Architecture

In 1974, the Department of Public Works in New South Wales launched a program that would see inflatable concrete shells used for the rapid development of public schools to fulfil an election pledge. Fifty years later, some of these structures still stand, and one school has plans to restore theirs.
The department looked to the Italian architect, Dante Bini, who, in 1964, had invented a radical construction system that enabled shell-like structures to be erected quickly and rather inexpensively through the use of an inflatable membrane. The construction process involved pouring a thin layer of concrete over the membrane, which was covered with a network of reinforcing rods. The entire process, from pouring the concrete to completing the finishes, took approximately two weeks.
By the 1970s, the Binishells, patented in 1964, were being reproduced worldwide. After observing the success of the system from afar, the department was eager to see it introduced in NSW. Concurrently, Dante Bini was looking for new work opportunities, and so, the department facilitated Bini and his family’s relocation from Europe to Australia.

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Interior of the Ashbury Public School, NSW, 1977. Image:

Max Dupain

According to the NSW Department of Education, 15 Binishells – including multi-shell complexes – were constructed at 14 public schools between 1974 and 1979, making it the “largest collection of Binishells in the world.” The shells come in either a diameter of 18 metres or 36 metres.
The schools were Narrabeen North Public School, Killarney Heights Public School, Peakhurst High School, Randwick Girls’ High School, Pittwater High School, Ingelburn High School, Ku-ring-gai High School, Georges River College Hurstville Boys Campus, Fairvale High School, Ashbury Public School, Callaghan College Jesmond Senior Campus, Richmond High School, Gateshead High School (now Hunter Sports High School), and Broadmeadow High School (now Hunter School of Performing Arts).
The Binishells constructed as part of the NSW public school program all took on the form of a dome. The first to be built were those sited at Narrabeen North Public School – a complex of three domes, two of which are connected – built in 1974.
The Binishells still in operation include the complex at Narrabeen North Public School, one at Ku-ring-gai High School, one at Ashbury Public School, one at Fairvale High School and one at Georges River College Hurstville Boys Campus. They are predominantly used as administration blocks, libraries, multi-purpose halls and out-of-school-hours care facilities.

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Binishells at Fairvale High School, photographed in May 2014. Image:

Alberto Pugnale

Alberto Pugnale, architect, senior lecturer in architectural design at The University of Melbourne and co-author of Architecture Beyond the Cupola: Inventions and Designs of Dante Bini, said the structures hold historical significance as Australia was the only country to initiate a specific school program that would facilitate the construction of the Binishells.
Furthermore, the domes in NSW represent some of the only instances in the world where Dante Bini himself was heavily involved throughout the design and construction process.
Pugnale explained that because the Binishell was patented it meant that architects, engineers and construction companies were replicating the system across the globe, often without any involvement or participation of Dante Bini. There were even structures made using the Binishell system in other parts of Australia that were not designed by Dante Bini, including a shopping centre in Queensland and some in Victoria, which have since been demolished.
“The first experiments in Italy were conducted directly by him because he was testing and attempting to enhance the technology. Also, Dante Bini’s office, the first office of the Binishell company, was within a Binishell. Apart from those instances and the instances in NSW it is really quite difficult to track down where he may have been personally and directly involved,” Pugnale said.
“In Australia, since he was employed by the Department of Public Works in New South Wales, the designs for the schools were directly made by Dante Bini. That’s probably also the reason why you can find more conceptual sketches of the original designs in Australia.”

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Narrabeen North Public School, photographed in May 2014. Image:

