NSW Design Medal

This Award acknowledges excellence in architectural design for a graduate who has completed their studies.

Winners

Jennifer McMaster and Jonathan Donnelly (joint submission) – University of Sydney Museum of Architecture | Utzon Archive

The museum of architecture and Utzon Archive is an accomplished response to a complex architectural brief that presents architecture as both content and artefact. It is a project that engages with the public through its urban responsiveness and through the clarity of organisation and idea.

Conceptually, the new gallery spaces present a clear diagram of organisation that allows the visitor to appreciate the work of Jorn Utzon through the collection and display of the archive material held in separate NSW archives and through the physical representation of his ideas in the building itself. The concept expresses powerful architectural ideas of podium and base walls and enclosure, all covered by a translucent veil that result in an open and approachable public building. The siting and entry to the building along the Ultimo Goods Line enhances the public nature of the new museum and would provide a positive influence to the development of this significant urban renewal project.

The jury was impressed that this team of Jennifer McMaster and Jonathan Donnelly, through working together, has produced a work with great clarity that is more than just a conceptual framework. It is an impressive work that avoids a simplistic approach that just uses a collage of Utzon’s motifs but rather generates a building that has its own unique identity.

Runner Up

Han Yu (Zoey) Chen – UTS
Research centre and museum of the lost art

This project confidently proposes a clever insertion into an existing building in Berlin to accommodate a recently found collection of art that was lost during the Second World War. The gallery and research spaces all have a restraint and have been arranged in a very mature and controlled manner. The architectural approach responds both to the program and the surroundings to deliver a new building that has an identity and presence that respects that artwork it displays.

Commendation

Jason Chen Sheer Goh – UNSW
Homeless Homed (a Newtown project)

This project has a strong sense of social commitment by both bringing awareness to housing issues and adaptively reusing the former Newtown tram sheds. The Jury was impressed by the adaptive reuse strategy that created neighbourhoods within the existing structure, although the appropriateness of the residential mix was questioned. The design creates opportunities for different building typologies with a dense but lively architecture through opening the building to the sky, carving up the space into solid and void, and the clever use of the existing structural grid. It is a thoughtful elegant response with a strong social conscience.

Commendation

Sebastian Fan Shin Tsang – UNSW
Animating Suburbia

Within Sebastian Tsang’s Animating Suburbia: A graphic commentary, water is reintroduced into a liminal space within an outer Sydney suburb as a generator for architectural program. This complex project for the activation of a forgotten suburban edge condition has been resolved through a rigorous and exploratory drawing process that has resulted in a highly original and engaging architectural proposal.

First Degree Design Award

This Award acknowledges excellence in architectural design for a student midway through their studies.

Winner
Alexander Galego – UNSW
Tidal

This project proposes an inhabited bridge at South West Rocks back beach. Its primary function as a local pedestrian link is enhanced by the addition of carefully selected supplementary uses including a café, pool and amenities.

The scheme is conceived as a series of distinct programmatic moments along an architectural promenade. In a careful exploration of the experiential qualities of architecture, the project goes beyond the status quo to develop a series of unique spaces which can be occupied in different ways. Each space explores different levels of enclosure, offering spaces of refuge and others of complete exposure to wind and sun.

A beautifully crafted sectional timber model demonstrates an understanding of timber construction detailing and of Juhani Pallasmaa’s ecological functionalist view of Architecture. The project is clearly designed to respond to the local environment and to enhance the human experience.

The jury was particularly impressed to see a complex sequence of architectural spaces integrated into such a seemingly simple structure. The project demonstrates an understanding of architecture which is greater than the sum of its parts. Structure, form, program and spatial experience have been integrated into a proposal of subtle elegance.

Runner Up
Benjamin Norris – University of Sydney
The Habitable Bridge 1993 – 2004

The Habitable Bridge 1993-2004 reimagines the reconstruction of the Old Bridge of Mostar (Stari Most) on a hypothetical site, embedding an urban farm and bar within the proposal during the process of rebuilding this structure. Within this project, Benjamin Norris combines a detailed understanding of the historical context for the Stari Most with ambitious and ephemeral architecture.

Commendation

Felicity May – University of Sydney
Reclaiming the River

In this project the idea of a habitable bridge has been resolved poetically by Felicity May with a series of elements that interact decisively with the given, hypothetical landform. The field of poles for farming oysters has created a purposeful pattern that demonstrates how architecture can be both practical and artistic.

Digital Innovation Award

This Award acknowledges excellence and innovation in the use of digital media and digital processes and their integration in architectural design or research.

Winner
Victor Martinez-Contreras – UTS
Field Embassy

With the possible exception of parliament houses, few building typologies are so imbued with the evocation of cultural spirit (both as evidenced in the past and projected into the future) as the modern embassy. It is a building type inherently fusing the intangible with the pragmatic, the conceptual with the prosaic and the future with the past. The contemporary embassy must provide a framework for the machinations of diplomacy, cultural interaction and commerce. It must project a confident, welcoming, open countenance while being one of the most overtly and covertly secure environments possible. By its very nature it must be many things to many people.

