Architecture

They are spaces for reading, study, inspiration and community – and they can also be sites of great architecture.
The best libraries in Australia have been recognized in the Australian Library Design Awards, announced at the Changing Spaces Library Design Conference on 18 March.
Organized by the Australian Library and Information Association, the awards celebrate innovation and excellence in contemporary library interiors and exteriors.
‘‘The award submissions showed an impressive array of innovative, creative and forward-thinking designs of new and refurbished libraries,” stated Janine Schmidt, judging panel chair. “Each of the winning, and commended, libraries represent some of the best architectural design in Australia.
“Each library prioritized user needs established through consultation, and created spaces which are inspiring, beautiful, fit for purpose and loved by their communities.”
The winners and commended entries are:
School Libraries
Winner
Ormiston College Centre for Learning and Innovation, QLD – BSPN Architecture
Highly Commended
Monmia Primary School Library, VIC – AOA Architects
Special Libraries
Highly Commended
Jerzy Toeplitz Library (Australian Film, Television and Radio School), NSW – Ingrid Weir
Academic Libraries
Winner
UTS Library, NSW – FJMT
Highly Commended
QUT Peter Coaldrake Education Precinct, QLD – Wilson Architects
St Benedict’s Library, University of Notre Dame Australia, NSW – CK Design International
Public Libraries
Winner
Marrickville Library and Pavilion, NSW – BVN
Highly Commended
Green Square Library, NSW – Studio Hollenstein in association with Stewart Architecture
Karalee Library Pod, QLD – Collectivus
Ruth Faulkner Library, WA – Bollig Design Group
Commended
Payinthi – Prospect Public Library, SA – JPE Design Studio
Salisbury Community Hub Library, SA – Hassell
Commended
Wentworth Point Community Centre and Library, NSW – CK Design International Project
National Exemplar Award
Winner
State Library Victoria, VIC – Architectus and Schmidt Hammer Lassen
Members’ Choice Award
Winner
Marrickville Library and Pavilion, NSW – BVN
ArchitectureAU is the media partner for The Australian Library Design Awards. The program is run by The Australian Library and Information Association the State Library of Queensland. ALIA will be running the awards again in 2022-2023. More

Plans have been submitted for another major development in Sydney’s burgeoning “Silicon Valley” tech hub around Central Station.
Designed by Fender Katsalidis and New York firm SOM with landscape architecture by Aspect Studios, the two-tower Central Place Sydney project would be built adjacent to the Atlassian headquarters designed by Shop Architects and BVN.
The scheme is the result of an invited design competition held between March and July 2020 and features two commercial towers of 37 and 35 storeys tall, with the larger tower appearing as two independent forms wrapping around the smaller tower. They are woven together by a low-rise “attractor” building anchoring the development and enlivening the precinct at street level. The “attractor” building is subject to further design refinements. Altogether the development will house around 155,000 square metres of office and retail space.
“The sculptural towers are shaped by the movement and civic connections at ground level and extend vertically into a ‘fine-grained’ skyline, orientated to address key vistas in a gateway configuration,” state the architects in planning documents. “The towers’ distinct shapes read as a family, while each retains its own identity in terms of height and scale, the dynamic forms emphasized by the articulated ‘smart awnings.’”

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Central Place Sydney by Fender Katsalidis and SOM with landscape architecture by Aspect Studios.

In selecting Fender Katsalidis and SOM’s design, the competition jurors praised the scheme’s “urban proposition” in opening up the ground plane to create a simple contiguous space with Railway Square, Broadway and the adjoining sites. They also noted that the placement and configuration of the towers to the south and east of the site would reduce the apparent bulk and scale around Henry Deane Plaza, while the “attractor” building would contribute to activation and mediate the scale of the towers.
A City of Sydney Design Advisory Panel, considering the design in December 2020, supported the competition jury’s comments but also raised concerns about the design of the towers. The panel found there wasn’t a coherent design approach and “the proposed buildings do not exhibit design excellence.”
The design has been refined since then, with smart awnings and integrated louvres contributing to a passive shading strategy. “Each of these architectural features have been optimized for their location and orientation on the three tower forms, creating dynamic textures to the wall that change relative to the angle that they are being viewed, and their relationship to the adjacent tower forms,” state the architects.

