Category: Australian Awards for International Architecture

Enter the 2015 Australian Awards for International Architecture

The 2015 National Architecture Awards

The Australian Institute of Architects Awards program is an opportunity for public and peer recognition of your work and provides the Institute with a valuable mechanism to promote architects and architecture in Australia and internationally.

To view the winners of the 2014 National Architecture Awards view the media release , winners gallery and video gallery.

Entering the awards

The Australian Institute of Architects’ Awards Program is a national program. In the first instance, entries are submitted and judged in each State and Territory. Subsequently, State and Territory level winners of named awards and architecture awards progress to become the national pool of entries for the Institute’s National Architecture Awards.

Awards entry

All State and Territory entries into the Institute’s National Architecture Awards program must be submitted online via the centralised ONLINE AWARDS ENTRY SYSTEM. Please note the online entry system works best on the “Internet Explorer” browser.

Only members of the Australian Institute of Architects are eligible to enter the Architecture Awards and A+ Members receive 10% discount on entries. To find out when other Chapters open for entry visit Key dates & events.

Entrants should read the following key documents before entering the awards:

2015 Awards, Prizes and Honours Policy
2015 Awards Entry Handbook

To download these documents visit Important documents.

Entries must be submitted in the State or Territory in which the project is located. Questions relating to submissions should be directed to the relevant local Chapter. Visit Contact us for Chapter contact information.

The International Architecture Awards

Projects in this category must be located outside the eight state and territory jurisdictions of the Commonwealth of Australia.

This award acknowledges the work of Institute members resident outside Australia and local members undertaking commissions overseas. Entries in this category will first be considered for architecture awards and commendations by the International Jury under the subcategories listed below:

Small Project Architecture
Commercial Architecture
Interior Architecture
Residential Architecture
Public Architecture

Entries in this category will not be visited. In lieu of a site visit, jury evaluation may be undertaken using (i) a short video walk-through, (ii) a teleconference interview with short-listed entrants, and (iii) an independent visit-report of the local Architectural Institute.

Winner: Jørn Utzon Award for International Architecture – Stonehenge Exhibition + Visitor Centre by DCM

DCM Awarded Jorn Utzon Award at the National Architecture Awards in Darwin

National Architecture Awards Jury citation

More than one million people visit Stonehenge every year, placing immense stress on one of the world’s most important archaeological sites. The site’s public facilities had grown in an ad hoc way over many decades and there had been several failed attempts to resolve the unsatisfactory arrangement. This important project finally finds a resolution for the site. Designing the Exhibition and Visitor Centre for this ancient UNESCO World Heritage site is a significant responsibility and Denton Corker Marshall has achieved it with grace and gentleness, ensuring most importantly that the facility does not dominate the site. The centre is placed 2.5 kilometres west of the stones, connected to the monument by a shuttle path but remaining out of sight from it.

The architectural composition is centred on a pair of single-storey pods, one timber and the other glass. These pods shelter beneath a sweeping canopy roof supported by slender angled stick columns, its edges perforated to cast dappled light on the forms beneath. The metal roof undulates to reflect the rolling landscape of Salisbury Plain, while the thin columns resonate with the nearby forest. The glass pod houses the cafe, shop and education space, and the solid timber pod contains the exhibition, information space and toilets. Service areas and staff facilities are placed in a low ancillary building behind trees that hide the coach parking.

The project harnesses a suite of measures to minimize its environmental footprint. These include extensive natural ventilation, natural light, open-loop ground source heat pumps, passive shading, bore water supply and on-site sewerage treatment. Most importantly, the centre is designed to be reversible, meaning that it can be removed in the future with minimal impact on the landscape.

This is a masterful work of architecture, both timeless and poetic. It sits with authority in the historic landscape, with facilities that help develop a better understanding of Stonehenge and its place in world history.

