Auckland: Skytower
New Zealand is boasting the
tallest structure in the southern
hemisphere: the 328 metre-high
Sky Tower above Auckland’s
casino. Designed by Craig Craig
Moller, it has a reinforced
concrete shaft of 12 metres
diameter, stabilised at the base by
a concrete collar attached to eight
legs. From an entrance gallery
screening audio-visual displays on
a 40 metre-long screen, lifts rise
through the shaft to a pod clad
with aluminium panels and
blue/green reflective glass. This
contains three observation levels,
an outdoor deck, a revolving
restaurant and a zone housing
sophisticated telecommunications
systems. The mast was made of
steel tube in sections of
diminishing diameter.
Perth: RAC
Maddington Depot
Calm aesthetics distinguish the
Royal Automobile Club’s premises
at Maddington from the chaos of
car yards along Perth’s Albany
Highway. Designed by Earle Arney
of The Buchan Group, the two-storey
complex has two long
wings sheltering a vehicle yard
accessed by two driveways. The
front building, for customer
service, has a glazed facade
terminated by a concrete
‘bookend’ beside the car entrance
and interrupted by sunshading of
aerofoil louvres (inspired by
sports car spoilers) and tilted-up
canopies (like the raised back
hatches of RAC vans). The rear
building contains workshops.
Kobe: Australian Consul-General’s Residence
The Stonehenge Group, Melbourne-based housing developers, have been
cultivating an export market to Japan since 1992. On this basis,
Austrade appointed the company to design and build a new residence in
Kobe for the Australian Consul-General. Constructed with more than 80
percent Australian materials and labour, the two-storey, 420 sq m house
combines styling of apparently Queensland origin with a post-modern
landscape incorporating topiary plants and a ‘benito box’ garden bed of
Australian soils, stones and plants.
Sydney: Ang House
Zooming in to challenge the brick and tile character of Dover Heights, a
waterside suburb on Sydney’s eastern peninsula, is this controversial
new house by Foster-trained Ed Lippmann. Just through the Land and
Environment Court, the glassy, feng shui design disrupts an existing
street alignment—of houses fronting the footpath and gardens behind—
to maximise water views. In section, the design has six half-levels,
placing bedrooms and service areas to the east (back-of-house) and
living zones, including a roof terrace, to the west.
Brisbane: Leatherfield Lodge
Built on a hill at Brookfield,
outside Brisbane, Leatherfield
Lodge is a 900 sq m complex of
four guest rooms attached to the
owner’s residence. Designed by
Bud Brannigan to exploit new
guidelines for multi-residence
construction in timber, it has a
steel and timber structure, timber
framing and plywood cladding.
The linear plan was generated
from a 10 by 8 metre living room
anchored to the ridgeline. From
this space, an internal corridor
(used as an art gallery) and wide
verandah (shaded by deep eaves)
lead to rooms downhill. The lodge
is oriented to capture summer
breezes, winter sun and distant
views towards Queensland’s
southern ranges.
Hobart: Old Woolstore
Redevelopment
A “mish-mash of roofed space”,
the old Robert Stewart woolstores
in Macquarie Street, Hobart, have
been recycled by Forward Viney as
a serviced apartments/hotel
complex. After ripping out some
undistinguished additions to give
good buildings airspace and create
courtyards, the architects planned
a versatile fitout of one and two- bedroom suites, sharing a foyer,
which can be combined for three
bedrooms. Technically, the project
was fraught with complexities—
the facades and roofs were
heritage-listed, the sub-ground
was archeologically sensitive and
the lack of foundations for a
four-storey brick complex on the
site of the old Hobart Rivulet
forced insertion of a floating raft
to stabilise the walls.
Sydney: Ibiza Café
Designed by Vince Squillace &
Associates, this new café brings
unfamiliar sophistication to
Sydney’s Cronulla Beach. In a
scheme intended to distort
perceptions of a plain-box space,
the architects used skewed
geometry for the service and
storage areas, rotations of the
ceiling grid, gradings of pale,
watery colours and, to offset the
angled lines, curvy chairs (Flair
Gogo) and barstools (Magis Lyra).
Marine imagery is emphasised by
uplighters, green and white glass,
and stainless steel accents.
Ballarat: Town Hall
Alterations
Ballarat’s Palladian Town Hall,
built 1868-72 with additions in
1912, has been refurbished by
Melbourne’s Peter Elliott to
provide a new council chamber
and reception rooms, and a refit
of the offices. Extensions to the
rear (south) of the old building,
together with a new forecourt,
form a new main entry designed
to present a fresh civic image for
the lately amalgamated city
administration. External materials
are green glass, zinc cladding,
cement render and painted steel
columns and fascias.
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