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Central Place Sydney by Fender Katsalidis and SOM with landscape architecture by Aspect Studios.

The facades would also be enlivened through extensive planting. “Planters are integrated into the end walls of the tower, providing self-shading, a biophilic connection to the workplace, and vertical landscapes of planting further emphasise the towers’ sculptural forms.”
The developers behind the $2.5 billion project in the government-backed tech hub are Dexus and Frasers Property Australia.
Central Place Sydney project director Kimberley Jackson said the project would be a key part of shaping Tech Central as Sydney’s tech and innovation hub.
“Central Place Sydney is a city-shaping development that will attract some of the best innovation and technology businesses to Sydney,” she said.
“The connectivity of the site to Australia’s busiest interchange, Central Station, and links to the neighbourhoods of Surry Hills, Chippendale, Eveleigh, Haymarket and Darling Harbour will contribute to a vibrant destination supporting Sydney’s 24-hour economy.
“The precinct will define the future of work and workplaces, incorporating the latest healthy building initiatives and powered by 100 percent renewable energy.”
Subject to approvals, the development is scheduled for completion in 2025. More

Two architects more defined by what they don’t do than what they do have won the 2021 Pritzker Architecture Prize.
Anne Lacaton and Jean-Philippe Vassal of Lacaton and Vassal, the winners of architecture’s most prestigious prize, have built a reputation for doing as little as possible. They live by the maxim “never demolish” and through projects in their native France and abroad have demonstrated that, by understanding and respecting what already exists, it is possible to enrich space and human life with only subtle architectural intervention.

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The most extreme example of this approach could be seen when they told a prospective client that nothing but some new gravel was needed to improve a public square in Bordeaux, but the ethos is present in everything they do – from social housing to cultural and academic institutions.
“Good architecture is open – open to life, open to enhance the freedom of anyone, where anyone can do what they need to do,” said Anne Lacaton, on winning the prize. “It should not be demonstrative or imposing, but it must be something familiar, useful and beautiful, with the ability to quietly support the life that will take place within it.”
A typical move of theirs, in working to improve housing, is to add greenhouse-like balconies to existing apartment buildings to improve thermal performance and increase living space.
At La Tour Bois le Prêtre in Paris in 2011, for instance, their firm transformed the experience of living in the 17-story, 96-unit city housing project originally built in the early 1960s via a few simple moves. They increased the interior square footage of every unit through the removal of the original concrete façade, and extended the footprint of the building to form bioclimatic balconies. Once-constrained living rooms now extended into new terraces, with large windows offering new views of the city.
The judges were impressed by the Lacaton and Vassal’s novel approach to sustainability and their commitment to improving lives through architecture.

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Latapie House

“Not only have they defined an architectural approach that renews the legacy of modernism, but they have also proposed an adjusted definition of the very profession of architecture,” the jury said in their citation. “The modernist hopes and dreams to improve the lives of many are reinvigorated through their work that responds to the climatic and ecological emergencies of our time, as well as social urgencies, particularly in the realm of urban housing. They accomplish this through a powerful sense of space and materials that creates architecture as strong in its forms as in its convictions, as transparent in its aesthetic as in its ethics.”
Lacaton and Vassal met in the 1970s studying at École Nationale Supérieure d’Architecture et de Paysage de Bordeaux and competed their first project together (a straw hut) in Niger, where Vassal was practising urban planning. They established Lacaton and Vassal in Paris in 1987 and have since completed more than 30 projects throughout Europe and West Africa.
“Our work is about solving constraints and problems, and finding spaces that can create uses, emotions and feelings,” said Vassal.
At the end of this process and all of this effort, there must be lightness and simplicity, when all that has been before was so complex.”
Anne Lacaton and Jean-Philippe Vassal are the 49th and 50th Laureates of the Pritzker Architecture Prize.
In March 2020, Lacaton and Vassal were appointed the inaugural Garry and Susan Rothwell Chair in Architectural Design Leadership at the University of Sydney’s School of Architecture, Design and Planning. More

