Heritage Architecture

Wesley Place - 130 Lonsdale • Lovell Chen with COX Architecture • Photographer: Trevor Mein

This category is for any built conservation project or study developed in accordance with the Australia ICOMOS Burra Charter, or any adaptive reuse of a heritage structure.

Peter Williams LFRAIA Jury chair David Wagner FRAIA Juror

Pamela McGirr RAIA Juror

Jury chair report

The overall quality of submitted projects with huge diversity in scale, complexity and budgets presented our jury with a considerable challenge. Assisted greatly by the evaluation criteria, our initial appraisal heightened the need for additional knowledge. We were all impressed by the thoroughness of the written submissions and images supplied but were reluctant to judge based on that material alone. The importance of jury presentations assisted greatly in this process. The words offered by the project authors were critical to our ongoing thinking and debate. Insight gained by hearing the architects speak directly about their work in the short time available to them highlighted key drivers for the project as well as the significant design steps and choices fundamental to the outcome. Following the presentations, we formulated a shortlist for further scrutiny at the site visits. We appreciated viewing the spaces and the buildings, supported with further explanation from the designing architects. The jury was most impressed by all submissions in this category ranging from the first project from early career architects to a small universally supported endeavour, involving many committed people and organisations, through to the significance of major revitalisation and targeted capital expenditure in regional Victoria and comprehensive commercial projects in the centre of Melbourne. All demonstrated the consummate skills and dedication of both experienced and emerging architects working in this complex and nuanced part of our built environment. Thanks to the participants and our heartiest congratulations to the winners.

Category sponsor

The John George Knight Award for Heritage Architecture Wesley Place - 130 Lonsdale by Lovell Chen with COX Architecture

Wurundjeri Country

The conservation and restoration of Wesley Place is a tour-de-force in the art of conservation as well as the activation of a heritage complex within the public realm. The complex contains a substantial collection of heritage buildings dating from the mid-nineteenth to earlytwentieth centuries with, at its core, an 1858-59 gothic revival rusticated basalt church with two-storey manse and schoolhouse, all designed by noted nineteenth-century architect, Joseph Reed. The jury was impressed by the regenerative vision for the site, involving the subjective consideration of all fabric leading to the removal of agglomerative elements while protecting and conserving through selective intervention and retention. A dynamic spatial fluidity has been generated between and around the historic buildings, ancient trees and historic fencing. The restoration project is further entwined by the development of a multi-storey tower cantilevering over the manse in a fascinating act of architectonic co-operation, founded on the manse’s redoubtable primacy and permanence. Wesley Place is the winner of the highest accolade in the heritage category, the John George Knight Award for Heritage, for its remarkable achievement in carefully conserving and preserving built heritage, for facilitating adaptive reuse and for revealing an exciting new public space to the City of Melbourne.

Practice team: Peter Lovell (Director Heritage Conservation), Christophe Loustau (Design Architect), Audrey Ong (Project Architect), Anne-Marie Treweeke (Architect), Kate Gray (Senior Heritage Consultant), Felicity Strong (Interpretation), Philip Rowe (Director), Alex Purdon (Interior Designer), Andrew Mayne (Associate), Christina Prodromou (Director), Johannes Lupolo-Chan (Associate), Michael Shore (Associate), Pete Sullivan (Director), Shjaan Versey (Associate), Simon Haussegger (Director), Tommy Miller (Associate), Zen Lee (Associate), James Fennell (Designer) Consultant / Construction team: Lovell Chen (Heritage Architect), McKenzie Group (Building Surveyor), AECOM (Civil Consultant), AECOM (Structural Engineer), Mark Hodkinson Pty Ltd (Heritage Structural Engineer), FLOTH Consultants (Services Engineer), NDY (Lift Consultant), Oculus Landscape (Landscape Architect), Armitage Jones (Project Manager), Dr Vincent Clark & Associates (Archaelogical), Greenwood Consulting (Arborist), NDYLight (Lighting Consultant), Rider Levett Bucknall (Quantity Surveyor), Morris Access Consulting (DDA Consultant), Irwinconsult (Fire Engineer), Urbis (Town Planner), BG&E (Façade Consultant) Builder: Lendlease

Photographer: Trevor Mein

Wesley Place - 130 Lonsdale • Lovell Chen with COX Architecture • Photographer: Trevor Mein

Award for Heritage Architecture – Conservation Keilor Police Hut by Andronas Conservation Architecture

