6 minute read
BOB BARTON
Creative directions
Bob Barton (FB’98) believes that there are few truly new ideas, simply new combinations of old ones. “To create something new you need to collide elements together and take the time to notice, and then harness, the reactions and the relationships,” Bob explained. As a landscape architect and creative director of MALA Studio Landscape Architecture, Bob has applied this process to designing masterplans, tourism projects, farms, schools, playgrounds, public parks, residential projects and waterways. “Our process is to combine everything that’s going on in a big Venn diagram – people, place and policies – and see how it all intersects and connects to identify the most powerful catalysts and most achievable goals.” Alongside brothers Barrie (FB’94) and Chris (M’01), he has applied the same process to pioneering urban placemaking and revitalisation projects, most notably Rooftop Cinema and the six-storey “vertical laneway” at Curtin House on Swanston Street in Melbourne, which led to Golden Age Cinema & Bar and the rejuvenation of the heritage-listed Paramount House, an iconic Art Deco building in Surry Hills, Sydney. Venn diagrams illustrate the relationships between different sets (such as concepts, functions, objects, elements, groups and/or environments), how they are similar or different, and where and how they overlap. The centre of the diagram (the intersection of two or more circles) represents the nexus or focal point, where the overlapping sets share commonalities. In so many ways, Bob has been the nexus between the project team (of architects, landscape architects, engineers and specialist consultants) and the School community for both the new Primary School and the Corio Campus Masterplan. He heads the team from MALA Studio Landscape Architecture and has the unique perspective of a past student whose family lived on campus at Corio.
Bob was 12 years old when his father, Bruce Barton (Staff 1993-97), was appointed Head of Manifold House and the family moved to live on Biddlecombe Avenue. Bob’s mother, Pam Barton (Staff 1993-2015), became a Year 5 teacher, later serving as Assistant Head of Barrabool and Garnett, and Resident Tutor in Connewarre and The Hermitage houses. Bob was a House Prefect in Francis Brown, Captain of Rugby, and received the Philip Russell Prize for Fine Art; he graduated from GGS in 1998 to study landscape architecture at RMIT. His recent re-engagement with the School began with a conversation about Creative Education (“not just a fancy of the arts”) with then Vice Principal, Charlie Scudamore (Staff 1990-2020), at Pam’s 70th birthday. This led to a cup of tea with the Principal, Rebecca Cody. Rebecca initially asked Bob to review the playground area at Bostock House. This soon became a masterplan for Bostock House, which evolved into the new Primary School at Corio, to be located adjacent to Cameron Close. “My earliest relationship with the site (for the new Primary School) is fruitlessly trying to catch yabbies there with my little brother when we were kids,” Bob recalled. “Jon Apted (Staff 1978-2011) started revegetating that area when he was Head of Senior School and it was always a fun place to play. We had the whole campus to ourselves during the school holidays. We’d ride our bikes around and would gravitate to the giant trees in Cameron Close and the dam.”
The design of the new Primary School was developed in parallel with a new Corio Campus Masterplan. “We’ve got everything here (at Corio) for the new Primary School to be remarkable, but we wanted to ensure it was in the right location, so we started to explore the Masterplan at the same time,” Bob explained. “Corio is not just a school, it’s a village. We needed to think about how it functions for the future of education as well as how it functions for the people who live there; the students, the staff and their families. The collaboration with community is essential. It is the collective wisdom that will make the Masterplan functional so that it has longevity. We’re asking questions all the time. The ambition is for an authentic embodiment of the people and the place. We can only set the direction and energise people and give them a sense of agency to create and make it better.” In addition to the community collaboration for both the Primary School and Masterplan, Bob has reflected on his own personal experience and the shared educational philosophy of his parents. “I’ve talked to mum a lot about age-specific learning. She really liked teaching Year 5 because she felt that it was a beautiful time between being a child and becoming a teenager – it’s an age when kids are really curious and they get a buzz from learning through action. Dad was a geography teacher. He was always interested in the connection between people and planet, and understanding how societal shifts create geographical change and vice versa. It’s not nature and people. It’s all one system.” The focus on nature, the surrounding environment and sustainability is of particular interest to Bob. “This place (Corio) is meaningful for a lot of people, so to engender that care for place, for nature and the environment, would be a fantastic outcome for the School and for society,” he said. “It is caring for country, caring for the planet, and caring for each other.” Bob is also excited by the potential of land management and sustainability to provide handson, real world learning experiences. “I’m hopeful the Masterplan provides opportunities for the curriculum and the campus to come together,” he said. “We have land (approximately 230 hectares) and how we use and activate that land is a huge part of the Masterplan, particularly for a school community that has a strong rural history. There is the potential for innovation in agriculture and agri-tech to be a focus, where subjects can come together, and where students can be creative and solve real world problems.”
The stakeholder engagement for the Corio Campus Masterplan began with in-depth ‘wisdom holder’ interviews with long-serving staff (teaching and operational), current and past students, School Council (past and present), Foundation Board and traditional owners (Wadawurrung). Each interviewee was asked their vision for the campus in 50 years’ time. Bob considers the question, picturing his big Venn diagram of intersecting circles. “I would hope that in 50 years’ time this is a progressive and inclusive village as well as a place of learning,” Bob said. “I would hope that it is a centre of innovation in terms of learning and teaching, but also land management. I can envisage Limeburners’ Lagoon becoming a national park level environment. I can see the fields (at Corio) being a future farm and agricultural testing ground for the rest of the country. I can see students of all different capacities understanding where they might make the most impact, individually and together. I would hope that Geelong Grammar can harness its community to create something that is a legacy, for the environment and sustainability, and which influences the rest of Australia. A school like this can make a huge impact. I feel pretty lucky to come back after this amount of time with a different skillset and life experience, and to be able to bring those skills and experiences to try to set a course for the future. That’s something I’m very grateful for and have an energy to do.”
Bob Barton
Creative director of MALA Studio Landscape Architecture