International travel might still not be on the horizon, but the Australian Institute of Architects’ Dulux Study Tour is returning in 2021, giving emerging architects the opportunity to explore the best of Australian architecture. Hopeful emerging architects can now apply to be a part of the tour, with entries closing on 6 April. Entries are […] More

Plans have been submitted for the proposed 50-storey apartment and hotel tower to be built above Sydney’s City Tattersalls Club, the famous social club started by a group of disgruntled bookmakers in 1895.
The development at 194–204 Pitt Street, which will also see the existing building refurbished, is designed by BVN, which won a design competition for the project in 2020.
Once complete, the building will house a 101-room hotel and 241 “high-end” residential apartments. The redeveloped club will also include an upgraded lower bar and grill, new restaurants, a commercial fitness centre, and event spaces.
BVN’s design seeks to make clear the distinction between old and new, as well as indicating the different uses of the building.
“The three parts of the project – club, hotel and apartments – are purposefully articulated in the overall mass of the project, with fenestration informed by the existing exuberant heritage facades,” said BVN principal architect Matthew Blair. “They weave together a story of a rich history and an optimistic future for this significant place in the middle of the CBD.”

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The development at City Tattersalls Club by BVN with FJMT.

BVN’s scheme was selected from a pool of six during the design competition, with the other designs prepared by Hassell, Bates Smart, SJB, Candalepas Associates, and DP Architects working in collaboration with Scott Carver Architects.
BVN has worked in collaboration with FJMT, the firm in charge of the heritage components and interiors.
“The home of the City Tattersalls Club will be transformed into a beautiful interconnection of exceptional heritage buildings and landmark heritage interiors with a new and exciting layer of contemporary design,” said FJMT design director Richard Francis-Jones.
“This new architectural layer will be like an organic ribbon of movement and light connecting all the great interior rooms of the club while also creating new modern spaces and facilities. The new architecture also makes an appearance on Pitt Street infilling between some of the finest heritage facades in our city. This seamless blend of new and heritage represents both the unmatched heritage of the club and its open, progressive, and innovative vision for the future.”

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The development at City Tattersalls Club by BVN with FJMT.

The club itself is spread across two heritage-listed buildings, one at 202–204 Pitt Street designed by Sheerin and Hennessyand built in 1891 and the other at 198–200 Pitt Street, designed by Ernest Lindsey Thompson and built between 1932 and 1924.
The statement of sigifigance for the older building notes that The Tattersalls Club is one of the few surviving city clubs in its late 19th century premises. “The quality of the building reflects the importance of this type of social institution, and particularly the prestige of the racing industry in Sydney.” The Tattersalls Club was founded by 25 bookmakers who took issue with a judge’s decision to disqualify a horse at a race at Kensington and refused to pay out – hence losing their right to run books at that racecourse. It celebrates its 125th anniversary this year.
Construction is scheduled to begin in 2022 with completion in 2026, pending approvals. More

