Bates Smart’s ‘civic landmark’ for Green Square

Bates Smart’s ‘civic landmark’ for Green Square

    Bates Smart has won a City of Sydney Design Excellence competition with its design for an office building in Green Square that offers a contemporary interpretation of the industrial sawtooth roof form.

The practice’s director Philip Vivian said the 28,570-sqaure-metre commercial development would respond to Green Square’s physical, social and historic contexts.

“The design creates the civic landmark entry that Green Square needs,” he said. “The city fringe location, alongside the connection to Green Square’s train station, provides a unique opportunity to create a fringe precinct that invigorates its context and sets the precedent for the workplace of the future.”

The design competition jury said the design had an “interesting built form, particularly due to the splayed rooftop and height.”

   The jury unanimously selected Bates Smart’s scheme, which they said provided the best response and was capable of achieving design excellence.

The building has been conceived as two volumes, with a through-site link connecting to an adjoining pocket park, creating a smooth public domain transition from the Green Square train station.

This space will be home to cafes and retail tenancies and will be defined by arched forms, chosen to celebrate the area’s industrial history.

Inside, the volumes house two workplace neighbourhoods with individual identities, connected via a naturally ventilated timber “social heart” that encourages connectivity and collaboration.

    Vivian noted that commercial city-fringe developments are increasingly important to the future of work in Sydney, as they allow for a greater focus on workplace wellbeing and can integrate with the surrounding urban context.

“This development in Green Square will weave together public space, retail, workplace and transport to create an exciting, holistic, shared place. It will meet growing expectations on commercial space and more importantly, serve the needs of the people as Green Square continues to grow,” he said.

written by :   ArchitectureAU Editorial
15 Mar 2021
published in : architectureau.com

Bates Smart’s ‘civic landmark’ for Green Square

    Bates Smart has won a City of Sydney Design Excellence competition with its design for an office building in Green Square that offers a contemporary interpretation of the industrial sawtooth roof form.

Candalepas designs addition to mid-century Sydney church

candalepas sydney church
candalepas sydney church

Candalepas designs addition to mid-century Sydney church

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.

candalepas sydney church

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.

written by :   ArchitectureAU Editorial
16 Mar 2021
published in : architectureau.com

Parramatta Powerhouse

Parramatta Powerhouse

    The NSW Government has given the go-ahead to the plans for the Parramatta Powerhouse Museum, in what is being described as Western Sydney’s first major cultural institution.

With plans for the precinct first unveiled back in 2019, with Moreau Kusunoki and Genton winning the design competition. The green light from the state government is a critical moment for Parramatta Council, creating over 4000 new jobs and injecting hundreds of millions of dollars into the local economy.

    Minister for the Arts Don Harwin says the final decision to move ahead with the plans for the Powerhouse on the banks of the Parramatta River followed extensive community feedback.

“Now that planning consent has been secured, I am delighted as Arts Minister that Western Sydney will now have the biggest and best museum in NSW,” he says.

“With a focus on science and technology, Powerhouse Parramatta will be the museum’s flagship site and hold the revered Powerhouse collection it is renowned for.”

    Member for Parramatta Geoff Lee says the new museum is a gift for a city slowly recovering from the COVID-19 pandemic that in turn puts Parramatta on the global culture map.

“The Powerhouse Parramatta is something the local community has been very keen for and I’m proud that this Government will be able to deliver it.”

    Minister for Planning and Public Spaces Rob Stokes says the inclusion of green open space as part of the overall plans will be mutually beneficial for locals and visitors to Parramatta.

“One of the great outcomes of this project is that a carpark on the foreshore is being replaced by a north facing, green public space on the banks of the Parramatta River,” Stokes says.

7 July 2020
published in : cityofparramatta.nsw.gov.au

Parramatta Powerhouse

The NSW Government has given the go-ahead to the plans for the Parramatta Powerhouse Museum, in what is being described as Western Sydney’s first major cultural institution.

200425_Powerhouse-Paramatta_Aerial-view_Crop-002

Henning Larsen Wins Competition for a Mixed-Use Development in South Korea

Henning Larsen Wins Competition for a Mixed-Use Development in South Korea

   Henning Larsen’s proposal for Seoul Valley was selected as the winner of the Central Seoul Development Competition. Seeking to become a new home for the public in the center of the city, the mixed-use development “merges Seoul’s global commercial profile with an ecological return to downtown pedestrian life”. Other entries included schemes by MVRDV and SOM.

