PROCESS Archives - Unsettling Queenstown

UNBOUNDING SITE AND TIME

Ben Cottam on 16 May 2023

UNBOUNDING SITE AND TIME

EMBEDDING ACTIONS IN ONGOING SURROUNDS

NMBW Architecture Studio + Leigh Woolley

LOCATION
TAS
Mt Wellington,
kunanyi, lutruwita

Unbounding creates evolving relationships between place, material and individual experience.

The Female Factory is a historical occurrence in Australia, a holding bay for convict women arriving at the Colony. The World Heritage listing of the site (operating 1826-1856) in lutruwita / Tasmania generated a design competition. We presented both a conforming competition locating an embroidered visitor centre within the archaeological courtyards, and a future stage. The future stage proposed the incremental relocation of the buildings to the surrounding historic areas outside the courtyard walls, but within the extents of the nearby quarry walls ‘made’ through the process of quarrying sandstone for the construction of the factory. The future stage returns the courtyards to their powerful empty condition and embeds them in the local surrounds.

The proposal engages with durations; from the contemporary and ongoing repair of the walls to the geological time of the kunanyi / Mt Wellington sedimentary deposition and uplift revealed in the quarry walls. The layered unbounding of site and time acknowledges convict labour and points to something of the brutality of the colonial project.

nmbw.com.au

ARCHITECT
NMBW Architecture Studio

ARCHITECT + URBAN DESIGNER
Leigh Woolley

STRUCTURAL ENGINEER
OPS Engineers

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Shrinking Yourself to Make Yourself Larger

Jessie Lewis on 16 May 2023

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SHRINKING YOURSELF TO MAKE YOURSELF LARGER

REFLECTIONS FOR ARCHITECTS ON THE EXPANSION OF OUR FIELD

Blaklash Creative, Deicke Richards, Genevieve Quinn

LOCATION
QLD
We thank all the people on whose land and waters we live and work. These are, the Barada Barna, Danggan Balum, Darambal, Gubbi Gabbi, Jagera, Kombumerri, Quandamooka, Turrbal, and Yugambeh people. We would also like to thank all First Nations people we have worked with, connecting to all parts of the Country. Without your trust, perspective, knowledge, and custodianship, we could not learn these lessons and better our practice and industry.

Shrinking Yourself is about removing ego, letting go
of authority and forgetting the timelines. It is about embracing fluidity and being uncomfortable when we have been trained to be linear and assured. Our design is ‘blurred’ because it is irrelevant. The accomplishment of this project is not visible in plan. It lies in the rejection of production-based and time-driven architecture, and the acceptance of uncertainty. The extended timeline prioritised listening and empathising (without a pen in hand), and conceded our design authority and sense of ‘expertise’. The removal of us as ‘designer’ allowed for the process, site and community to be the designers.
We became documenters and illustrators. Some of the armour that protects us as architects (Gant charts, resourcing and budget) was shed, yet our design time remained the same. Months were spent talking, gaining trust, listening, and learning. Shrinking ourselves drove us into a larger profession of compassion and community. This is a small step in decolonisation. We are a small part of the process. This tactic is not a small task.

shrinkyourselftomakeyourselflarger.com

ENGAGEMENT AND DESIGN TEAM
Blaklash Creative & Deicke Richards

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UNSETTLING GROUND

Ben Cottam on 16 May 2023

UNSETTLING GROUND

NURTURING AND INVITING IN

NMBW Architecture Studio + Openwork

LOCATION
VIC
Richmond, Melbourne
Naarm, Boon Wurrung and Woi Wurrung Country

We ask how we can relate to the ground as active and remember what lies dormant.

While much historical and contemporary urban practice is based upon an approach of ‘settling’ of ground, the Richmond factory conversion is an urban ‘unsettling’ of ground. This two-story brick building is a former factory filling the extent of its site. Taking away is a significant part of the project. A large cut-out is made in the existing continuous ground floor concrete slab, exposing the ground. A cut-out in the first level slab above and new large skylights bring natural light down to the ground.

