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The Naomi Milgrom Foundation has announced it has commissioned Venice-based Map Studio to design the 2021 MPavilion. Map Studio was originally commissioned for the 2020 iteration of the annual architectural installation at Melbourne’s Queen Victoria Gardens. However it was postponed due to COVID-19 and MPavilion’s program of events were held at various locations and online. […] More
The Sydney Harbour Foreshore Trust has unveiled a draft concept of its plan to revitalize the World Heritage listed Cockatoo Island. The draft vision follows an independent review commissioned by the federal environment minister in 2020 and draws from the complex and layered history of the 18-hectare island in the middle of Sydney Harbour, as […] More
Architects and heritage advocates have expressed concern about a proposal to transform Don Gazzard’s seminal Wentworth Memorial Church into a private residence.
The owner of the state-heritage listed church, which the late Sydney School architect said was “without a doubt” his most important building from the 1960s, has submitted plans for the development to Woollahra Municipal Council.
Sydney firm Architectural Projects has prepared the designs, which call for a three-level addition at the rear of the church along with an underground carpark and a plunge pool. In a heritage impact statement, the architects say the addition would be localized and reversible, and that it would read “as a minimalist element that is distinguishable from the original but compatible.”
But some architects have labelled the $5 million proposal “totally inappropriate” and the organization Friends of Wentworth Memorial Church has called on the architecture community to show their support for the heritage building.
“The church holds immense cultural value as a rare ecclesiastical example of Sydney School architecture and is widely considered to be Don Gazzard’s most significant building,” the group said in a statement.
Architect Nicholas Bucci, who formed Friends of Wentworth Memorial Church with colleague Jordan Silver, said they and Gazzard’s former business partner Mark Sheldon were looking to raise awareness about the proposal.
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Wentworth Memorial Church by Clarke Gazzard and Partners. Image:
Sydneysider: An Optimistic Life in Architecture
“It’s a state heritage-listed item and a former community and religious building,” he said. “It still has the capacity to serve the public, or serve some sort of function that allows the public to interact with it, and not be totally privatized as a luxury residence.”
The Wentworth Memorial Church was built in 1965 as a memorial to residents of the district who died in WWII. It was built on land given to the Church of England in 1927 by the descendants of colonial statesman William Charles Wentworth, for the purpose of building a church.
In May 1964, Clarke Gazzard and Partners, with Don Gazzard as design architect, was commissioned for the building that now occupies the site in May 1964.
The church’s state heritage listing describes the building as “citadel-like” with its “soaring white walls and walled courtyard” atop a rocky hill. Architectural historian and critic Jennifer Taylor has described the journey to the church along a winding path as one of “revelation.”
She writes that the church combines the “clear forms and high natural lighting” characteristic of the Sydney School with “a Greek sense of the three-dimensional form and sequential progression.”
Architectural Projects states that the public walkway, spatial promenade and courtyard would be retained in their current appearance and that the 350 square metre church space would remain intact.
The proposed plans does includes other interventions, however. Bucci notes that the project would involve excavating large amount of sandstone out of the church’s base. “The building is perched on this sandstone outcrop and the whole design is intended to be in harmony with the natural landscape,” he said. “The proposed design burrows deep into the rock, creates an underground leisure room, spa, lap pool and underground parking, and a lift that shoots up through the rock and pops out at the back of the church.”
The Friends of the Wentworth Memorial Church said that beyond stopping the current proposal a broader conversation should be had about an appropriate future for the church.
“We as an architectural community have real agency to shape the future of our most loved buildings and protect our cultural heritage, as proven by the recent campaign to save Sirius,” they said. More
The Museum of Applied Arts and Sciences’ proposed $30 million expansion of its Museums Discovery Centre in Castle Hill, north-west Sydney, has been approved. Designed by Lahznimmo Architects, the expansion will include a public-facing building giving visitors access to the Powerhouse Museum collection, as well as hosting public education programs, workshops, talks and events. There […] More
Melbourne’s Birrarung (Yarra River), will be transformed by a new “Greenline” project along its north bank, according to an implementation plan that will be voted on by councillors on Tuesday, 4 May.
The $300 million Greenline, being pitched as one of the biggest transformations of the city since Southbank Promenade in 1990 and Fed Square in 2002, will include new pedestrian bridges and boardwalks and create a continuous green link along all of Northbank.
“We want Northbank to become one of the city’s premier destinations for workers, residents and tourists,” said Melbourne mayor Sally Capp. “This investment would transform some of the most unloved areas in the city into a series of connected parklands with opportunities for food, art, culture and entertainment.”
The council will be seeking funding contributions from the state and federal governments as well as the private sector to deliver the project.
The implementation plan notes that the north bank of the Birrarung is currently underused, with a lack of cultural expression and limited ecological and habitat value. It also describes poor pedestrian and community connectivity and a lack of social amenity.
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Greenline concept.
The Greenline will seek to address these problems, taking into considration some of the significant environmental and climate-related challenges that Melbourne faces. “It will focus on improving river health, creating a connected ecological corridor, reintroducing riparian edges and enhanced biodiversity, and providing opportunities for environmental education and public interaction with the river,” the plan states.
It will also seek to make visible layers of history via a historical trail with design interventions “to educate, celebrate and recognize Melbourne’s rich history and culture.”
The Birrarung is highly significant to both the Boon Wurrung and Wurundjeri Woi Wurrung peoples, with the Eastern Kulin people thriving along the banks of the river for at least 60,000 years prior to European colonization. What is today known as Enterprize Park, for instance, was once Narm jaap (the place of the tea tree shrub), an ancient crossing point of the river and a meeting place of the Woi Wurrung and Boon Wurrung peoples.