    Located on the northern border of Yongsan-Gu, one of Seoul’s central districts, the winning proposal of the 360,644 m² mixed-use urban development, is designed by Henning Larsen in collaboration with local architect Siaplan and retail consultant Benoy. Mixing office, retail, hotel, and residential program within a public podium, the project will enter the Schematic Design phase in the spring of 2021. Aiming to meet the goals of Seoul’s 2030 plan, Seoul Valley creates a comfortable and vibrant space for locals and visitors.

    Seoul Valley is such an exciting project for central Seoul. For well over a decade the city has been actively working to revitalize its urban fabric, focusing on the spaces between buildings and the pedestrian links. Seoul Valley fits into that vision, promising to bring public life back to the center not just through shops and amenities but through a design that focuses on public comfort, greenery, and local tradition. —

Jacob Kurek, Henning Larsen partner in charge.

    Seoul Valley merges both human and city scale. Fragmenting its elements into numerous smaller masses as they meet the elevated ground floor where they generate gardens, terraces, and courtyards in between the structures, Seoul Valley invites pedestrian flow to access the project from a sprawling tribune stair on the north side and along the Seoul Skygarden Park to the south.

    Office and hotel towers cluster around a leafy core: a Biospheric Layer mitigates pollution, a Percolation Layer blocks noise and forms a lush green interior, and a Conscious Layer stimulates the senses. The massing is the result of extensive wind and climate studies, aimed at reducing heat buildup and prolonging the outdoor season. Retail modules are dispersed throughout the site, creating a free-flowing, ever-changing space that encourages lingering and exploration.

    As an industry, we’ve known for a long time the benefits of daylight, exterior views, greenery…but such benefits are often pushed to the side in favor of maximizing frontage in commercial design. Shopping in the future won’t necessarily be about coming out of the shop with a bag, so our goal with Seoul Valley was to have both. In the end, we believe the whole is more than the sum of its parts. — Jacob Kurek, Henning Larsen partner in charge.

written by : Christele Harrouk
30 November 2020
published in : archdaily.com

Henning Larsen Wins Competition for a Mixed-Use Development in South Korea

    Henning Larsen’s proposal for Seoul Valley was selected as the winner of the Central Seoul Development Competition. Seeking to become a new home for the public in the center of the city, the mixed-use development “merges Seoul’s global commercial profile with an ecological return to downtown pedestrian life”. Other entries included schemes by MVRDV and SOM.

Australia is Building the World’s First Coral Conservation Facility

coral conservation facility

Australia is Building the World’s First Coral Conservation Facility

    Contreras Earl Architecture has revealed its design for the world-first coral ark. Located at the gateway to the Great Barrier Reef in Port Douglas, North Queensland, Australia, the conservation facility “aims to secure the long-term future and biodiversity of corals worldwide which are under severe threat due to climate change”.

Dedicated to the future of corals worldwide, the Living Coral Biobank, designed by Contreras Earl Architecture, with leading engineering and sustainability consultants Arup and Werner Sobek for the Great Barrier Reef Legacy, is the first facility of its kind. Focusing on taking care of 800 species of the world’s hard corals, the new building is a “living ark”, with next-generation renewable energy design, creating optimal conditions for coral storage while minimizing energy consumption and solar gain.

    Securing the living biodiversity of the world’s coral species immediately, the 6,830 sqm multi-function center will also host exhibition areas, an auditorium, and classrooms as well as advanced research and laboratory facilities over four levels. Commissioned by the Great Barrier Reef Legacy, the project responds to context, climate, the user, and its function to protect 800 species of coral. The volume, inspired by the mushroom coral, takes a series of organic undulating concrete fins, on the façade, “clustered closely at ground level to offer protection from adverse tropical conditions including threats of a flood”. On higher levels, the fins twist and unfurl, allowing natural light and ventilation while providing solar shading. On another hand, the visitor’s’ journey is defined by an architecturally manipulated play of light.

    Responding to the need to conserve the corals in a highly controlled environment as well as the requirement for biosecurity to prevent cross-contamination, sustainability is at the core of every design decision, aiming to be self-sufficient and carbon neutral. In fact, the structure was divided into six compatible climate zones over four levels, with adjacencies minimizing energy resources used for climatic control. 

written by : Christele Harrouk
11 November 2020
published in : archdaily.com

Sutherland Shire entertainment center gets the final go ahead

Sutherland Shire entertainment center gets the final go ahead

    The Sutherland Entertainment Center holds an important place in the collective memory of the Sutherland community. Designed and built in the 1970s primarily as a musical venue, the then ‘Sutherland Civic Centre’ relied on an inward focus on its auditorium and on a narrow public address to Eton Street.  This was a time when buildings like this relied on a separation between inside and outside and where spaces such as the foyer had only one purpose.  This was also long before the development of Peace Park to the building’s north.