Alberto Pugnale

As the Narrabeen North domes’ 50th anniversary draws closer, plans to restore them have been revealed. A spokesperson from the NSW Department of Education said they are currently in the process of developing a scope of works with an engineer for the school’s Binishells. Once the scope is finalized, funding will then be confirmed.
“We are consulting with stakeholders and heritage experts where remediation work is required,” the spokesperson said. “The structures are complex due to their dome shape and heritage significance and require careful attention when considering repairs and restoration including waterproofing.”
Pugnale said finding a new purpose or function for the Binishells is not always a simple task. Due to their dome shape, the structures have acoustic challenges, particularly if you are sitting in the centre as the sound can reverberate back at you. “They would not be ideal for concerts or performances, for example,” he said. “The Binishells that have been used as sporting facilities seem to have worked pretty well in the past, they could potentially also be used as libraries.”
Pugnale also said using a Binishell permanently for residential purposes could be challenging as walls and ceilings in a shell typology function as a unified system, rather than as separate entities. However, there are examples of holiday homes in Trinity Beach, Queensland, and southern Italy that function well as unique, temporary accommodation. “If you find the right function, then they can be used successfully,” he said.
All of the remaining Binishells have some level of heritage listing. The domes at Narrabeen North, Ashbury and Ku-ring-gai are state heritage listed, while Narrabeen North and Ashbury are also listed as local heritage sites. All of them are listed as heritage significant on the department’s S170 Heritage Conservation Register, which ensures that the buildings are managed and maintained.
Pugnale attributed people’s fascination with Binishells to the innovative construction method, the rapidity of construction and their distinct “futuristic” look. “When you place the reinforcing rods on the grounds, they are flat, and then they bend together with the concrete while it’s taking shape. That’s a very interesting aspect of the Binishell system,” he said. “Another aspect is that, in most cases, these domes sit in a natural landscape so there is this contrast between natural and artificial, and in a way, that creates the impression of a futuristic building.”
Another intriguing element is the way in which the Department of Public Works NSW implemented the system, setting the Binishells in NSW public schools apart from those found elsewhere in the world. More

The City of Helsinki will soon launch an international two-stage design competition for a building that will house the New Museum of Architecture and Design. The council announced it will commit €60 million funding to establish the new museum, on top of €30 million already raised through private donations. The museum will be operated by […] More

A new exhibition at the WA Museum Boola Bardip, explores alternative models of “the great (West) Australian dream.”
Titled “WA Homes – S, M, L,” the exhibition covers a range of housing types in Western Australia, from small houses, medium-density developments, and multi-unit apartment blocks.
Australian houses are the largest in the world, with a median size of 256.3 square metres. Western Australia has the greatest promotion of four-bedroom homes in the country at 36 percent. While at the same time, household sizes are decreasing and the proportion of single-person households are increasing.
“We need to change the way we plan for more housing. We can’t keep building out we need to create capacity for more infill, with more diverse types of homes,” said Perth Design Week co-creators Sandy Anghie and David Smith.

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The exhibition includes domestic architecture at three different scales – small-footprint single residences, medium-density developments, and multi-unit apartments. Image:

Dion Robeson

The exhibition will feature a range of award-winning, small-footprint homes by Perth architects, showcasing how the state can increase the supply, and quality, of homes while also reducing costs and the impact on the environment.
“Small homes include award winning Celilo Springs House by architect Andrew Boyne. At just 120 square metres, this beautiful hand crafted home is half the size of the average Australian home,” the co-creators said.
“The exhibition will also focus on medium density developments, the missing middle. With the start date for the state government’s new Medium Density Code announced just a few weeks ago, this exhibition shows the diversity of housing – and choice ‐ medium density provides.
“Apartments featured in the exhibition challenge the norm. Architects have led the way in innovative apartment design across Perth for decades – from setting precedents in urban density, through to adaptive reuse of existing buildings and build to rent.”
WA Homes – S, M, L is on exhibition at the Hub, Old Gaol, WA Museum Boola Bardip until 29 March 2024 and will be a key part of Perth Design Week. More

A round-up of beautiful new things for your home that draw inspiration from European summers, ancient symbols and time-honoured Japanese traditions. Tsukiko lamp Tsukiko Table Lamp by Alexander Lotersztain for Derlot. Image: Rodrigo Rabaco Tsukiko, meaning “moon child,” is a collaboration between Australian designer Alexander Lotersztain and Kyoto-based, tenth-generation lantern makers Kojima Shōten. A paper […] More