Wurundjeri Country

Keilor Police Hut is an exemplar of conservation work, resurrecting and restoring the disassembled componentry of a prefabricated, corrugated iron-clad structure, manufactured in Great Britain, possibly Scotland, in the mid-nineteenth century and imported into a colony stimulated by the gold rush. The shed was initially established in 1853 to house the Keilor Police on the road to the goldfields, but has been subsequently moved several times. In 2012, supported by the Keilor Historical Society, Brimbank Council agreed to restore the building and relocate to the adjacent historic Harrick’s Cottage in Keilor Park. Original materials were carefully conserved including reforming of severely damaged five-inch corrugated iron walling, removal of damaged galvanising and application of protective treatments while historical repairs to the delightful castiron columns were retained. Interpretive interventions such as placing the structure on a concrete slab, introducing tensile restraints, replacing lost fenestration, and partially relining the interior have been undertaken intelligently and with sensitivity. The interpolation of conservation, historical interpretation, and the discreet insertion of a technological prosthesis to facilitate the authentic re-erection of this archaeological relic, is a considered study in the science of architectural conservation making Keilor Police Hut a worthy winner of this year’s Architecture Award for Heritage – Conservation.

Practice team: Arthur Andronas (Director), Gabrielle Moylan (Design Architect), Greg Stephens (Draftsperson), Luke Peldys (Draftsperson) Consultant / Construction team: Willem Snoek (Archeologist / Conservator), Landmark Heritage (Historian / Building Conservator), Quatrefoil Consulting (Structural Engineer), BSGM Consulting Building Surveyors (Building Surveyor) Builder: SIDA Constructions Photographer: Casamento Photography

Award for Heritage Architecture – Creative Adaptation Myer Music Centre Melbourne Grammar School by Peter Elliott Architecture + Urban Design

Bunurong Country

This project refurbishes two heritage buildings and adds one new infill building. The infill stitches together an almost 100-year heritage divide. It is flanked by a Victorian residence with a verandah profiled like a waxed moustache, and a lofty mid-century modern school building with a butterfly roof as trim as Don Draper’s clean-shaven bristles. The architect manages the leap between these symbols of two different eras with a long and loose finger-joint that gently scissors the two buildings together – where the lower part and pattern of the modern facade is extended, and then, floating over this low wall, from the other side, a new breezeway roof is formed, by striking a datum somewhere on the waxy curves of the Victorian verandah. The resulting low facade of the infill gives distinction to the original buildings without slavish reference to the past. The jury was impressed with the modest expression of the new and how this belied a bold new spatial arrangement, including a basement with two large rehearsal spaces. This would have presented significant technical challenges of the regulatory, heritage, performance and construction kind, which the architect has skilfully resolved. While the outside experience is appropriately as neat and collected as a well-mannered school uniform. The interior is warm and friendly. Public and private experience is invigorated with three buildings from three eras joined as one.

Practice team: Peter Elliott (Design Architect), Sean van der Velden (Design Architect), Tim Foster (Project Architect), Daniel Bennetts (Project Architect), Juliet Maxsted (Project Architect), Jude Doyle (Project Architect), Hosna Saleem (Graduate of Architecture), Shigeru Iijima (Project Architect), Geoff Barton (Project Architect) Consultant / Construction team: WSP Irwinconsult (Structural Engineer), WSP Irwinconsult (Civil Consultant), WSP Irwinconsult (Services Consultant), WSP Irwinconsult (ESD Consultant), WSP Irwinconsult (Fire Engineer), Philip Chun (Building Surveyor), Bryce Raworth Pty Ltd (Heritage Consultant), Nicholson Planning & Development (Town Planner), Urban Initiatives (Landscape Consultant), Marshall Day Acoustics (Acoustic Consultant), Marshall Day Entertech (AV Consultant), Slattery Australia (Quantity Surveyor), Maben Group Pty Ltd (Contractor) Builder: Maben Group Pty Ltd Photographer: John Gollings

Award for Heritage Architecture – Creative Adaptation Hilton Melbourne Little Queen Street by Lovell Chen with Bates Smart

Wurundjeri Country

Acquisition of the site and a vision for the completion of this project by the new owner hands back to the fabric of Melbourne a repurposed building of distinguished architectural quality and captured an embedded social history. This project has arrested what was surely a slow trajectory of neglect and deterioration. The clever conversion of the historic Oakley and Parks Equity Chambers 1930-31 from Barristers Chambers to the new Melbourne Hilton Hotel, is an exemplar project combining comprehensive conservation and insightful architectural judgement. The appointment of Lovell Chen with Bates Smart has delivered a memorable Melbourne project proudly occupying its original Bourke Street frontage and exploiting its inter-war Romanesque details. Interestingly this building’s qualities were not recognised by the heritage council until 2010. This is a project where, thorough analysis of the existing fabric, forensic research and meticulous reconstruction were coupled with imaginative propositions, judgements regarding access, facility planning and new construction. The result realises a series of interconnected new public and private spaces fundamental to the new hotel use but configured in well-mannered juxtaposition to the original. Congratulations to the architects, Melbourne is all the richer for this project.