Fast forward to the present day.  What we now find is a 40+ year old building which is in relatively good physical condition. However, as a modern day public venue, it must now cater to a diversity of cultural and technical needs. It must have a more open outlook and offer more to its community, both in terms of its relationship with its immediate surrounds but also in its spatial flexibility.

    Our proposal seeks to offer a new and more engaging address for the Entertainment Centre by virtue of a friendlier and integrated relationship with Peace Park.  This speaks to an opportunity to re-affirm Peace Park as the civic heart of Sutherland – a place with stronger connections not only to already established civic institutions but also with anticipated future developments within the Sutherland Town Centre.

    Just as there is much spatial potential between the building and the park there are also wonderful opportunities to re-use much of the building’s current fabric.  We propose that the existing black box space and administration building be retained and re-purposed to be café / theatre bar and foyer on the Ground Floor and multi-purpose community room and rehearsal space on Level 1.  Likewise, the structure and facade on the north side of the building would be adapted for new uses such as restaurant, kitchen and stores on the Ground Floor; Administration spaces on Level 1 and Green Room on Level 2, each with a view of the park and connected by the existing ivy clad egress stair.

    The auditorium also retains much of its surrounding envelope but will become an entirely new and lively space.  The existing flat floor will be transformed into a more immersive tiered seating arrangement and all acoustics, accessibility and back of house functions revitalised to provide a venue with broad appeal for audiences and performers alike.  The new theatre will be designed to meet or exceed national benchmarks for Performing Arts Centres, achieving a four star rating for theatres on the local, regional and national touring circuit.

Sydney’s Sutherland Shire Council has voted unanimously to go ahead with the largest infrastructure project in the council’s history, the redevelopment of its Civic Centre.

    A state-significant development application for the proposed Sutherland Entertainment Centre was approved in October.

Chrofi and NBRS Architecture won a design competition for the project in May 2019. Their winning scheme included a verandah structure that will be added to the north of the existing structure, the Sutherland Civic Centre, and form a large foyer space and connection to the adjacent Peace Park.

Other works include a refurbished theatre with tiered seating, a fly tower over the stage to cater for diverse performances, flexible teaching and rehearsal spaces, a new entry court incorporating flexible outdoor events space, and upgrades to Peace Park.

    “The Sutherland Entertainment Centre has been a much loved and well used performance and events space for over forty years, but we all acknowledge it is in need of a refresh to ensure it can continue to be the region’s premier entertainment destination for many years to come,” said mayor Steve Simpson.

“Plans to redevelop or replace our Entertainment Centre have been floated for almost as long as the building has been standing, with plans to upgrade the facility first brought before Council in 1984.

Construction will begin in early 2021, and completion is expected in 2022. The council is continuing to seek funding from relevant government agencies to support the project.

written by : ArchitectureAU Editorial
19 Nov 2020
published in : architectureau.com

Sutherland Shire entertainment center gets the final go-ahead

 “The Sutherland Entertainment Centre has been a much loved and well used performance and events space for over forty years, but we all acknowledge it is in need of a refresh to ensure it can continue to be the region’s premier entertainment destination for many years to come,” said mayor Steve Simpson.

Clement Meadmore

clement meadmore sculptor

    Clement Meadmore is one of the most highly respected artists of his generation, for both the quality of his work and the integrity of his commitment to public sculpture. This sculptor has been uniquely successful as a creator of public art that serves as a positive, unifying force in the environment.Although initially linked with the Minimalists, Clement Meadmore transcended geometry with work of uncommon force and elegance, powerful in large scale and small.

    It relies for its effect on the opposition between line and mass, also deriving power and eloquence from its fusion of formal invention with intense feeling, a frankly spiritual dimension. Yet ultimately the appeal of Clement Meadmore’s work lies in its success as sheer form.The artist has managed to overcome geometry’s qualities of stasis, containment, rigor, and sobriety. His sculptures deny their physical reality, suggesting weightlessness. Because of this extroverted and animated character, his public commissions provide oases of humanity in the urban environment. He himself has stated: “A building is part of the environment, but a sculpture is a presence inhabiting the environment.”

