Image Credit : Tom Ross
Project Overview
As an independent not-for-profit social enterprise Collingwood Yards protects the emerging artists and arts organisations who are central to our community and creative future. With affordable rents and structured support, we work alongside and for our tenants to ensure that the arts have a place in the inner-city for perpetuity.
Project Commissioner
Project Creator
Team
COLLABORATORS
Builder: McCorkell
Landscape & Public Realm: SBLA
Photography: Tom Ross
Project Brief
Situated on the traditional lands of the Wurundjeri People of the Kulin Nation, Collingwood Yards is the first of its kind in Australia; a new contemporary arts precinct emulating internationally successful and self-sufficient social enterprise models. The former Collingwood Technical College has been redeveloped into a major new creative hub offering secure and affordable tenancies for artists, arts organisations and creative enterprises.
Our vision of Collingwood Yards was developed through a study of the urban ecology of Collingwood and in consultation with artists, musicians, curators and indigenous urban planners to understand the needs of contemporary practitioners and organisations.
Project Innovation/Need
Our approach to working with the existing fabric was one of minimal intervention. We used design strategies to preserve the sense of discovery and patina of the old buildings, without ossifying them as relics or simply preserving them. Through our design we tried to frame and highlight existing ‘banal’ features, while making new work distinct.
Design Challenge
Our aim is to ensure that the core operations of our spaces can be financially self sustaining at below market rents. Both the Collingwood Yards site and the organisation built to run it have been designed from the ground up to minimise the cost and complexity of operations. The efficiencies generated will be invested back in the community through more affordable rents and investment in future facilities, initiatives and programs.
Architecture - Community & Civic
This award celebrates the design process and product of planning, designing and constructing form, space and ambience that reflect functional, technical, social, and aesthetic considerations. Consideration given for material selection, technology, light and shadow.
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