International Architecture Awards 2014 – Award for Public Architecture

Just as this project was being selected for an International Award, an exhibition opened at London’s RIBA with the neo-colonialist, chest-beating title ‘The Brits who built the Modern World’. The provocative subtlety of the Stonehenge Visitors Centre suggests a countering appendix title to the macho posturing in Upper Regent Street – something in the order of: ‘…and the Australians who taught them how to deal with the World of Pre-history’.

That the modern world is not all high-tech bling is well demonstrated by the busloads of fast-food splattered gawkers who descend on Stonehenge; 1 million per year. The Visitor Centre feels Australian; in its basic partie it is a decoy, but also a sheep-pen and wool shed to shear the visitor flock of their spare change while dispensing a basic understanding of where and why they are there (Interpretive Exhibition).

In the DCM building, a deft transition takes place: a transition from crowd management to spatial and tectonic poetry. The multiple poles that hold the wafer thin roof aloft remind one of the Aboriginal activist delegation that landed on the shores of England in the 1970’s, planted a stick in the ground, and with brilliant polemic ‘claimed the Island in the name of the Aboriginal people of Australia’.

The two pavilions, one timber clad and the other glass, put the visitor conceptually and physically into the mysterious landscape of the Salisbury Plain. This is a building that does justice to a UNESCO World Heritage site; its lightness and reversibility giving dignity to the solidity and timelessness of the standing stones 2.4 km away beyond the horizon.

Peter Wilson Affiliate RAIA, Jury Chair

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Header photo by James Davies

Winner: Australian Awards for International Architecture – Shelter@Rainforest by Marra + Yeh Architects

Marra + Yeh Architects awarded Australian Award for International Architecture in Darwin

National Architecture Awards Jury citation

This project is as much about symbolism as it is about function. For a site located in remote highland jungle in Borneo, the brief was to provide shelter for the manager and staff of a private regrowth forestry company that has stewardship over the local land. Equally important was the building’s role in sending messages of craft, care and environmental stewardship to the wider community.

The architects have skilfully met both elements of the brief by creating an unassuming, zero-energy house that addresses the challenges of remoteness and climate. The design fits well with the regional vernacular, having been built using modular timber construction and other local materials. Its simple construction also helped the architects overcome many of the challenges of its remote location, including lack of infrastructure and few skilled builders. Nonetheless, through thoughtful design and skilful engineering, the project achieves important sustainability ambitions, maximizing efficiency and minimizing cost. One example is the long verandah overlooking the jungle, which provides a valuable setting for its occupants to gather and converse while enjoying the views, as well as protecting interior spaces from heat gain.

The final result of this project, based on smart design, engineering and collaboration, is a low-cost and self-sufficient building that does much more than simply meet the functional requirements of its users. It sits with elegance and raw beauty in its surrounds and the wider community. This project is an excellent example of design and construction in remote locations with limited resources.

Australian Awards for International Architecture 2014 – Award for Small Project Architecture

Despite or perhaps because of the difficulty of trying to spot the architecture in the blackness of extremely high contrast photos (which to their credit do much to simulate a bleaching tropical light), this is an ideal recipient of the Small Project Award.

The technology and detailing are more than appropriate to the location and climate, whilst the spaces are rich in seductive atmosphere and ambience without any of today’s too familiar stylistic mannerisms. The symmetrical plan describes the double coding of use (family and visitors) and the verandah offers a treetop experience as an alternative to media amusement.

The shiny roof is by now such a familiar Australian trope that it is almost surprising to see it here returned to its locus and reference of origin – the longhouse in the jungle. Over and above, this project boasts an exemplary list of ecological and environmental credentials: sustainable re-forestation, locally harvested materials, solar energy, rainwater collection, biotechnologies and minimal site disturbance.

As updated vernacular, it is overwhelming in its taking up of the responsibility for environmental stewardship; a lesson both as architecture of quality and for the political correctness of its sustainability manifesto.