The Greenline will seek to celebrate this significance, formally recognized in Yarra River Protection (Wilip-gin Birrarung murron) Act 2017, as well as recognizing Northbank as a site of maritime and rail history.
“The Greenline would tell stories of Melbourne’s history and increase visibility and understanding of the area’s Aboriginal culture and heritage,” said Capp. “The Northbank could be used to recognize and celebrate Aboriginal culture and knowledge along the Yarra River – Birrarung.”
City of Melbourne noted that it does not own or independently manage the waterways or banks of the Birrarung, which is variously managed by state government, Parks Victoria, Melbourne Water and the City of Melbourne. The transformation will be “a collective responsibility of all Victorian Government partners and adjoining landowners.”
Consultation has begun with the Bunurong Land Council Aboriginal Corporation, the Boon Wurrung Foundation and the Wurundjeri Woi Wurrung Cultural Heritage Aboriginal Corporation along with a number of state government departments and stakeholders. More
A proposed blood red, 27-storey North Sydney tower, inspired by the waratah, is being billed as “a new sculpture in the heart of the city.”
The curved tower designed by Woods Bagot incorporates a through-site link, a central atrium space, and flexible office floor plates. In total it will have 33,000 square metres of gross floor area.
In planning documents before North Sydney Council, the architects explain how the design references the waratah, New South Wales’ official floral emblem, which is a symbol of resilience and regeneration – and an analogy for the post-pandemic renewal of North Sydney.
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Warada, 63-83 Walker Street, by Woods Bagot.
“Surrounded by existing multi-storey commercial towers, the proposal seeks to strengthen North Sydney’s position as a major commercial centre by introducing a new premium commercial offering to the mix,” Woods Bagot’s design report reads.
Developed by Thirdi Group and Couloumbis Property Group, the $191 million tower will be built at 63-83 Walker Street, a site formed through an amalgamation process involving 21 owners and 31 lots across two freehold and two strata buildings.
Ethos Urban notes in a report that “It constitutes one of the last remaining significant redevelopment sites in North Sydney.”
The design of the office space aims at creating diverse workplace experiences that are more attractive than working from home.
Planning documents describe “A new approach to spatial layout that encourages a porosity of movement through divisible lobby and workspaces with separable cores.”
With landscape architecture by 360 Degrees, the tower will include multiple outdoor work spaces, including roof gardens and a street-level urban outdoor room.
The building will be called Warada, the Eora word for the waratah. More
Minimum accessibility standards for residential housing and apartments will be part of the National Construction Code from 2022, Australia’s buildings ministers decided at a national meeting on 30 April.
A majority of building ministers agreed to include the standards in the NCC at the annual National Building Ministers Meeting. The standards will be based on the Livable Housing Design Guidelines silver level.
These include a step-free path from the street to entrance, a step-free entrance, doors and corridors to facility unimpeded movement, a toilet on the entry level, a bathroom that contains a hobless shower recess, reinforced walls around the toilet, shower, and bath to support future installation of grab rails, and stairways designed to minimize injuries and enable future adaptation.
The ministers also agreed that the Australian Building Codes Board will publish voluntary gold technical standard for accessible housing.
Each state and territory government will be tasked with deciding how the new provisions will be applied.
Ahead of the Building Ministers’ Meeting, the Victorian government said it would seek a leading role in working with other states and territories to implement the standard.
Already, three million Australians are living with disabilities or with restricted mobility, and demand for accessible housing is expected to increase as the population ages.
The implementation of the accessible living standard would mean that by 2050, an anticipated 50 percent of the total housing stock will be accessible.
The Victorian government says it has lead the way on universal access, with 50 percent of new apartments required to include accessible standards under the Better Apartment Design Standards and all public housing units required to incorporate key elements of the LHDG silver level guidelines.
By comparison, the NSW Apartment Design Guide stipulates a benchmark of 20 percent of total apartments in a development to incorporate LHDG silver level guidelines. More
Two 20-storey towers inspired by Sydney’s cliff faces will rise above a retail building designed by SJB, should a development application before the City of Sydney be approved.
SJB won a competition to design the towers at 284 Wyndham Street, Alexandria, with the jury appreciating the consistency of architectural character and material between the towers and podium, which was approved in 2018 but has not yet been built.
The new application calls for a two-storey above-ground car park; a two-storey upper-level podium accommodating 4,656 square metres of office floor space; and the two towers, housing 258 build-to-rent apartments.
The tower design responds to the approved podium, “in particular the material and form of the playful parapet, which is reflected in the form of the towers as they in step in profile and plan to create forms that transition in height and scale down towards the north-east,” the competitive design report notes.
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284 Wyndham Street, Alexandria by SJB.
While the selection panel was impressed with the overall cohesiveness of the design, it did suggest variegating the expression of the facades through the introduction of vertical elements and strategic landscaping, to break up the horizontal forms “which may easily become too monotonous and unrelenting.”
SJB said its revised design “seeks to strike a balance between vertically stacking and offseting balcony elements. The planter and balcony projects create variation across the facade and provide varying intensities of greenery, in keeping with the ‘Sydney cliff face’ concept.”
Taylor Brammer Landscape Architects is behind the landscape design, which incorporates intensive planting across a range of communal spaces.
The Green Heart space on level three is conceived of as a sprawling network of intimate spaces dissected by timber decking. “As the central green space for the development, this is signified through advance tree plantings in deep soil beds, tall palms allowing dabbled light through and pockets of open turf,” the landscape architects state.
Another communal space on level seven dubbed Emerald in the Sky aims to capture and distribute reflected light throughout an expansive communal terrace. It features a large swimming pool and lush vegetation including advanced trees to provide a green belt around the terrace, minimizing noise from the traffic below.
The development application is on exhibition until 19 May. More