Material taken away is rearranged and reused. Decisions around reuse consider the capacity for materials to be in relationship with and catalysts for the conditions of the wellbeing of the ground and plant growth. The holes in the concrete slabs, made through both coring and cutting of the concrete, make circular and square blocks of concrete that will be rearranged into stacks to support plants and create microclimates for the plants to erode, trespass, and grow out of the rubble and waste of the building.

nmbw.com.au

CLIENT
Tripple

ARCHITECT
NMBW Architecture Studio

LANDSCAPE ARCHITECT
Openwork

STRUCTURAL ENGINEER
FORM Engineers

BUILDER
Never Stop Group

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LINGUISTIC TRUTH

Ben Cottam on 16 May 2023

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LINGUISTIC TRUTH

PLACE NAMING AND LANGUAGE

Tanner Kibble Denton Architects

LOCATION
NSW
Alexandria
Gadigal / Cadigal Land

Alexandria Park Community School is on Gadigal Land and is a fully connected learning precinct for over 2,000 children between the ages of 4 to 18 years.

Framed around the idea of ‘Clouds’, the project is a community-focused precinct that means different things to different people. Blurring the perception of the site boundary and merging the outdoor play areas of the school with the adjacent public park, the project sought to decolonize the approach to enclosure.

A key tactic of dual language place naming and wayfinding was used by the project team to embed a positive approach to social inclusion, decolonizing the institutional nature of schools. Working with our cultural mentor and linguistic advisor, the project team developed inspiring concepts for naming gathering spaces, administration, the library, and sporting zones, reimagining the way these parts of a school should be named that together created a narrative for the school that was deeply rooted in the place.

Building upon the graphic concepts of artist Tony Albert in the 2016 book “Alexandria Park Community School is Gadigal Land,” the design and graphic realization of language is the result of real community engagement.

southsydneyherald.com.au/local-teacher-and-elder-recognised-at-Aboriginal-education-awards/

tkda.com.au/projects/alexandria-park-community-school- architecture

CLIENT
Department of Education / School
Infrastructure NSW

ABORIGINAL CULTURAL
REPRESENTATIVES
Uncle Terry Denzil,
Aunty Deborah Daley

CULTURAL MENTOR AND
LINGUISTIC ADVISOR
Shayne Beckham

SCHOOL PRINCIPAL
Diane Fetherston

ARCHITECT
Tanner Kibble Denton Architects
ARTIST
Tony Albert

GRAPHIC DESIGNER
Leading Hand Design

LANDSCAPE ARCHITECT
Context Landscape Architecture

PROJECT MANAGER
Savills

CONTRACTOR
Richard Crookes Constructions

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A Sc(ore) for Listening

COUNTER-PACE

MONOCULTURE

Jessie Lewis on 16 May 2023

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MONOCULTURE

REALMstudios

LOCATION
VIC
East Melbourne
Wurundjeri

The context, geographical, operational and conceptual, for this project is a series of drainage easements in Melbourne’s east. Once integral parts of the extensive and interconnected network of waterways in the Birrarung (Yarra River) Valley, these creeks were home of the Wurundjeri people of the Yulin Nation. These riparian corridors were travelling routes, settlement sites and food and water sources, especially in times of drought, when humans and animals alike would gather around clearings in the forest along creeks, where vegetation continued to flourish.

The creeks were part of a regional-scaled natural flood management system, fluctuating through drought and inundation. The Wurundjeri have co-existed with this fluid landscape for millennia, as custodians of Country and its ecosystems. The richness of the landscape for which they cared, and their deep knowledge, endure today – this project aims to recover some of this richness, and restore some of this knowledge.

Contemporary management, engineering and hydrological practices had reduced the corridors to monocultures, dedicated only to the efficient conveyance of water through the landscape.