Peter Wilson Affiliate RAIA, Jury Chair

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Header photo by Brett Boardman

Jury Chair Debrief – Peter Wilson

Peter Wilson Aff RAIA and 2013 Australian Institute of Architects Gold Medallist, shares his experience on International Awards Jury.

The jury process was as international as the submissions for the international Awards.

By necessity submitted material was circulated digitally for pre selection. This from my experience simulates closely the procedure for spatially focused juries where, in a first round judges circulate silently, depositing post-it stickers on schemes they consider worth discussing further. Here the submissions must speak for themselves, without an advocate or the possibility of one or the other jury member verbally influencing co-jurors. With one judge in Hong Kong, one in Singapore and one in Germany our International pre-selection achieved a remarkable short list consensus.

Obviously there is an issue of media here, the quality of photographs submitted and the story told by their sequencing. In the age of Photoshop and the bling of spectacular renderings, it is in the case of completed projects up to the photographer to dazzle with seductive imagery. The cult of blogs and iPad compatible office home pages has rendered us all addicts and victims of the calendar-shot-photo which pretends to say all there is to be said about the complex spatiality and conceptual structuring of buildings.

In Germany where I operate many competitions now, as a reaction to Photoshop Orgies, only allow one rendering per entry; any further eye candy is masked by a sheet of white paper for the duration of the jury sitting. Such draconian methods imply that judges lack the visual sophistication to distinguish between media and content (which often is the case).

What are we looking for with Australian International awards, not the calendar -in your face – photo, and there were submissions which knocked one off ones seat with spectacular opening images and then told a different story of dark Freudian undersides in the follow up.

In the best of all possible worlds an award is a signal, a signpost to emerging architects – hear I must confess that I did at the outset send a ‘bling-sceptical-message’ to the other judges. In this sense the Small Project Award for a highly sustainable Rainforest Shelter must be singled out as exemplary. It is not a product of big bucks overseas work, more a responsible, sensitive signpost and yardstick. With more of these Rem Koolhaas would no longer be able to say as he outrageously did a few years ago that Australian architects are responsible for some of the worst buildings in Asia.

In Europe, where competitions are the principle procurement method, there is a trick often perpetuated by the jury chairman – once the list has been narrowed down to finalists the models (a white 1:500 model is always required to insert in a big context model) the chairperson lines up in his/her preferred sequence of the five or six finalist models and says ‘lets do a test vote on this’ – knowing that such voting according to European Competition Rules is binding and irreversible other jurors leap in attempting a quick reshuffle. This scuffle moment is not possible with telephone or skype juries. It was though once or twice necessary for deciding the current International Awards for me as chairman to break a deadlock by changing my vote.

My experience as international jury chairman last year hit a surreal high – a Velodrome competition in Medellin in Columbia. The jury was in Spanish – and proved that it is not necessary for a jury to speak the same language to achieve consensus – with a few thumbs-up we premiated a truly spectacular project that is now under construction as part of an impressive program of public buildings and spaces that have transformed and tamed Medellin, not long ago the worlds most dangerous city.

The scan potential of the jurying process is horizon expanding, I have in recent years found myself in Estonian Tallinn choosing a new City Hall, in Slovenian Maribor debating a Cultural Centre or in Albanian Tirana choosing between MDRDV or Valerio Olgiati. While these Australian international awards offered a deep insight into corners of Asia and China I must confess to feeling more culturally at home with the Stonehenge Visitors Centre submission. The enigmatic Salisbury Plain and its palimpsest of interpretations (which include V.S.Naipaul’s ‘the Enigma of Arrival’ a profound analysis of the post-colonial condition) has now been inscribed with an Australian overlay that is more than worthy of its prominent position on the world stage.

View the Jury profiles

Winner: Residential Architecture – Sukhothai Residences by Kerry Hill Architects

Australian Awards for International Architecture 2014 – Australian Award for Residential Architecture

This complex choreography of deep shadow, residential slabs and reflecting pools presents itself as a taxonomy of atmospheres. Stairs descend past rough tectonic walls into black depths in the manner of Swiss masters. The residential slabs wear a concrete Mondrian brise soleil frock – a passive energy device, a modifier of climate which also frames a zone colonised by balconies.

