Architecture

A new planning policy for New South Wales that prioritizes walkable neighbourhoods, housing diversity and thermal performance has been welcomed by the Australian Institute of Architects but slammed by developer and property groups.
The new Design and Place State Environmental Planning Policy, now on public exhibition, is being described by the government as the state’s first comprehensive design policy. It has been designed to deliver greater housing diversity and choice, while ensuring that dwellings have adequate sunlight, more storage and usable balconies. It calls for more, better quality parks, as well as greater permeability in new subdivisions to make walking and cycling easier.
It also requires new commercial buildings to operate at net zero emissions “from day one,” as was signposted by planning minister Rob Stokes in November.
The president of the NSW chapter of the Australian Institute of Architects, Laura Cockburn, said communities across the state would benefit from the proposed updates.
“It is imperative that the planning and design of cities and towns evolves to address the challenges of climate change, as well as social and cultural divides, if we are to ensure a high quality, sustainable built environment legacy for future generations,” she said.
“People’s basic rights to access sunlight, ventilation, privacy and open space must be protected and placing good design at the heart of the planning process will significantly improve outcomes for our communities. The Institute supports planning policy which enables community input in shaping the future of places, delivers certainty for investors and the resulting confidence in the system.”
The policy has been months in development, with the government consulting with industry, local government and environmental groups, and the Institute. In a submission made as part of the development of the policy, the Institute called for planning controls that protect solar access, cross-ventilation, privacy and access to open space; strengthen the role of BASIX; increase sustainability targets; focus on connection with Country; and demonstrate clear and consistent design principles in development applications.
“We welcomed the opportunity to work alongside government in the development of the Design and Place SEPP and strongly endorse what it aims to achieve,” said Cockburn.
NSW government architect Abbie Galvin said proposed changes to the Apartment Design Guide and Urban Design Guide aimed to respond to changing needs.
“During the pandemic we’ve seen our homes and apartments become schools, offices and gyms, and many of us have enjoyed walking or cycling more in our neighbourhoods. This timely policy seeks to reflect our new way of living,” she said.
“There’ll be quality apartments with outdoor space and plenty of room for growing families and friends. There’ll be quality streets, public spaces and neighbourhoods that are cool and connected. Places where people love to live.”
Planning minister Stokes said principles-based policy was an important step in defining what matters in planning. “This policy will allow designers to think outside the box and support innovation and creativity when building new homes, suburbs and cities,” he said. “Great places aren’t always the product of rules and regulation, they are the result of place-based design that puts communities at their heart.”
Property developers’ organizations Urban Taskforce and the Property Council have been less than glowing in their assessments, however, claiming that the policy will act as a break on investment.
“There are lots of pressures on costs at the moment and the last thing we need is a utopian SEPP designed by architects that further bumps out the costs of delivery at a time when we can least afford it,” Urban Taskforce chief executive Tom Forrest said, according to The Urban Developer.
The draft Design and Place State Environmental Planning Policy is on exhibit until 28 February 2022. More

Blight Rayner has designed a 14-strorey tower for 388 Brunswick Street in Fortitude Valley, Brisbane, overriding a proposal for the site from earlier in the year for a 29-storey tower by Elenberg Fraser. Whereas the previous tower was to house apartments and a hotel, the new proposal is for an office tower with retail at […] More

Herman Miller considers what the office of the future will be, in response to the changing face of work, in its latest investigation: Work, Redefined – The Design Challenge 2021.
Designers were invited to conceptualize a future workplace, submitting their concepts to a panel of expert judges.
The winner of the 2021 challenge was Melbourne-based design studio SLAB, which put community at the core of its imagined workplace. With remote work an ongoing prospect, SLAB argued that the office needs to offer “social opportunity, human connection and collaboration.”
There are four essential elements that make up SLAB’s concept – Pods, Gardens, Walls and Curtains. Each element responds to principles SLAB believes are essential to the future office: community, agility, collaboration, the individual, wellness, balance, accessibility, sustainability and flexibility.

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The office “should be able to shift, move, adapt, evolve, and change,” says the SLAB team. Image: SLAB

SLAB envisages Pods being ordered online in a range of sizes and configurations to suit an organization’s needs. The Temple pod is a space for reading, focus work and “doing things you love.” Resort is an in-office wellness pod for yoga, workouts, meditation and more. Home offers a comfortable setting with space for employees’ family to hang out, with the option of including a laundry or kitchenette. And Hall invites social interaction over meals.
The Gardens provide space for team building and food cultivation.
The Walls and Curtains – fluted glass sliding walls and white cotton curtains on tracks – allow organizations to turn large meeting spaces into smaller spaces geared at collaboration or focus work, or to close off sections when fewer people are in the office.
Modular and highly flexible, thanks to the prefabricated pods, this system allows companies to adjust their workplace. The office “should be able to shift, move, adapt, evolve, and change,” says the SLAB team.
The whole system is built on a grid. The high street and gardens are the only permanent elements, and they form the underlying structure that allows other elements to operate dynamically.
SLAB has conceived an agile, accessible workplace that adapts to users’ requirements. The concept is a realistic, functional and original approach that offers insight into the potential of the office.
Herman Miller More

