogg and Lamb (architecture), Heath Williams (interiors) and Steven Clegg Design (landscape design) in 2021. Adjacent, 900 Ann Street was completed by Wardle (formerly John Wardle Architects) in 2018 with a fitout by Hassell.
Speaking at the launch event, Carr CEO Nick Carr reflected on the studio’s fifty-year design legacy and its natural evolution into the Queensland market so many years ago.
“Over this time, we have collaborated with a wide range of clients on a diverse portfolio of endeavours. As the practice grew and the vision of our clients expanded, there came a natural moment when a new home was needed.”
“We believe that relationships, capability and trust are the foundations of our success over the past five decades,” he said.
Carr’s new location coincides with a series of multi-residential and commercial projects already underway in the state. More

Entries are now open for the 2025 Dulux Colour Awards. Architects, interior designers, specifiers and design students from Australia and New Zealand are invited to submit recent projects that demonstrate an exceptional use of colour across seven categories.
Projects must have been completed between 1 September 2023 and 31 December 2024 and cannot have been previously entered into the awards.
Prizes are awarded across categories of commercial interior for workplace and retail; commercial interior for public and hospitality venues; commercial and multi-residential exterior; residential interior; single residential exterior; temporary or installation design; and students.

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A panel of industry experts will be judging the 2025 competition entrants based on the criteria of innovation, expression and execution of colour. This year’s panel includes Andrew Parr (SJB), Kim Bridgland (Edition Office), Rachel Luchetti (Luchetti Krelle), Kerstin Thompson (KTA), Alex McLeod (At.Space) and Andrea Lucena-Orr (Dulux).
Andrew Parr explains that the Dulux Colour Awards provide an exciting opportunity to witness and assess some of the most inspiring and innovative techniques being employed by the best of the best to push the boundaries of colour in architecture and design.
“The creative use of colour is such an integral aspect of design, particularly when a project has multiple constraints, and I’m eager to see how this year’s entrants have embraced it to enhance function and form across residential and commercial spaces,” adds Parr.
Finalists will have the opportunity to be judged for the coveted Australian Grand Prix and New Zealand Grand Prix titles. Entries are open until Friday 21 February 2025. Winners will be announced at a ceremony on Thursday 28 May 2025.
For more information on the Dulux Colour Awards or to enter, visit the Dulux website. More

A pine-framed, Saveboard-clad house silhouette has been unveiled within the garden of the National Gallery of Victoria. Concealed inside its 236-square-metre footprint, a 50-square-metre timber pavilion provides a template and meditative space for contemplating smaller-scale dwelling solutions amidst Australia’s current housing and climate crisis.
As Jeremy McLeod, director of Breathe, explained, “Size matters, and I just want to have an honest conversation with Australia about that.”
Breathe’s winning design for the 2024 NGV Architecture Commission, titled Home Truth, interrogates Australia’s trend of building big. By capturing the actual footprint of Australia’s average home – the largest on earth – the design aims to reveal the ethical and environmental realities of oversized homes: including suburban sprawl, environmental degradation and social inequity.

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“You can live well in 50 square metres and you can live poorly in 450 square metres… it’s been proven time and time again that inequality of life is not described by the size of the housing footprint,” McLeod observed.
Rather than provide a specific solution to the problem, the design offers a reflective, timber volume, representing a small-scale home. As McLeod noted, “It’s meant to be a moment of respite to consider, what possible future could there be?”
In making their point quite literally at scale, Breathe has been mindful to conserve resources where possible, seizing the NGV Architecture Commission as an opportunity to further their research into (and advocacy of) closed-loop construction and material production while also experimenting with spatial qualities of a minimal material palette.

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For McLeod, the 90 x 35 millimetre proprietary pine frame of the external home ordinarily represents “some of the bleakest housing outcomes in our country [but] when you put it together in a particular way and you catch the light and shadow it becomes this beautiful thing.”
The frame’s skin of silver-flecked Saveboard is made by heating the Tetra Pak packaging of almond and soy milk cartons. “The whole thing is held together with screws and nails so that at the end of the Commission it can be dismantled,” McLeod added. “The framing pine will go back to the builder that assembled it [who’s] going to use it to frame other homes,” a case in point to build with less.
Home Truth will be on display from 13 November until April 2025.