Views from the deep shadows of the high apartments speak of retreat; a world of luxury for residents versed in the codes of minimalism; other views from the slit windows are, according to the authors, ‘curated’. The ground levels are decks for contemplating water (reflecting pool, lotus pool) and for the young and brave to plunge (children’s and main pool).

A movement route from drop-off to core negotiates this hedonistic landscape via a shady and light filtering nine-metre-high colonnade and three bamboo filled light wells. The concept sketch is infinitely useful to unravel the complex and sophisticated organisational arrangement. A pool house pavilion updates and abstracts an Indian typology, stripped of Mogul decoration, with a bar and gym lurking behind glass wafers.

Didactic stringencies in the Sukhothai Residences present a striking counterpoint to the ‘colonial reference’ of the earlier and adjacent Kerry Hill Architects’ stage one hotel.

Peter Wilson Affiliate RAIA, Jury Chair

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Header photo by Albert Lim KS

Winner: Commercial Architecture – PARKROYAL on Pickering by WOHA

Australian Awards for International Architecture 2014 – Australian Award for Commercial Architecture

The block-sized PARKROYAL on Pickering consists of a hotel of three linked towers in an E-shaped plan, on a podium shared by a speculative office building. The front faces north-east over a park with tree canopies co-opted into the landscape of the pool terrace. At lower levels the interplay of trunks and branches is recognised in the trabeated detailing of the interior, with an overlay of Chinese styling in a lantern motif explored at large and small scales.

The car-park supporting soffit, readable as a geological or jungle element, shelters public areas of the hotel. The narrow lobby is visually broadened by mirrored screening of the core, and control of the ground plane is maintained right to the street edge with generous ponds, planting and covered walkways. The swimming pool on level five cascades into a garden that loops the podium-top; heavy timbers project over the water with light gangways spanning to suspended cabanas.

Double loaded wings of guestrooms rise from level six. Elevation elaboration is resisted, investment instead made in sculpting garden terraces at four floor intervals and in managing the mullions to integrate with internal planning and furnishings. Additional rooms hang off the single loaded access corridor with its open, planted and naturally ventilated bridging both alluding to the typical form of neighbouring housing board flats and replacing the green view which they lost with the construction of the hotel.

PARKROYAL on Pickering achieves a fine balance of the natural and the cultural. The architects’ theories of context and climate have been proven experimentally; ‘breathing architecture’, at least in the tropics, can work.

Fiona Nixon FRAIA

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Header photo by Patrick Bingham-Hall

Winner: Interior Architecture – ASB North Wharf by BVN Donovan Hill

Australian Awards for International Architecture 2014 – Australian Award for Interior Architecture

The interior of BVN Donovan Hill’s ASB building in Auckland’s Wynyard Quarter continues the architect’s exploration of agile working; a philosophy they pioneered at Campus MLC more than 10 years ago. The ASB interior benefits from being in a purpose-built structure, and the influence of internal planning and design is visible on the external envelope; an inner façade pushed and pulled by balconies and outer screening responding to double height internal workspaces. The office is organised by perpendicular atria, one above a common laneway bisecting the site at ground level, the other rising above the large open floor plate of level three. These day-lit volumes are used to great effect with crisscrossing bridges allowing visual connectivity between floors.

Level three in particular demonstrates the huge variety of settings demanded by agile working, a desk specialised for any purpose so that the user need adapt less. The harbour side location is referenced by breaking waves of fins defining a central café work zone. A large shared table in puddle blue touches a similarly painted bubble defining semi-enclosed meeting spaces. Bright colours signpost the collaborative areas while the base building palette is neutral grey, white and natural timber. Nautical theming is continued in the exposed treatment of ducting and power whilst sustainability is co-opted into the form with a ventilation funnel above the upper floors labelled ‘Rangitoto’, slightly mixing the metaphors.