    Clement Meadmore’s works range in size from those that fit in the palm of a hand to others that stretch more than forty-six feet, not to mention a proposal for a six-hundred-foot skyscraper sculpture. This range in scale is belied by the seeming monumentality and robust physicality of even the smallest maquette.In a typical Meadmore sculpture, a large rectangular volume of steel twists and turns upon itself. The point about his classic works is that they are huge, and so the great curl of steel takes on this epic scale, as if mighty and usually exuberant forces are at work. In Melbourne, a massive steel structure called Dervish has been sitting beside the Yarra River for 20 years.

    Another Meadmore sculpture called Flippant Flurry slumbers on the rooftop of the Art Gallery of New South Wales. It was hidden behind a wall until 2010, now it can be seen through the glass panes of the gallery rooms. But a Meadmore sculpture titled Janus has met a more controversial fate. Australia donated Janus to Mexico City for the Mexico Olympics in 1968, and for a while it was on public display, but that’s no longer the case. Since 1996, it’s been inside the grounds of a private school. Some people are now saying the Mexican government has effectively abandoned this gift and Australia should now ask for it to be returned.

published in : Clement Meadmore | Sculptor

clement meadmore sculptor

    Clement Meadmore is one of the most highly respected artists  of his generation, for both the quality of his work and the integrity of his commitment to public sculpture. This sculptor has been uniquely successful as a creator of public art that serves as a positive, unifying force in the environment.

Paige Bradley

Paige Bradley – Sculptures in Bronze

     Paige Bradley is an American sculpture artist who gained fame for her figurative bronze works that were internally illuminated with electricity. Titled “Expansion”, the bronze sculpture depicted a woman sitting in a cross-legged position with light streaming from cracks in her body. This piece was originally photographed in 2004 against New York’s skyline, gaining international fame and putting Paige on the map.

      Paige Bradley’s (b. 1974) powerful sculptures of dynamically posed figures showcase more than just physical strength and passion – they testify to the inner strength and fortitude woven into the fabric of a person’s soul. Her own personal experiences are the starting point for Paige’s work, and she then uses her skill, intuition, and sensitivity to build these stories out into universally understood creations. The unseen and often unspoken dichotomies one encounters in life – joy and sorrow, dissonance and harmony, weakness and strength, ugliness and beauty – become powerfully alive in Paige’s sculpture, as she is an artist who has the rare ability to turn abstract feeling into three-dimensional form.

      Working in the figurative genre, Paige’s sculptures are anything but relics, antiques, or pastiches of figuration past. Rather, her works combine iconic media and uncommon skill with modern thought, philosophy, and psychology, speaking in the currency of our contemporary culture. Paige is also known for eschewing stylistic rules and parameters of any kind, which has kept stagnation far from her studio. In looking at the variety of thought-provoking work she has produced over her 25-year career, one can see how this mind set continues to serve her creative diversity: some of her figures sit strong and grounded in outdoor spaces; others float delicately in suspended compositions; others are sturdily wrapped in silk while stretching toward freedom. Although she primarily casts in bronze, Paige’s artwork also encompasses painting and charcoals, woodcuts, iron-bonded resin, aluminium, mixed media, or any other material she feels helps communicate her message.

in her own words

     “Inspiration comes from my connection to the world, my relationships with others, and my relationship with myself. I don’t need to travel the planet or hire dancers to find a muse. My individual journey is inspiration enough.Since I was nine years old I knew I would be an artist. I was drawing since I can remember and began casting my work into bronze when I was seventeen. Three decades later, I am still doing it – and I intend to never stop.”

       “As much as I try to avoid labelling myself, I am a figurative artist in everything I do. The figure to me is the perfect vehicle to communicate the human condition. My definition of success is to be a visionary through truthful and courageous artwork, work that communicates what it feels like to be alive in the world today.I keep moving my work forward by questioning, observing, looking for truth and searching for clarity. My goal is to have the courage to create what feels real, not necessarily beautiful, in order to create lasting, fine art.”

Paige Bradley

published in : paigebradley.com

Paige Bradley – Sculptures in Bronze

      Paige Bradley is an American sculpture artist who gained fame for her figurative bronze works that were internally illuminated with electricity. Titled “Expansion”, the bronze sculpture depicted a woman sitting in a cross-legged position with light streaming from cracks in her body. This piece was originally photographed in 2004 against New York’s skyline, gaining international fame and putting Paige on the map.

3D View Living Room

Bibendum Metus

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