The Australian Tapestry Workshop has launched the 2021 Tapestry Design Prize for Architects.
The $10,000 prize challenges architects to design a site-specific tapestry for a hypothetical site, which in 2021 will be a choice of three galleries inside Phoenix Central Park by John Wardle Architects and Durbach Block Jaggers: the basement gallery, the double height gallery and the top floor gallery.
The prize is open to architects, architecture students and multi-discipline design teams worldwide. Entrants are asked to consider how tapestries can articulate, transform and enrich public and private space.
John Wardle Architects, who won the 2015 prize with his design Perspective on a Flat Surface, will be be on the judging panel, along with Cameron Bruhn (dean and head of the architecture school at the University of Queensland), Diane Jones (executive director of PTW Architects), Valerie Kirk (artist and tapestry weaver), Dimmity Walker (director of Spaceagency Architects) and interdisciplinary artist Brook Andrew.
Entries close on 7 June at 5 pm and the winner will announced at the Australian Tapestry Workshop on 26 August. A people’s choice winner will also receive $1,000.
An initiative of architect and former ATW board chair Peter Williams, the Tapestry Design Prize for Architects celebrates the long standing connection between architectural space and tapestry design.
The hypothetical sites for previous competitions have been the Australian Pavilion in Venice (2015), the National Gallery of Australia in Canberra (2016) and an unbuilt monumental cenotaph for physicist Isaac Newton drawn by the French neoclassical architect Étienne-Louis Boullée in the 18th century (2018).
Two of the winning tapestry designs have been made by the Australian Tapestry Workshop, including John Wardle Architects’ Perspective on a Flat Surface which was named joint winner in 2015 and Justin Hill’s 22 Temenggong Road, Twilight. The winner of the 2018 prize, Chaos and Fertility by Pop Architecture and Hotham Street Ladies is currently in production.
Entries to the 2021 prize close on 7 June at 5 pm and the winner will announced at the Australian Tapestry Workshop on 26 August. A people’s choice winner will also receive $1,000.
The 2021 Tapestry Design Prize for Architects is presented by the Australian Tapestry Workshop and supported by Architecture Media (publisher of ArchitectureAU.com), Metal Manufactures Limited, , Creative Victoria and the City of Port Phillip. The launch of the prize is part of the Asia Pacific Architecture Festival. More

Candalepas Associates has designed the redevelopment of a the largest mid-century church building central Sydney, which will include a mixed-use tower addition above the existing building.
Located on George Street in Haymarket, St Peter Julian’s Catholic Church was originally designed by architect Terrence Daly who undertook a large body of work for the Catholic Church in NSW. A City of Sydney heritage review found that the George Street church “may be his finest work.”

The church’s George Street facade is divided into five equal bays. Candalepas Associates’ design for the mixed-use addition extends “celebrates original Terrence Daly design” and “provide cohesive presentation to George Street,” according to a heritage impact statement prepared by Urbis.

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The redevelopment of St Peter Julian’s Catholic Church by Candalepas Associates.

The redevelopment will also include upgrade to the sacristy, interview parlours, meeting rooms, six domiciles with a refectory, a recreation room, a private chapel and a roof garden.

The commercial addition will rise nine storeys above the existing building.
St Peter Julian’s Catholic Church was constructed in 1964 and is one of four – and the largest – church buildings constructed in central Sydney in the post World War II period. In 2008, it was refurbished by PMDL Architecture and Design.
A development application for the project is currently exhibited on the City of Sydney website.
Candalepas Associates are also leading the redevelopment of a significant Edmund Blacket designed church in Redfern. More

An exhibition at the University of Sydney Tin Shed Gallery explores how women, girls and the LGBTIQ+ communities experience public space.
Presented through data, research and narratives, the exhibition highlights the spatial inequity and injustice experienced by women and marginalized communities with a particular focus on public safety and sexual harassment.
The exhibition is created by the XYX Lab at Monash University, which was established in 2017 to research the intersection between gender and the built environment. The work was originally planned to be presented as part of the Space-Time-Existence exhibition at the 2020 Venice Architecture Biennale.

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Hypersext City exhibition at Tin Shed Gallery.

Accompanying the exhibition is an online repository of documents, data, research and lived experiences. These include the fact that in Canada, “one in three women and one in eight men feel uncomfortable or unsafe in public because of another’s behaviour;” and that in the United State, “around 50 percent of harassed women and men [had] experienced street harassment by age 17.”

In a video work created for the exhibition, XYX Lab director Nichole Kalms says, “So many women and so many girls tell of not wanting to be out at night who will not return to a space or a place where something wasn’t quite right.”
The exhibition also invites visitors to contribute their ideas and suggestions for mitigating spatial inequity in urban settings.
The exhibition program also includes a series of workshops which will use the data and stories collected for the exhibition to prompt consideration for public spaces could be made safer for women, girls and LGBTQI+ communities.
The exhibition is on at Tin Shed Gallery until 9 April. More