ASB’s workplace is a rich and expertly detailed interior which evidently supports revolutionary work styles. In the deftness of its realisation it perhaps marks the crest of the agile working wave, and we look forward to BVN Donovan Hill’s next influential idea.

Fiona Nixon FRAIA

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Header photo by John Gollings

2014 Australian Awards for International Architecture – Commendations

Public Architecture

Commendation – Binus Kindergarten and Primary School by Denton Corker Marshall Jakarta (PT Duta Cermat Mandiri)

This is a textbook example of how to compose a school in the grand style – the style of Friedrich Froebel whose educational building blocks were Frank Lloyd Wright’s introduction to architecture… Lego morphed with Snakes and Ladders; a fun place to be.

Peter Wilson Affiliate RAIA, Jury Chair

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Commendation – Phoenix Valley Youth Palace & Grand Theatre by studio505

The authors describe it as ‘a wilderness claimed by its inhabitants’ with the ‘geological innards of the mountain-like form’ housing a 1000 seat theatre. Here, the gelatinous luminosity of the ‘insect exoskeleton’ ceiling gives any show on stage a run for its money.

Peter Wilson Affiliate RAIA, Jury Chair

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Continue reading 2014 Australian Awards for International Architecture – Commendations

2014 international entrants gallery

Thank you to all who entered a project for the 2014 Australian Awards for International Architecture. Winners of each subcategory will be consider for named awards at the National Architecture Awards in Darwin on the 6th of November.

Commercial Architecture

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Public Architecture

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Interior Architecture

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Residential Architecture

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Small Project Architecture

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2014 Australian Awards for International Architecture

The Australian Awards for International Architecture winners have now been announced!

2013 Jørn Utzon Award: Australia House – Andrew Burns Architect, Atelier Imamu, Atelier Sotaro Yamamoto, Casey Bryant

The Jørn Utzon Award for International Architecture

Australia House, Japan

By Andrew Burns Architect in association with Atelier Imamu, Atelier Sotaro Yamamoto and Casey Bryant

National Jury citation

Australia House is an elegant and poignant building of physical and conceptual strength, which skilfully negotiates between the cultures of Australia and Japan, providing rich opportunities for engagement and exchange.

The building is part of the Echigo-Tsumari Art Triennale, a festival developed explicitly to help rejuvenate a region with a diminishing and aging population. Australia House provides a space for residencies for – and exhibitions by – Australian artists and curators. Established in 2009, it occupied an abandoned traditional Japanese farmhouse up until March 2011, when that building was destroyed by a powerful aftershock. The new Australia House by Andrew Burns is the result of an open competition run by the Australian Embassy Tokyo, Art Front Gallery and Tokomachi City, with a jury chaired by Tadao Ando.

The outcome is small, surprising and highly refined. Triangular in plan, with a steeply canted roof, the building is formally striking, and creates intriguing spatial relationships between the exhibition spaces on the ground floor and living spaces above. The crisp form, natural materials and the use of spaces common to both cultures – such as the verandah or engawa in Japanese – make a warm, welcoming and comfortable space for both cultures.

But this delicacy belies the building’s toughness – it is designed to be able to withstand a major earthquake while covered in three metres of snow. This means that it also works as an emergency shelter for the local community. As a result, this building crosses cultures in multiple ways, resonating with multiple audiences. It is a poignant way to build international ties, both symbolic and highly functional.

International Area Committee Jury citation

Australia House is a beautifully crafted (as is perhaps usual in Japan), quirky and refined piece of architecture.

The combination of typical indoor-outdoor relationships seen in Australian architecture with a traditional Japanese “borrowing of landscape”, has culminated in an abstracted verandah structure. The building’s form responds well to high snowfall with its steeply sloping roof, and its monochromatic contrasts are set up between the blackened timber cladding against a substantial build-up of white snow. The triangular plan is employed theatrically to deceive perceptions as does the flattened verandah, reinforced by dramatically sharp corners that frame the facade.

