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The Student Lounge

Located at the heart of The University of Tasmania’s Sandy Bay Campus, the Student Lounge was designed to provide students with a dedicated but informal social and study space. With a mix of lounges, study nooks and booths, ‘the Lounge’ provides students with a range of individual and group learning areas encouraging appropriation. Key design strategies were to encourage movement paths through the campus, establish an identity on the Main Boulevard and provide an ‘in between’ space connecting the traditional library and the existing adjacent café. Key to the design is a plywood joinery spine that splices the originally open plan space into two parts. The central joinery item is manipulated to suit standing and sitting study and encourage conversation between the rear study ‘caves’ and large open-plan area. A robust palette of plywood and concrete complements the raw materiality of the existing building. Colour is boldly applied with dark, cavernous spaces to the rear, graduating to lighter open spaces at the front of the building. A cross motif (X marks the spot) is playfully applied throughout the space as joinery handles, door cut-outs, tabletop connections and as floor decals.

Architect

Preston Lane

Contractors

Construction 3, Inc

Consultants

Structural engineer – Gandy & Roberts Consulting Engineers

Hydraulic consultant – ASC Consulting Engineers

Electrical consultant – ASC Consulting Engineers

Services consultant – ASC Consulting Engineers

Photographer

Adam Gibson

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