The NSW government has allocated $5.6 million towards artificial intelligence (AI) to accelerate the process of assessing development applications and increase housing supply.
The Department of Planning, Housing and Infrastructure (DPHI) has invited AI industry experts to submit existing, mature, proven and successfully implemented AI technology solutions to the department, with the objective being to assist councils with assessing and streamlining the pre-lodgement phase.
Submissions will be reviewed with assessors focusing on how each proposal addresses one or more priority focus areas, demonstrates low-impact implementation, and aligns with the NSW AI Assurance Framework and AI Ethics Policy. Following the evaluation stage, the department will shortlist a selection of products and offer guidance to councils on appropriate AI tools for their individual council.
A statement released by the Minister for Planning and Public Spaces, Paul Scully, stated that proposal reviews would be guided by six principles: trust, transparency, customer benefit, fairness, privacy, and accountability.
“Councils are responsible for determining approximately 85 percent of all new dwellings in NSW,” Scully said. “Introducing more AI features into our planning system is about working smarter so that councils can assess DAs faster, which helps to build more homes where they are needed most. Using AI tools will help us cut down DA assessment times, saving proponents, councils, developers and taxpayers valuable time and money.
“AI won’t replace our highly skilled planners at the core of the planning system, but it will free them up from repetitive daily tasks so that they can focus on more complex DAs.
“The department is also trialling AI tools such as chatbots and automated document processing to support triage queries and enhance response times for the Planning Portal.”
The DPHI confirmed it had already consulted with and conducted workshops with councils to determine the key challenges related to the process. More than 30 metropolitan and regional councils participated in those workshops.
Wagga Wagga City Council was one of the councils who participated. The council manager for development assessment and building certification, Paul O’Brien, said AI could assist their council with arranging pre-lodgement applications into the correct format, eliminating the need for council to undertake time-consuming tasks such as “going back and forth” with the applicant to clarify details regarding the project.
“For most of the regular clients they understand what needs to happen, however, for occasional developers who might do it once or twice in their lifetime it’s very confusing and having an AI presence can help step them through it,” O’Brien said.
Port Stephens Council manager for development and compliance, Evert Grobbelaar, said they can also see the potential benefits of using AI in the pre-DA lodgement process, such as improving “application quality, reduced DA processing timeframes, and education opportunities for the community and landowners on the lodgement process.”
AI proposals can be submitted until 11 March 2024. To find out more, visit the NSW Planning website. More

The 2024 Dezeen Awards is now accepting entries for the seventh edition of its annual awards program. In 2023, the program attracted more than 4,800 entries from 94 countries. Seven architecture projects and six interior projects from Australia made it through to the shortlist, resulting in three Australian projects being awarded or highly commended. Nightingale […] More

The Australian Government Department of Social Services has terminated the competition-winning design for the National Memorial for Victims and Survivors of Institutional Child Sexual Abuse in Canberra by architects Jessica Spresser and Peter Besley, citing “complex construction challenges.”
Spresser and Besley said they were “blind sighted” by the decision to axe their design, after being informed by a journalist for The Australian in early February 2024.
The article had uncovered that the project had been secretly terminated in November 2023.
“We’re a little bit bewildered by what happened,” Besley said. “It just got axed in silence. We were just not expecting it to be honest.”
Besley and Spresser stressed that they had enjoyed a good working relationship with the government project team, but, in the months leading up to the revelation, they had stopped receiving responses to their repeated inquiries on project updates.
Since the publication of The Australian article, the Department of Social Services (DSS) has updated its website and outlined the reasons for the termination.
Spresser and Besley’s winning concept, “Transparency and Truth”, proposed a series of catenary arches to be made from glass blocks with a meandering path encircling a meadow of perennial grasses and wildflowers.

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‘Transparency and Truth,’ the winning design for the National Memorial for Victims and Survivors of Institutional Child Sexual Abuse by Jessica Spresser and Peter Besley. Image:

Courtesy National Capital Authority

The DSS website states that in 2022­–23, “The design concept underwent technical assessments, which revealed complex construction challenges. The department worked with the National Capital Authority, in consultation with Mr [Peter] McClellan [former chair of the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse] and the advisory group to attempt to resolve this. It was agreed the design challenges were too complex to resolve.”
“Assessments of the selected design concept […] identified complex technical challenges due to the unique and innovative use of glass in the design,” DSS states.
“The department and the National Capital Authority worked closely to explore options to resolve the design challenges and engaged with the National Memorial Advisory Group on these options. This consultation determined the selected design had unacceptable technical risks and a protracted timeframe.
“In addition, the assessment was unable to determine whether the design would have long-term durability in Canberra’s climate.”
Besley and Spresser disagree with the assessment. “We had produced a detailed, proof-of-concept report,” Spresser said. “We were working with a structural and a facade engineer, and a lighting designer at the time, who have contributed to this report and delivered quite a technical set of documents, and cost analysis of the glass, and recommended within the report that the project go ahead.”
Spresser and Besley said their winning scheme had built in flexibility so that the number of catenary arches could vary in order to meet the budget.
“We had 49 paired arches, which is a lot. We made it very clear that we were not wedded to that number – we would have halved or cut it by two-thirds. We would have redone the site plan, reorientated it, redistributed those arches, and it would have reduced the cost massively, but we never went through that process,” Besley said.
“The timeframe is massively affected by the extent of work. If we were doing half or one-third the number of catenary arches, then clearly the effect on the program would be enormous.
“Let’s say it went down to 15 or 20 arches, it still would have been great. We’re really disappointed that we went to the effort of embedding that into the design and then no one reached for the lever to pull it.”
As to the long-term durability of the glass blocks, Spresser and Besley said they had already consulted with a manufacturer who supplies glass blocks to the world market.
“We were pretty confident about the glass that we got because it’s already used in the building industry. It’s not like it had to come from a glass manufacturer that we were adapting for construction,” Besley said. “[The manufacturer] were just going to make a new mould for us.”
The architects say they were never given the opportunity to review or respond to the government’s assessment of their scheme.
“We think it was pre-emptively cut,” Besley said. “What should have happened is we should have sat with them around a table with their concerns, and as designers have the opportunity to vary the works, which was part of our competition pitch. The cost and the time issues could have been solved very quickly.”
Spresser added, “Our feeling is it got axed because they felt like it was just too complicated, but I think that’s completely untrue in reality, it’s just that bespoke construction is complicated.”
DSS will soon begin a new two-stage design selection process that will require applicants to “have the required skills and experience to design and deliver a memorial” in stage one. “And in stage two shortlisted applicants will provide a detailed design submission that will be independently assessed for compliance (buildability, durability, timeframe, cost) by professionals, prior to final selection by a panel.”
Construction is expected to begin in 2025 with completion anticipated in 2026. More

A design competition is calling on architecture students and graduates to envision a safe and welcoming maternity centre in southern Senegal, Sub-Saharan Africa.
The Kaira Looro 2024 Architectural Competition has been launched to address the life-threatening health complications that pregnant women in Senegal and the wider region are prone to experiencing. The competition brief states that “every year, [in Sub-Saharan Africa] more than 200,000 women lose their lives due to a lack of basic care” subsequently “resulting in more than 1 million orphans each year.”
“In Africa, one in 16 women risks dying giving birth to a new life, while in other parts of the world, thanks to prenatal care and specialised assistance during childbirth, this risk affects one in 35,000 women,” the brief reveals. “This issue is often the result of complications that could be prevented or treated with access to basic medical care.”
The competition objective is to generate a design for a humanitarian-operated facility that provides health services to pregnant women. The jury will be seeking a scheme that is innovative, comfortable, emblematic, professional, promotes sanitary conditions and emanates a feeling of safety among women.
The structure or structures must be able to be self-constructed by local community members, without the requirement for qualified tradespeople, construction companies or heavy vehicles. A sustainable architecture model must be adopted and the scheme must incorporate local materials. The design will be required to accommodate a reception area and waiting room, an operating area for caesarean sections, a reserved area for healthcare personnel, a neonatal observation area, a medical examination and consultation area and a labour and delivery area.
The international jury comprises Kengo Kuma of Kengo Kuma and Associates, Benedetta Tagliabue of EMBT Architects, Mario Cucinella of Mario Cucinella, Agostino Ghiradelli of SBGA – Blengini Ghirardelli, Tosin Oshinowo of Oshinowo Studio, Urko Sanchez of Urko Sanchez Architects, Raul Pantaleo of TAM Associati, Emmanuelle Moureaux of Emmanuelle Moureaux Architecture, Driss Kettani, Saad El Kabbaj and Mohamed Amine Siana.
Competition winners will be rewarded cash prizes and internships. First prize winners will receive €5,000 and an internship with Kengo Kuma and Associates in Japan; second prize winners will receive €2,000 and an internship with EMBT Architects in Spain; third prize recipients will be presented with €1,000 and an internship with SBGA – Blengini Ghirardelli in Italy.
Registrations close on 14 May 2024 and the submission deadline is 11 June. The jury will evaluate the submission until 29 June, with winners expected to be announced on 9 July.
The competition is run by an independent not-for-profit organization Balouo Salo and is aimed primarily at students, young architects, designers and engineers. Awarded designs will be donated to the organization and may be used to construct a charitable project.
To find out more, visit the Kaira Looro competition website. More