The concept as a useful emergency shelter, meeting centre and “home” for visiting Australians, enables the crossing of cultural boundaries and enables a community focus complementing its iconic formal expression.

This project encompasses a sophisticated architectural solution by establishing a sensitive Australian ambassadorial outpost that is a credit to its creators and its host community – a worthy finalist indeed.

Robert Grace

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Photos: Brett Boardman

IAC Awards Jury Chair Summary – Peter Zellner

The Australian Institute of Architects’ Jørn Utzon Award for International Architecture received twenty six submissions for projects completed across Asia, the United States, the UAE, the UK, Russia and New Zealand.

The projects, executed by Australian firms and individuals based both overseas and in Australia, were received and reviewed by a jury comprised of four members based in Asia, Europe and North America.

The jury discussion, conducted via teleconference and across four time zones was lively, and at times slightly raucous, if not unruly. However, over the course of several hours, six projects were unanimously selected by the International Area Committee’s jury as finalists for the award.

Collectively, the projects chosen represent a small indication of the range and breadth of work being produced internationally by Australian architects; but the high quality, variety and excellence of the work is a testament to the healthy state of Australia’s architectural culture and its impacts on other shores.

Peter Zellner

Project	Architect	Location
Australia House	Andrew Burns Architect	Niigata, Japan
Silver House	Peter Stutchbury Architecture	Cherepovets, Russia
Martin No.38	Kerry Hill Architects	Singapore
387 Tamaki Drive	Ian Moore Architects	Auckland, New Zealand
28th Street Apartments	Koning Eizenberg Architecture, Inc.	Los Angeles, United States
Sobieski House	Koning Eizenberg Architecture, Inc.	South Pasadena, United States
Finding Country Exhibition	Kevin O’Brien Architects	Venice Architecture Biennale 2012

The Australian Institute of Architects is coming to Hong Kong

Join us and President Paul Berkemeier in celebrating the finalists of the Australian Institute of Architects’ Jørn Utzon Award for International Architecture.

Where: Rotunda, 3/F, Exchange Square, Hong Kong
When: 6:30 – 8:30pm, Tuesday 15th of October 2013
Drinks and canapés provided

Please RSVP by the 1st of October to peter.beratis@architecture.com.au

View the invite.

NAA ’13 Finalist: Martin No. 38 – Kerry Hill Architects

Martin No. 38, Singapore

By Kerry Hill Architects

Martin No. 38 by Kerry Hill Architects is a masterfully executed case study in concrete and aluminium architecture in the tropics. As a contemporary mixed use development on the fringe of the Singapore CBD, the project introduces high quality next-generation ‘low carbon’ living spaces supported by a clever program mix of amenities for professionals in a global city context.

A variety of apartment types, distributed in 15 and 9 story volumes, with open layouts maximizing flexible use of space, are dispersed in an intelligent manner to take advantage of breezes, sun, views and existing mature tropical vegetation. An understated yet iconic building skin composed from dynamic operable sunscreens, results in a constantly changing appearance. Competent use of appropriate passive systems such as correct orientation for maximizing daylight and natural ventilation (not easy in Singapore to minimize the need for air-conditioning!) contributes to low carbon emissions.

With this project, Kerry Hill Architects has made a significant contribution to contemporary low carbon living in a modern Asian metropolis.

Steven Smit.

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Photos: Albert Lim

NAA ’13 Finalist: Sobieski House – Koning Eizenberg Architecture

Sobieski House, USA

By Koning Eizenberg Architecture Inc.

This project illustrates a strong clarity of ideas and consistent three dimensional expressions.

Clean utilitarian materials, bold strategic colour and a skilful formal composition, create a domestic landscape that speaks to the traditions of Californian life without imitating Californian modernism. The clear framing of openings to the outside and the highly intentional visual relationships they create, are a critical part of the project’s success.