In coalescing this inherent complexity into a clear conceptual idea, the Victor has utilized a variety of digital tools, each chosen carefully as part of a rigorous exploration of the possibilities that live within the brief’s inherent contradictions. The brief is interpreted through a conceptual gradation of electric fields (representative of layers of high security) interacting with magnetic fields (signifying public spaces and functions). Interactions represented as metadata become the genesis of form within Rhino software. 3d Printing facilitates a process of analysis, interpretation, modulation and iteration, which lead to refinement in the tectonics of the eventual building form. The final digital presentation illustrates a clear relationship between the built form and its generative electromagnetic fields.

The project is awarded first place in the Digital Innovation category not only for its extensive use of digital tools as a means to explore new ways of defining architectural spaces, but for the rigor of its methodology and maturity of its final resolution.

Commendation
Nan Ding and Yiran Hu – University of Sydney
A New Common Framework (Redfern station)

Investigating a new architectural paradigm, this proposal displays an understanding of the relationship between form and brief through its controlled and elegant use of sinuous curves and humanist attention to place making. The jury looks forward to the entrants’ future works as their tectonic awareness develops and matures.

Commendation
Vincent Ping Hei Chung & Pierre-Antonie Marie Maitre – University of Sydney Connect 6 (Redfern station)

A project focused on juxtaposition in its attempt to explore complexity whilst retaining clarity and order. Curvaceous funnels of light / ventilation / circulation contrast with a skeletal roof structure evoking the work of Nervi without the overt rationality. The jury hopes that the authors will maintain their conceptual strength as they interact with the latest iterations of structural and construction technologies.

Structural Innovation Award

This Award acknowledges excellence and innovation in the integration of structure in architectural design.

Winner
Max Hu, Harry K Roland Henshaw-Hill & Hongkai Yuan – University of Sydney
Tri Axial Pavilion

The tri-axial Pavilion is a modular structure created by the combination of three hyperbolic shapes. The structure makes use of a pure structurally efficient form to generate an interesting, practical and modular architectural form. The structure could be used to create shade and interest in parks and other public meeting places.

The proposal is innovative in its journey to create the final structure. The team started by investigating structural forms with physical models, stretching fabric to create a variety of hyper shapes. After selecting a preferred shape the team then constructed a full-size model of the shape, experimenting with materials and construction techniques. The next step is via a number of digital tools where the final structure is parametrically form-found using software including Weaverbird, Karamba, Grasshopper and Rhinoceros. The final step was the creation of large scale plywood model of the shapes joined together to form the pavilion.

The design process is interesting as there has been innovation at each stage of the process. That is, the design has evolved as a result of each of the steps to the final structure. Even in the final stage the team introduced a ribbed construction with gaps in the fabric to play with the introduction of light to the form.

Runner Up
James Vlismas – UTS
Fuji Children’s Museum

The Fuji Children’s Museum is an extension to the existing steel and in-situ concrete Fuji Kindergarten building. The designers have carefully thought through the building and its context to arrive at an elegant and efficient building structure that is highly sustainable. The design has explored a number of structural strategies appropriate for its context including:

• Use of a modular timber structure that is responsive to earthquake load.
• Use of repeating elements that maximise the potential for prefabrication
• Use of interlocking elements to simplify column and beam connections, maximising the structural continuity and efficiency.

 

UNIVERSITY AWARDS

Masters Graduate of the Year

Awarded to the most outstanding graduate from the Masters program. An award given for each NSW school of architecture.

Michael Ford	University of Technology, Sydney
Philippa Marston	University of NSW
Jennifer McMaster	University of Sydney
Noel Yaxley	University of Newcastle

First Degree/Bachelor Graduate of the Year

Awarded to the most outstanding student graduating from the first degree Bachelor program. An award given for each NSW school of architecture.

Lucas MacMillan	University of Technology, Sydney
Nailah Masagos	University of NSW
Sukrit Sukasam	University of Sydney
Jake Kellow	University of Newcastle

Construction and Practice

Awarded to the student who receives the highest aggregate marks in the discipline areas of Construction and Practice. An award given for each NSW school of architecture.

Jeffrey Baikie	University of Technology, Sydney
Menglan Li	University of NSW
Karl Dela Torre	University of Sydney
Noel Yaxley	University of Newcastle

History and Theory

Awarded to the student who receives the highest aggregate marks in the discipline areas of History and Theory. An award given for each NSW school of architecture.

Adrian Taylor	University of Technology, Sydney
Sarah Sim	University of NSW
Rida Khan	University of Sydney
Timothy Burke	University of Newcastle