Practice team: Peter Lovell (Heritage Conservation), Christophe Loustau (Design Architect), Imke Beutmann (Heritage Conservation), Audrey Ong (Architect), Katherine White (Senior Heritage Consultant), Julian Anderson (Design Architect), Kristen Whittle (Design Architect), Jeffery Copolov (Interior Design Director), Karen Wong (Project Leader), Grant Filipoff (Interior Designer), Tim Fowler (Project Architect), Quentin Leroy (Project Architect), Lisa Gerstman (Project Architect), Derek Hawkes (Project Architect), Chui Yao (Judy) Chan (Architect), David Smith (Architect), Bobby Wei (Architect), Sarah Kren-Kibblewhite (Interior Designer), Ting Sun (Designer), Sophia Ge (Designer), Molly Rizzo, (Designer), Dominic Cheuk (Designer), Neil Penny (Designer), Sarah Hull (Designer), Laura Fisher (Designer), Jefferson Protomartir (3D Visualisation Specialist), Rando Profnasta (Designer), Audrey Cavalera (Designer), Mark Di Bartolo (Designer) Consultant / Construction team: Acoustic Logic (Acoustic Consultant), CHW Consulting (AV Consultant), Philip Chun & Associates (Building Surveyor), Robert Bird Group (Civil Consultant), M&L Hospitality (Developer), Simpson Kotzman (ESD Consultant), Lovell Chen (Heritage Consultant), Andrew Long and Associates (Archaeological Consultant), Simpson Kotzman (Hydraulic Consultant), Bates Smart (Interior Designer), Point of View (Lighting Consultant), Jack Merlo (Landscape Consultant), Duo Projects (Project Manager), WT Partnership (Quantity Surveyor), Simpson Kotzman (Services Consultant), Robert Bird Group (Structural Engineer), SJB Planning (Town Planner), Philip Chun & Associates (DDA Consultant), Wood & Grieve Engineers (Fire Engineer), Mack Group (Kitchen Consultant), Fabio Ongarato Design (Signage Consultant), Arup (Façade Engineer), Simpson Kotzman (Electrical Consultant) Builder: Multiplex Photographer: Sean Fennessey

Stable & Cart House by Clare Cousins Architects

Country: Wurundjeri

This creative adaptation of a 1920s stable building into a domestic sanctuary fully preserves the timeworn texture and scale of the exterior. The architect’s touch is invisible on the outside, and the heritage imprint of horses, drays and grittier services, traditionally located in back lanes, remains strong. Inside, the light touch continues with rusted iron patina, exposed dark timber and signage left in situ. Original conditions are exploited to create a moody palette that promotes a wonder of the past while providing the comfort of contemporary amenity. All heightened by highly crafted steel insertions. A workhorse has been transformed to a beautiful, crossbred polo pony.

Builder: ProvanBuilt

Photographer: Sharyn Cairns

Other entries for Heritage Architecture

Shortlisted • Bendigo TAFE City Campus Revitalisation • Six Degrees with Architectus (lead) • Kane Nicholson Joint Venture • Dja Dja Wurrung Country • Photographer Trevor Mein

Courtyard House • Ha Architecture • LocBuild Pty. Ltd. • Wurundjeri Country • Photographer Tom Ross Shortlisted • Collingwood Yards • Fieldwork • McCorkell Constructions • Wurundjeri Country • Photographer Tom Ross

Gatwick Private Hotel • Kosloff Architecture • Neometro Projects Australia Pty Ltd • Bunurong Country • Photographer Derek Swalwell Shortlisted • Queen & Collins • KTA + BVN • Probuild Constructions • Wurundjeri Country • Photographer Derek Swalwell

Glencairn • Trower Falvo Architects • Grossi Constructions • Wurundjeri Country • Photographer Ben Hosking Caringal Flat • Ellul Architecture • Owner Builder • Wurundjeri Country • Photographer Rory Gardiner

Rebuild La Mama • Meg White and Cottee Parker Architects • Chroma Group Pty Ltd • Wurundjeri Country • Photographer Glenn Hester