Architecture

Italian furniture maker Pedrali introduces its New Ideas 2020 collections, which includes collaborations with designers Sebastian Herkner and Robin Rizzini.
Sebastian Herkner was named Maison et Objet’s 2019 Designer of the Year. He has created the Blume collection for Pedrali, inspired by concepts of elegance and sophistication. The collection includes a chair, lounge chair and a set of coffee tables, which feature flower-shaped extruded aluminium profiles.
The chairs are characterised by their soft, rounded shapes with the steel structural element placed under the seat to strengthen the chair and secure removable legs.

The coffee table set is avilable in a range three different heights and various sizes, table tops and finishes.
Robin Rizzini’s design for Pedrali, the Toa table, is a lightweight and minimalist, made from a solid die-cast aluminium frame. The legs are tapered towards the base and the table’s stability is achieved through two steel ars connecting the legs to the top. The table is available in a range of widths and depths and a variety of finishes.

The New Ideas 2020 collections also include designs by Patrick Jouin, CMP Design, Eugeni Quitllet, and Pedrali’s own R&D team.
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Victoria’s Koorie Heritage Trust has launched a four-year program aimed at fostering First Nations design talent and establishing Indigenous-led-and-operated design businesses.
Participants will be mentored in design, production, and small business skills to lay the groundwork for long-term, sustainable design practices.
“We want to work with artists, craftspeople and designers living in Victoria to support their long-term sustainable design practice,” said Tom Mosby, CEO of Koorie Heritage Trust. “This program is an important step in this process by bringing together mentors and industry leaders to work with and nurture talented Indigenous makers.”

The Blak Design program is underpinned by the Indigenous Design Charter and has been developed in partnership with the National Gallery of Victoria and RMIT University and is supported by the Ian Potter Foundation.
Each year the program will focus on a different discipline, kicking off in 2020 with jewellery. A spokesperson for Koorie Heritage Trust told ArchitectureAU that the design disciplines to be focused on in the following years will be decided shortly.

The jewellery program will take place over four months, with participants taking part in a series of free hands-on jewellery design and making workshops, as well as small business skills tutorials and visits to jewellery design studios, galleries and stores across Melbourne. Guidance will be provided by cultural mentors, design professionals, jewellers and industry practitioners and experts throughout, and at the end of the program, an additional opportunity will be awarded to up to three participants to be mentored and work towards realizing a jewellery collection for production, launch and sale in 2021.
Applications open on 1 September close on 13 October, 5pm.

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A “colossal” 81-storey tower approved for central Brisbane has been cut down to size, with the original architect Blight Rayner preparing new designs for a much smaller 34-storey office building.
The updated scheme for the development at the corner of George and Queen streets removes the 534 residential units planned for the original tower, approved by Brisbane council in 2017, and instead all levels above the podium will be given over to office space.
Facing outward towards Queen Street Mall and the Brisbane River, the tower will still be visually prominent within the inner-city skyline, with green “sky terraces” set into the building giving it a distinctive look. The site is located on the land of the Yugara/YUgarapul people and Turrbal people.

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60 Queen Street Brisbane by Blight Rayner.

In addition to the office space, the development will include a new arcade connecting Burnett Lane and Queen Street, an active ground level including hospitality and retail tenancies along Queen Steet and through the arcade and an open podium terrace garden for the building’s workers.

“The proposed density and scale of the development capitalises on its unique location, orientating itself toward to the river to take advantage of key views and vistas and linear nature of Queen Street,” Urbis states in planning documents, currently before council. “The location of the site is ideal for a signature piece of sub-tropical architecture and a high-quality commercial office building.”
“The location of the building will act as an arrival marker to the Queen Street Mall. At the ground level, the articulated building facade reflects the surrounding nature of adjacent buildings and forms, whilst still being a prominent and welcoming entrance to the Queen Street Mall.”
The development is a project of Charter Hall and Investa. Plans are on public exhibit here.

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A group of architecture academics are calling on the federal government to increase funding for built environment research to aid Australia’s economic recovery from the COVID-19 pandemic.
The Australian Deans of Built Environment and Design (ADBED) made a submission to the federal education minister Dan Tehan and minister for cities Alan Tudge ahead of the proposed bill to change higher education fees going before the parliament on Monday 24 August.
Under the proposed changes, student fees for architecture degrees would decrease by 20 percent. The ADBED welcomed the change but highlighted that research in built environment receives less than 1 percent of Australian Research Council funding.

“As the peak body ADBED, we advocate for increased recognition of our sustained contribution to the development of Australian cities and regional centres,” the group said.
“Australian researchers are world leaders in understanding how the design of healthy cities can encourage walkable neighbourhoods, which can reduce impacts on our health systems and is especially relevant in the context of COVID-19.”

“In parallel we are reconsidering policy for low-rise medium-density housing with generous private and public outdoor space as a development solution for future housing needs. Our construction workplace safety and advanced construction technologies research is also world class.

“The breadth and richness of our research and the capabilities of our graduates justify considerable, sustained investment from government, business and our own universities to support the impact that built environment disciplines bring to the making of our cities.
“Our professionals are the glue that connects engineering with health and wellbeing. Through working together we can bridge the divide between economic drivers and social agendas, we can demonstrate a link between long-term strategies for sustainable growth and immediate benefits, and we can show how the crisis of this pandemic can be turned into an opportunity to transform our cities and towns that enable our people to enjoy an improved quality of life.”