This was our starting point.

realmstudios.com/channel-naturalisation

PROJECT TEAM
REALMstudios, Alluvium Consulting, E2DesignLab

CLIENT
Melbourne Water

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ERASURE

Jessie Lewis on 16 May 2023

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ERASURE

REALMstudios

LOCATION
VIC
East Melbourne
Wurundjeri

The primary physical act was the removal of boundaries, both physical and conceptual, that segregated the drainage easement from surrounding ecologies, both human and natural. This included the deconstruction of the trapezoidal concrete drainage channel; once this dangerous canyon was removed, fences separating the corridor from surrounding residential neighbourhoods could also be removed.

realmstudios.com/channel-naturalisation

PROJECT TEAM
REALMstudios, Alluvium Consulting, E2DesignLab

CLIENT
Melbourne Water

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INFILTRATION

Jessie Lewis on 16 May 2023

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INFILTRATION

REALMstudios

LOCATION
VIC
East Melbourne
Wurundjeri

Once boundaries and barriers are removed, or even breached, the possibility exists for excluded constituents to enter the space of the easement. These are both human and natural players, as well as dynamic climatic forces. Some of the invisible barriers removed include suppressive regimes and management programs, like herbicides, mowing or animal removal. Birds, animals, local children enter, and all that these exploratory constituents carry (and drop).

realmstudios.com/channel-naturalisation

PROJECT TEAM
REALMstudios, Alluvium Consulting, E2DesignLab

CLIENT
Melbourne Water

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ACCEPTANCE

Jessie Lewis on 16 May 2023

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ACCEPTANCE

REALMstudios

LOCATION
VIC
East Melbourne
Wurundjeri

Removing elements and instruments of control is both an acknowledgement and eventual acceptance of natural forces, rather than trying to resist them. The creek becomes again NOT a human space, but rather an entity in its own right. We accept that social infrastructure sometimes is submerged; more challenging, but equally necessary, is the idea that sometimes, humans also have to relinquish occupation.

realmstudios.com/channel-naturalisation

PROJECT TEAM
REALMstudios, Alluvium Consulting, E2DesignLab

CLIENT
Melbourne Water

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LANDSCAPE-LED DESIGN

Formulating Design Principles

CO-CURATION

Jessie Lewis on 16 May 2023

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CO-CURATION

REALMstudios

LOCATION
VIC
East Melbourne
Wurundjeri

Instead of solely human-led authorship, the project eventually allows a vast range of endemic agency in the re-occupation and reimagination of the site. Curators include animals, plants, local kids, the wind and the creek itself.

realmstudios.com/channel-naturalisation

PROJECT TEAM
REALMstudios, Alluvium Consulting, E2DesignLab

CLIENT
Melbourne Water

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In Absence

Jessie Lewis on 16 May 2023

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IN ABSENCE

Edition Office and Yhonnie Scarce

LOCATION
VIC
Melbourne
Naarm, Boon Wurrung and Woi Wurrung Country / Kulin Nation

Located on Naarm, the traditional lands of the Kulin Nation, ‘In Absence’, the fifth annual National Gallery of Victoria Architecture Commission, invited audiences to better understand the fallacy and ongoing legacy of the colonial premise of Terra Nullius, which declared Australia as an emptiness awaiting ownership, by revealing and celebrating over 3000 generations of Indigenous design, industry and agriculture.

Within the context of the NGV garden site, the elemental cylindrical form of the project stands tall and proud, exerting a tangible presence upon the National Gallery of Victoria and to the people venturing within it.

The void within the centre of the bifurcated tower, the false absence of a people, contains a twin pair of chambers whose form and material reference historical permanent stone dwellings, charred smoking trees and fish traps. 1600 handmade black glass Murnong which adorn the inner walls reference a staple yam crop of Indigenous communities, managed and harvested for thousands of generations

The mirrored interior speaks to equity of exchange, an intimate resting space to enable deep listening, truth telling, knowledge sharing and connection to country.

edition-office.com/project/in-absence

DESIGN
Kim Bridgland
Aaron Roberts
Yhonnie Scarce