The suggestions of material and spatial complexity in the exterior spaces imply a welcome future richness as the landscape matures. The project’s economy of means is realized with a sophistication that brings a robust flexibility to the current and future use of the buildings and site.

Elizabeth Mossop.

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Photos: Eric Staudenmeier

Koning Eizenberg awarded WAF housing award for 28th Street Apartments

28th Street Apartments, USA

By Koning Eizenberg Architecture Inc.

Koning Eizenberg was just awarded the prestigious 2013 World Architecture Festival Housing Award for the 28th Street Apartments.

The World Architecture Festival gathered over 1,750 architects from around the world in Singapore from October 2-4 to exchange ideas and inspiration for design. 260 shortlisted projects were considered for award in 30 different categories. This year, only 15 of the shortlisted projects were from the USA. Koning Eizenberg was the only US firm to receive an award. Referring to the 28th Street Apartments, the judges noted: “This project demonstrates architecture as an agent for social transformation. The architect was able to knit together historical continuity and something very new, something of high architectural value.”

Los Angeles maintains leadership in the US for socially responsible design. It is great to see that innovative social programming and design are valued internationally by the World Architecture Festival.

International Area Committee Jury citation

This project demonstrates a confident and sensitive integration of a significant historic original building with a new housing wing. It places a focus on communal and social spaces that bode well for its future inhabitation.

The qualities of the public spaces in the old building have been effectively incorporated into a new program and enhance the new uses whilst preserving the detail and character. The new roof garden and its preservation for outdoor use by residents is a key implementation as is the removal of unnecessary parking. The bold colour and well-scaled layout of the roof garden is both inviting and interactive. The graphic-type screens provide an appropriate juxtaposition to the detail of the historic building.

The 28^th Street Apartments are a terrific demonstration of architectural skill in spatial design and the programming and incorporation of new technology. Koning Eizenberg have orchestrated the effective re-use of a significant historic building for a contemporary use. They have demonstrated how these qualities can create a balance between the private and public needs of this complex project type.

Elizabeth Mossop

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Photos: Eric Staudenmeier

NAA ’13 Finalist: 387 Tamaki Drive – Ian Moore Architects

387 Tamaki Drive, New Zealand

By Ian Moore Architects

This project is a classic piece of modernist minimalism – something of a signature piece from Ian Moore. It has been finely crafted in precast white concrete panels and its siting on a large rectangular suburban seaside block has been carefully considered.

Moore has sensibly developed the suburban shopping centre site whilst holding the boundaries of the site. To enable the division of activities and accommodation on this deep block, he has created six internal courtyards, which bless the dwellings and office units with multiple sources of natural light and intimate and expansive outlooks. The superb view over the beach and sea takes primacy with the internal courtyards enabling placement of the offices and living accommodation to the periphery of the site.

The sensitivity of Moore to this site is evidenced in the raising of the plinth of the building where the commercial activities are located to permit views over the ubiquitous suburban street of parked cars to the fabulous beach and sea. Furthermore, the publicly accessible courtyard at the lower level gives users and passers by the opportunity to enjoy the virtuosity of an internalized public space.

Ian Moore is to be commended and complimented on this sophisticated (sub)urban and architectural project.

Robert Grace

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Photos: Daniel Mayne

NAA ’13 Finalist: Silver House – Peter Stutchbury Architecture

Silver House, Russia

By Peter Stutchbury Architecture

Peter Stutchbury Architecture’s winning design for the Living Steel 3rd International Architecture Competition for Sustainable Housing in Russia is a compact (165m2) and robust piece of prototype architecture that intelligently addresses sustainability in Cherepovets, Russia.

A disciplined, wind and sun optimized sculptural form with traditional Nordic influences, the design employs prefabricated steel refrigeration wall panels which achieve a certain industrial chic. The functional plan has been skilfully executed at a prototypical level; the key plan feature is an innovative internal thermal wall that acts as a heat bank (thermal mass radiator).