A design representing layers of human connections and relationships has taken out the People’s Choice prize in the Australian Tapestry Workshop’s 2021 Tapestry Design Prize for Architects. Entitled World warp and woof: Understand the space between weaving, the creation by Iranian architecture graduates Hamidreza Majnooni, Samaneh Khatamirad and social worker Maryam Khatamirad is inspired by […] More

Italian furniture studio Minotti has launched its 2021 collection, curated with Rodolfo Dordoni and featuring designs by Gam Fratesi and Marcio Kogan of Studio Mk27. Embracing rationalism and brutalism, the range includes sofas, beds, dining and armchairs, stools, tables and sideboards. The Roger seating system by Dordoni himself is designed to be versatile, with a […] More

In the depths of Melbourne’s 2020 lockdown, a group of urban designers hatched an idea to create a “force for good” for the future development of our cities. As we emerge from a second year of pandemic isolation, the group has resurrected a more than 30-year-old organization to galvanize like-minded peers and colleagues to tackle major challenges facing our cities.
First established in 1986, the Urban Design Forum is a not-for-profit organization bringing together a network of aligned professionals with an interest in improving the quality of Australian cities. The original organization produced quarterly newsletters, as well as conferences, but has been inactive since 2006.
The leadership team of the revamped Urban Design Forum comprises Leanne Hodyl and Margie McKay (joint-presidents), Katherine Sundermann (vice-president) and Andy Fergus (advocacy lead).
When this new generation came together to connect, share knowledge and advocate for better urban design outcomes, they discovered the dormant organization that had chartered a similar path three decades earlier.

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Sub Base Platypus by Lahznimmo Architects and Aspect Studios is the winner of the 2021 Walter Burley Griffin Award for Urban Design at the National Architecture Awards. Image:

Ben Guthrie

“We approached the original founders who were still the president and treasurer and had been in those roles for 35 years,” joint-president Leanne Hodyl said . “It was an exciting opportunity to take all of their fantastic advocacy and knowledge sharing work and pick it up again and reinvigorate the Urban Design Forum.”
“They were just thrilled and very supportive of the next generation coming in and continuing to drive a debate around good design in our cities.”
The new Urban Design Forum, which launched in early November 2021, now has more than 100 members as well as supporting organizations including universities and design practices.
“[Our members are] primarily people who work in and with cities,” vice-president Katherine Sundermann said. “They might be urban designers but we’ve also had people join us who are ethical developers, a lawyer and landscape architects. They’re people who work with these big urban challenges on a daily basis.”
The group has three main purposes: first, to support its member through social and career mentoring events; second, to share knowledge about urbanism through its website and social media channels; and thirdly to advocate for better urban design outcomes in the public interest.
“Most people live in cities,” Sundermann said. “We know that cities are where we’re facing a lot of the big issues in terms of climate change, biodiversity loss, and income inequality. Our main purpose is to ensure the way cities are developed and governed can help address some of those challenges. I think that’s something that touches on everyone.
“So, how can we be a force for good that really gets everyone involved in how we can conceive of the future of the city? Because we don’t want to leave it just to the private sector, or to the public sector. Everyday people need to be a part of that.”

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Carrum Station and Foreshore Precinct by Cox Architecture received the Joseph Reed Award for Urban Design at the 2021 Victorian Architecture Awards. Image:

Peter Clarke

An important area of advocacy for the group will be the planning system, which they see as a key tool in delivering good urban design outcomes. “It’s about creating the right preconditions for amazing architecture. That’s a really important part of what urban design does,” Sundermann said.
“If we’re able to set up the right built form controls for an area – it means it won’t get over developed. It means the sunlight to the parks is protected, so you can sit there on your lunch break. It seems like it might be something that people don’t think they need to be interested in, but it affects everyone and how we use our neighbourhoods.”
In the next three years, the group hopes to have an overarching urban design strategy connected to the planning system to add regulatory weight to the importance of urban design. “At present, urban design too often treated as a plug-in condition – there’s not one overarching strategy, which we think is a key gap,” Hodyl said. “If we can get something like that in place, more positive outcomes will flow from there because urban design will be seen as an intrinsic and central driver of good cities.”
The group has also made a submission to Victoria’s parliamentary inquiry into apartment design standards and aims to use their collective voice to advocate for the key drivers of good development.
“We’re also really excited about being a resource and an ally,” Sundermann continued. “Our website and Instagram have a lot of information about cities so even if you don’t want to become a member and urban design is not the core thing that you do, certainly spreading the word within the industry about the importance of thinking about these things and how it can support great design outcomes is a really big part of what we’re wanting to do.”
Urban Design Forum hopes to expand its membership to all Australian states and territories and has plans for a number of public events throughout the year, including its launch event, What Cities Need Now, to be held at MPavilion on 8 December.
“We’re definitely looking to be an small organization that punches above our weight,” Sundermann said. “We’re entirely volunteer run at this point. We’re independent so we can really advocate for the things that we want to see and we’re not beholden to other interests.”
For more information and to become a member, head to the Urban Design Forum website. More

