above The Civic Plaza seen from Swanston Street. Like most provincial cities, Melbourne is
ill-informed about architecture and its
citizens have debated the new Federation
Square with scant respect for the creative
integrity of its authors. Sociologist John Carroll calls it “a mixture of
Le Corbusier on a bad day and deflated
German expressionism … neither pleasing to
the eye nor striking”. Pollster Gary Morgan
has called it a dogs’ breakfast, the National
Trust’s Simon Molesworth thinks it is
uncomplimentary to our past, ex-mayor
Kevin Chamberlain believes that the design
should be changed by public vote—some
sort of collective acclamation—to achieve a
populist design. Others more closely associated with the
project have remarked that the scheme is
light on ideas, theoretically sparse and
needing some remarkable effort to lift it
beyond the banal. At a recent release of the developed
design by the architects LAB with Bates
Smart (with Premier Jeff Kennett as MC)
we saw a relatively underdeveloped
concept which has been accepted by the
State government and city council and will
now step into documentation phase
(although the building’s concrete slab base,
to roof the railway yards, is already well
into construction). The shattered geometry of the plan allows
for loose-fit placement of the museums,
galleries, restaurants, bars and a plaza over
the site. Two glass buildings, called shards,
signpost a view back from the proposed
civic plaza into the main facade of St Paul’s
Cathedral. Ramps and long runs of stairs
deliver pedestrians from the ‘wind garden’
(which faces Melbourne’s infamous south-west
ice winds) down to the Yarra River.
The architectural expression appears to be
on hold; walls are an undefined collage of
stone, glass and metals. A set of concrete
walls has been designed to provide low-energy
cooling and a gigantic metal frame
will cover an atrium which appears, from
illustrations, to be a shopping mall. | It is a dense project. Barely a third of the
site is open plaza and much of it is walled
by a three-level collection of galleries,
cinemas, bars, shops and SBS accommodation. The planning of the complex is fashionably
inspired by the Jewish museum in Berlin
designed by Daniel Libeskind (a juror for this
competition). But the Square is more
constrained and less fluid than Berlin; more
a product of drafting equipment, with set
square angles and collisions from a
compass, than a well-argued architectural philosophy. People have noticed similarities between
this and Bilbao’s Guggenheim. One thing
worth remembering is that this project is
located over an old railway yard on
reclaimed city space—just as Gehry’s
gallery sits beside a container yard at the
back end of that dreary little town. However, Bilbao is an emblem, a hard-argued
piece of contemporary architecture
which elaborates Gehry’s long-standing
fascination with fish, organic forms, shiny
materials and an almost obscene appetite
for shaping unexpected structures. His
building has changed sleepy Bilbao forever.
LAB’s square will not infringe on Melbourne
like that. It will be a flat composition of low-rise
buildings around an open space—
evolution not revolution; part of a continuum
for Melbourne rather than a sharp vision of
fresh ideas. This will be more theme park than
compelling urban design. That direction places the project among
recent developments like the casino and
most of Southbank, Melbourne Central, the
Jolimont railway yards housing and (what
we know of) many Docklands proposals.
Federation Square will add another layer
on the city. Despite some minor nuances of
twisted geometry and collided facades, it
will be part of—not apart from—the norm. And there’s nothing wrong with that. Norman Day is a Melbourne architect, writer
and RMIT adjunct professor. |