Common Ground

2023

The project, titled common ground, aims at uniting seemingly irreconcilable contradictions on the chosen site. It addresses Northcote as an oxymoron between small and big-scale development, industrial heritage and future urbanisation, public and private programming, transience and permanence of activities, and many other conflicting needs of Northcote's complex demographical and sociological make-up in an inclusive manner. It negates the definitive boundaries between forms, functions and scale, resulting in an undulating and multilayered urban response. Through this negation, the project absorbs oppositions and dichotomies and synthesises them into its unifying architectural language; instead of separation or containment, the field of exchange (or contradiction) became the common ground.

Act 1: site analysis

Situated in the centre of the council's proposed future mixed-use precinct, the site abuts potential large-scale developments on all sides while simultaneously being in proximity to low-density residential suburban conditions. Since the site at large is well connected with an existing network of private and public laneways, the new development is looking at expanding this network to link up with the Merri Creek reserve.

Its central location and high level of permeability call for the site to be donated to the general public, especially on its ground level. The design also addresses the diverseness of the 'public', between its temporary occupants and permanent residents, between its shifting demographics and further transient activities.

Act 2: The public

The entirety of the ground plane, basements and part of the lower air space are donated for public use. As a natural point of convergence, the space is designed to act as a town square/piazza. A hallmark of the town square is its ability to withhold occupants intermittently through quasi-public functions while acting as a flexible node between passages. It is a literal common ground where ideas are exchanged, and lives are experienced. The smaller-than-usual size (compared to other examples) made the design relies on a multilayered typology to achieve the complexities required. Between the field of entry to the amphitheatre steps, each structure bears double connotations; entry becomes a playground, seating becomes the stage, observers are observed, and what is visible is also obscured. This simultaneity is itself theatrical and dialectical. In the basement, the theme of double entendre continues. The double and single-height 'vault' contrast generates a cinematic atmosphere. It is both designed as communal parking facilities and for temporary festival activities.

Above the ground plane, a bridge is suspended mid-air. It instigates further engagement with the activities below and as an extension of the landscape. The void it occupies is three storeys tall, expanding the public domain and opening the site towards the Merri creek reserve.

The basement, ground and bridge are also visually connected through lightwells and cutouts. The light wells in the basement are placed according to the passage of natural light to link it with the ground temporally and allow rain and air to penetrate through. The cutouts can also be found as a visual linkage between the stages/steps and platforms.

This public consideration also extends to the design of the project's residential component.

Act 2: The private

Situated three storeys above the ground, the residential tower seemingly floats above the public domain and is supported by vault-like colonnades. The tower's façade is made of a translucent fabric shading device. The softness of the fabric instils a gentle presence; it playfully entangles the private space visually with the public realm while not losing the elusiveness of the private quarters. It is not imposed onto the landscape but absorbs the nearby building profiles. The solid presence of the concrete core is a visual counterweight to the floating mass, and its stripe texture connects the tower with the public steps. While the residential function cannot be further contradictory from the bustling public space below, its multi-layered façade, its translucency, and the penetrative lightwells first soften this differentiation, then encourages indirect interaction between the two, generating complexity by bounding them as a dialectical image.

The apartments are made up of 2-3 beds in response to the council's development. Grounded in reality, the building is setback towards the southern boundary to maximise exposure to the northern sun. They adopted a loft typology to improve building efficiency and include a generous terrace. As the tower and its structural support tilted inwards, it creates an illusion of opening up of space when entering from Merri Creek and closing off when exiting the more low-rise residential neighbourhood.

Act 3: The Ruin

The idea of ruin is derived from de Chirico's painting and Walter Benjamin's concept of ruination. The ruin is a phantom of the past coexisting with the present and future reality. It strips back architecture to its essence, a distinguishable atmospheric skeleton yet ambiguous in its physical manifestation. It is this temporal simultaneity that forms the field of exchange where the common ground is resting within. From the basement, the theme of ruination begins with the columns' negative space reminiscing an industrial vault; the holes on the ground and the ceiling height transition signal both decays of the industrial structure and anticipates its future use as event space. In the public domain, the extruding platforms and suspended bridges form another phase of ruin where industrial structures' devolution rests in fragments. The colonnades and the building core become a monument of the past (acting as chimneys and factories like vaults) while supporting future development. The use of symbolism, such as vault, cutout, stripes and stairs, forms the core of this project's architectural language.