The City of Melbourne has released its plans for a four-kilometre promenade along the north bank of Birrarung (Yarra River).
Dubbed the Greenline, the six-metre-wide promenade will run uninterrupted from Birrarung Marr to the Bolte Bridge, an area where walking and cycling is currently limited by narrow and poorly connected paths, steep slopes and uneven pavements.
Going before the Future Melbourne Committee on 7 December, the Final Greenline Implementation Plan outlines how the project will establish the riverbank as an ecological corridor, while also engaging with its history as Wurundjeri Woi Wurrung Country and as a maritime port.

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Greenline project concept image, City of Melbourne.

“Imagine walking along the north bank of the Yarra from the MCG to Docklands as the sun sets. You meander along pedestrian boardwalks and over bridges, explore in new parks, and celebrate our Aboriginal heritage and culture,” said lord mayor Sally Capp.
“Just as Southbank and Federation Square energized Melbourne at the turn of the century, Greenline will usher in a new era for our city at a time we need it most.”
Along with improving public amenity, the project will focus on improving river health, increasing tree canopy and reintroducing riparian vegetation to support biodiversity. The edge of the river will be reconstructed and softened, allowing for natural processes to shape the river
Some of the initiatives proposed as part of the project include expanding the promenade in the existing Birrarung Marr precinct; creating better connections between the river, Swanston Street and Flinders Street Station; upgrades to Banana Alley vaults and the lower promenade in the Yarro Yarro precinct; and creating a new park at the end of the Salt Water Wharf precinct.
The council will also work with the Yarra Pools community association to formally assess the merits of its proposed swimmable river project. Already underway is an upgrade to Enterprize Park, which will be completed soon.

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Yarra Pool concept design by Wowowa.

“Locals and visitors will soon enjoy an extra 1,000 square meters of green lawn – almost the size of one Olympic swimming pool – with better views and access along the river,” said Capp.
The final plan comes after a period of community consultation, in which around 400 people providing their feedback online.
“Feedback was overwhelmingly positive and found more than half of those surveyed wanted the space to be used for exercise and recreation, as well as opportunities to enhance greening and improve the environmental health of both the riverbank and the river itself,” said councillor Olivia Ball.
The City of Melbourne is advocating for a tri-government funding partnership, and is asking for $100 million each from the federal and state governments. More

Timberlink Australia unveiled the new brand for their forthcoming engineered wood products building solutions range – NeXTimber by Timberlink.
NeXTimber by Timberlink will manufacture cross-laminated timber (CLT) and glue-laminated timber (GLT) products, providing an Australian-made renewable and carbon-positive timber building solution for commercial, residential, and public projects.
Backed by a $63 million capital investment, the NeXTimber range will be manufactured on Australia’s first combined world-scale softwoods CLT and GLT manufacturing line, within a purpose-built manufacturing plant being constructed adjacent to Timberlink’s state-of-the-art timber manufacturing facility in Tarpeena, South Australia. Production will begin in 2023.
Timberlink chief executive officer Ian Tyson said, “NeXTimber by Timberlink places us at the forefront of integrated forestry and softwood processing in Australia. The NeXTimber range will be manufactured on Timberlink’s Tarpeena site from Timberlink timber, sourced from local certified pine plantations. The plantations, like Timberlink, are under the ownership of funds managed by New Forests. This connection from seed to structure will give NeXTimber customers a unique level of supply certainty.”
Ian Tyson continued, “Currently around half of all of Australia’s engineered timber is being imported and the demand for this is expected to rapidly grow in the next decade, so building the sovereign capacity of locally made CLT and GLT is great news for Australian manufacturing and local regional employment.”
A total of 27 full-time permanent jobs will be created when the facility opens in 2023, rising to 50 at full output. A significant number of additional jobs are also being created during the construction phase.
Engineered timber products are increasingly being used in Australia and globally, particularly in mid-rise buildings, due to a combination of factors, including cost-effectiveness, livability, and ease and efficiency of construction. Timber products also satisfy the increasing demand for energy efficient, sustainable, and carbon-positive building materials.
Timberlink CEO Ian Tyson concluded by saying, “Timberlink is looking forward to growing the NeXTimber brand and supporting more specifiers and builders in using Australian-made mass timber that stores carbon because as our brand says, NeXTimber: It’s what better tomorrows are built on.”
To support the launch of the NeXTimber brand, Timberlink has released a new video.
NeXTimber More