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The Koorie Heritage Trust Stage II – designed by Lyons, Greenaway Architects and Architecture Associates – has won the 2024 City Design Award at the Melbourne Awards.
The project involved expanding and rejuvenating a First Nations arts and cultural centre in the Birrarung Building in naarm/Melbourne’s Federation Square. The updated centre – extended from two floors to three – boasts new exhibition galleries and improved areas for hosting community and educational programs. The reimagined centre reopened in December 2023.
The design team involved in realising the Koorie Heritage Trust Stage II was praised by the jury for “honouring and amplifying Indigenous art and culture in a contemporary execution.”
Munro Development and narrm ngarrgu Library and Family Services by Six Degrees Architects and Bates Smart was shortlisted for the award, alongside 38 Albermarle Street by Fieldwork. More

Coming up in Sydney on Friday 29 November, the Sydney rendition of The Architecture Symposium by Design Speaks will speculate on the architectural possibilities of a less centralised urban life.
Despite being one of the most urbanised countries in the world, Australia is undergoing a shift in its metropolitan areas. The pandemic, coupled with the increasing cost of living within Australia’s capitals, has boosted the appeal of a regional lifestyle and prompted a more decentralised workforce.
Curators Andrew Burges and Maryam Gusheh have coordinated a lineup of speakers who will investigate how works of architecture and infrastructure can galvanise and better support new urban environments, and what factors are informing the architectural project within these satellite cities.
Titled An/Other City, the symposium will feature speakers Thierry Lacoste of Lacoste Stevenson Architects; Steven Toia of Genton; Rhonda Itaoui of Centre for Western Sydney; Jared Webb of J.AR Office; Ian McDougall of ARM Architecture; Anna Maskiell of Public Realm Lab; Lee Hillam of Dunn Hillam; John Wardle of Wardle, and Dan Etheridge of Living Lab Northern Rivers.

The Architecture Symposium is a Design Speaks program organised by Architecture Media, supported by premium partners Planned Cover, Bondor and Deco, and hotel partner Ovolo.

To find more about The Architecture Symposium: An/Other City, visit here. More

A new on-estate Pullman hotel planned for Perth Airport has been greenlit for development and is slated for completion in 2027. Situated immediately adjacent to the airport’s terminals, the scheme by DKO incorporates a holistic architecture and landscape design intended to link the hotel together with the greater airport precinct.
The hotel development comprises 250 rooms spanning eight levels and is within walking distance of the airport’s arrivals and departure terminals, catering for the 15 million passengers that transit through Perth Airport on an annual basis. Amenities for guests include a pool, a gym, a lounge, a cafe, a restaurant, a bar, a conference room and a co-working space.
Director of DKO Perth Dennis Chew explained that the approach to the project was “guided by a vision to create a transformative space that exceeds the expectations of global travellers.”
“As we are designing a landmark that will serve as a gateway to Perth, the development needs to reflect the city’s vibrant spirit and its forward-looking ethos,” he said.

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According to a media communique, the firm’s intent has been to design a place “destined to become not merely a stay of convenience, but a destination unto itself with the textures and forms of the scheme all evoking the unique landscape and culture of West Australia.”
Chew added, “Our strength lies in delivering a hotel that is contextual to place.”
The project’s concept employs natural materials on the ground levels that are intended to mimic the earthy tones and rugged textures of Western Australia’s landscapes while warmly inviting travellers into the lobby. Above, a glass facade integrates active shading that aspires to the aesthetics of the modern age.
The landscaped gardens included in DKO’s scheme reference the state’s topography of sand dunes, geological formations and coastline forest. Inside the hotel, the practice has prioritised comfort and celebration of culture, collaborating with local indigenous communities to incorporate design elements that reflect their traditions, stories and art.
According to Chew, “The Airport Central Hotel is more than just a place to stay; it will be a catalyst of economic growth in the region, providing jobs, attracting more visitors and supporting Perth’s development as a major travel hub.” More

FJC Studio have made global architecture history, winning their second World Building of the Year award at the World Architecture Festival in Singapore.
The firm was awarded the prestigious accolade for the Darlington Public School in 2024 and for Auckland Art Gallery Toi o Tamaki in 2013. This makes FJC Studio the first practice in WAF history to win the top award twice.
On behalf of the jury, Paul Finch, the programme director of WAF, said the design team behind the winning project not only explored but also expanded the client’s formal programme to encompass the perspectives and experiences of the local community and various users.
“The result of the project is poetic, a building in which topography and landscape, inside and outside, form and materials flow seamlessly in an unexpectedly delightful way. It is also an inspirational proposition about the acknowledgement and reconciliation of historic difference – a pointer to brighter, better futures for all.”
The jury tasked with awarding the World Building of the Year was chaired by Sonali Rastogi and included Emre Arolat, Mario Cucinella and Ian Ritchie. 

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Upon receiving the accolade, FJC Studio associate Alessandro Rossi remarked, “It’s very humbling given the modest scale of the building – it’s a little school project, so to have won against all the other big projects at WAF is a testament to the client and the community engagement that helped drive the design process.”
Elsewhere in the awards, fourteen Australian projects won a category or received a high commendation across both day one and day two. Australian educational facilities accounted for the highest volume of awarded and commended projects. More