The ADBED executive comprises president Martyn Hook, dean of RMIT School of Architecture and Urban Design; deputy president Kerry London, dean of Western Sydney University School of Built Environment; Helen Lochhead, dean of UNSW Built Environment, and Jane Burry, dean of Swinburne University School of Design.
The groups says, “If we are to have a ‘building the future’-led recovery to our economy we must seek to make the new versions of our cities green, safe and healthy.” More

The City of Melbourne will consider a proposal to create a mixed-use precinct on a large swathe of land on the edge of the Maribyrnong River. More

A house designed by Robin Boyd in Melbourne’s eastern suburb of North Balwyn is at risk of demolition after the property was listed for sale as an opportunity to buy “vacant land.” More

Lahznimmo Architects and landscape architecture practice Spackman, Mossop and Michaels have designed a new exhibit for Taronga Zoo that will show Australia’s unique animals in their natural habitats, “whether up in the trees, or down in a burrow.”
Aiming for a message of conservation, the “Upper Australia” exhibit will feature a built form designed to be as unobtrusive as possible, with minimal intervention made to the existing mature landscape and topography. Taronga Zoo stands on the Country of the Cammeraigal people of the Gai-mariagal, on the shores of Sydney Harbour.

The new structures, sitting within a dense tree canopy, will not be visible from the harbour or from lower down the hill in the zoo.
Marking the formal entry to the Upper Australia precinct will be the new Western Pavilion, consisting of a large sculptural built element formed of a mix of natural recycled hardwood and anodised aluminium in a muted colour complementary to the surrounding landscape.

From there, the architects state in planning documents, “the main exhibit path will snake through various native landscapes, ranging from lush rainforest through to arid woodland and then up into the tree canopy via an elevated boardwalk to view koalas at their natural sitting height in the tree canopy.”

“The Australia journey then winds its way down through the Blue Mountains rock escarpment and then underground into the Nocturnal House; where a complete refurbishment of the existing building will provide state-of-the-art keeper facilities and unique night-time viewing of Australia’s nocturnal creatures.”
The macropod exhibit, where visitors will be able to see kangaroos, wallabies and emus at close range, will be located around the northern precinct perimeter, in the area of the existing exhibit and extending west into the existing ponds area, towards the Western Pavilion. It will feature minimal built form – aside from pathways and occasional bench seating – while the landscape design will provide an immersive experience that aims to reflect diverse Australian landscapes, “from dry rainforests and hanging paperbark swamps to open woodlands.”

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The treehouse of the Upper Australia exhibit at Taronga Zoo by Lahznimmo Architects and Spackman, Mossop and Michaels.

The koala exhibit, in the north-eastern part of the precinct, will takes advantage of the existing level changes between the high plateau at the centre of the existing macropod exhibit and the zoo’s boundary fence to create an elevated viewing experience.
And at the centre of the precinct will be the Treehouse, a hardwood timber deck open on three sides with a high timber roof above. Connecting the macropods exhibit with the koala exhibit, and then linking visitors down via the escarpment walk to the Nocturnal House, the Treehouse will offer shaded space to sit, as well as space for a shop and bathroom facilities.
Planning documents for the project are on public exhibition until 3 September. More

Fender Katsalidis and Skidmore Owning and Merrill (SOM) have won a design competition for a $2.5 billion, two-tower development in central Sydney.
To be located on the southern edge of Henry Deane Plaza, on the land of the Gadigal people of the Eora nation, Central Place Sydney will sit adjacent to the proposed headquarters of Atlassian by Shop Architects and BVN. It will be part of the NSW government’s mooted technology precinct adjacent to Central Station.
The first competition in the City of Sydney to be conducted entirely online, it included six participants from around the world.

The development will accommodate 150,000 square metres of office and retail spaces, as well as civic spaces wrapped around its edges.
The design team said the project will be “a dynamic urban marker” with curved sandstone forms that respond to different urban orientations and the scale and materiality of surrounding heritage precinct. The two towers – 37 and 39 storeys respectively – will be expressed with three distinct forms but read together “as a family.”

“The building anchors the southern edge of the Plaza and combines creative workplaces, collaborative and community spaces, and active ground level retail along an internal pedestrian laneway,” SOM design partner Scott Duncan said.
“The design delivers a powerful narrative by establishing a new civic place that extends into the workplace, blurring the lines between public and private, while producing a highly vibrant and diversified experience.”

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The design of Central Place Sydney by Fender Katsalidis and Skidmore Ownings and Merrill responds to the scale and materiality of the surrounding heritage precinct.
Image: Courtesy Fender Katsalidis
The buildings will run on 100 percent renewable energy and utilize natural daylight and ventilation with a computer controlled facade system that will mitigate direct sunlight and minimize heat gain.
Fender Katsalidis design director Mark Curzon said, “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.”
Workplaces inside the buildings will be designed to be flexible both horizontally and vertically to accommodate a range of technology and innovation business. Each floor will be connected to non-workplace spaces such as wintergardens, atria and external terraces.
The is an unsolicited proposal from Dexus and Fraser Property Group, which was approved to proceed by the NSW government in April 2020.
SOM and Fender Katsalidis are also the architects of a 40-storey office and hotel tower planned for 600 Lonsdale Street, Melbourne. More