As a prototype structure claiming energy consumption reduction of over 60%, the Silver House has the potential to make a significant contribution to lowering carbon consumption when executed at a larger scale. The Silver House by Peter Stutchbury Architecture offers an interesting foreign solution to a local problem and is an excellent showcase of Australian know-how in sustainable design in an extreme foreign climate.

Steven Smit

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Photos: Peter Stutchbury

2013 National Architecture Awards – International Category Submissions

Thank you to all who submitted their projects for the International category award. The winners will be announced at the National Architecture Awards on November 7th at the Sydney Opera House. Please click on the images below for a project description and gallery.

	Andrew Burns ArchitectAustralia HouseJapan
	ArchiCentre Sdn BhdS11Malaysia
	ArchiCentre Sdn BhdNo.19Malaysia
	Cox Architects & PlannersPlatinum SentralMalaysia
	Cox Rayner ArchitectureThe Helix BridgeSingapore
	East Design Architect Sdn BhdThe Light LinearMalaysia
	GHD Architecture Pty LtdAl Bidda TowerQatar
	Ian Moore Architects387 Tamaki DriveNew Zealand
	Johnson Pilton Walker Pty LtdSuzhou Industrial Park Merchant Bank BuildingChina
	Kerry Hill ArchitectsMartin No. 38Singapore
	Koning Eizenberg Architecture28^th Street ApartmentsUSA
	Koning Eizenberg ArchitectureSobieski HouseUSA
	Lab Architecture StudioGuardian TowersUAE
	Lab Architecture StudioNingbo Wanda FacadeChina
	Lab Architecture StudioXitaihu International Commercial PlazaChina
	Leigh & Orange LtdAl Shaqab Equestrian Performance ArenaQatar
	Lilian H. Weinreich ArchitectsRichman Duplex Apartment, New YorkUSA
	New Space Architects Pte LtdShelford SuitesSingapore
	Peter Stutchbury ArchitectureSilver HouseRussia
	Robert A M Stern ArchitectsFolly and Pool Cottage, Glen Ellen, CaliforniaUSA
	Robert A M Stern ArchitectsOur Lady of Mercy Chapel, Salve Regina UniversityUSA
	Robert A M Stern ArchitectsInternational Quilt Study Center and Museum, University of NebraskaUSA
	Ronald Lu & Partners (Hong Kong) LtdZCB Zero Carbon BuildingHong Kong
	Ronald Lu & Partners (Hong Kong) LtdSiu Sai Wan ComplexHong Kong
	WoodheadDBS Asia CentralSingapore
	Woods Bagot UKGrosvenor House Apartments by Jumeirah LivingUnited Kingdom

Woods Bagot UK – Grosvenor House Apartments by Jumeirah Living

An adaptive reuse of the landmark 20th century Grosvenor House Mansion and Ballroom, designed by Sir Edwin Lutyens in the 1920s, to create ‘hotel residences’ for the exclusive Jumeirah Living brand. The team led by Design Director Earle Arney adapted the historic Park Lane address and breathed new life into the derelict building that lay dormant for nearly a decade. In the process, the team unlocked the commercial development potential of this significant building and created a new public space for London from what was a disused and unloved light well. “With core values of re-use and architectural resuscitation, we approached this opportunity by creating a ‘Best of British’ design narrative that leveraged a deep understanding of both the site and social history of previously uses. The new architectural elements reinterpret devices from traditional English Mansions and those used by Lutyens to create a contemporary long-stay apartment environment. An over-scaled substantial fireplace sits within the garden conservatory which employs scaling and feathered edge elements common in the Sunken Garden at Kensington Palace.” said Arney. The development activates four existing street frontages within the historic fabric of Mayfair. The result is a beautiful 5-Star hotel aligned to contemporary standards.

Photos by Will Pryce