Project Overview

The Grampians Peaks Trail (GPT) Stage-2 offers a world-class hiking experience over 160km of pristine Gariwerd wilderness, traversing the lands of three Traditional Owners. This diverse trail program accounts for day trips through to 13-day odysseys, tailored to a vast array of users and abilities. The brief for the GPT demanded designs that were deeply connected to the landscape, and enhanced the hiking experience as it evolved through diverse terrain.
Our collaboration between McGregor Coxall and Noxon Giffen Architects culminated in a unique experience that curates the various contexts, histories, and conditions at 10 campsite locations along the trail. The architectural brief called for the provision of structures at selected campsites along the trail, including Communal Hiker Shelters, Amenities Pods, and Gariwerd Camp Huts. The considered selection of natural materials celebrates the specific nature, colours, and textures of each campsite whilst minimizing impacts on the environment. Touching the earth lightly, the structures will age and weather over time, becoming enveloped by vegetation and gaining the patina of the site.
The GPT will also bring visitors closer to the rich Aboriginal culture of the Jardwadjali and Djab Wurrung peoples who have lived in these ranges for thousands of years, and the robust shelters and structure will help conserve, protect, and celebrate the unique beauty of Gariwerd, achieving the highest grade of environmental sensitivity through the protection of site-specific conditions.

Project Commissioner

Parks Victoria

Project Creator

Noxon Giffen with McGregor Coxall

Team

Architect: Noxon Giffen
Project Architect: Andrew Jenner
Darren Giffen
Stephanie Morgia
Sophie Chomard
Olivia Peel

Landscape Architect and Lead Consultant: McGregor Coxall
Associate Director and Co-Studio Leader: Nick Griffin
Thomas Flugge
Rupert Carmichael
Christian Borchert

Consultants:
Engineer: OPS Engineers
Project Manager: OnToIt
Quantity Surveyor: WT Partnership
Building Surveyor: Nelson McDermott
Main Contractor: Linct Group

Project Brief

The Grampians Peaks Trail Stage 2 project called for ten new campsites along the trail (together with a Group Camp for school groups at Stony Creek, adjacent to the GPT). As part of the design process, Parks Victoria collaborated with Traditional Owners over several years to select the campsite locations, and define clear guidelines and boundaries for landform, ecology, spatial typology, and cultural immersion at each site. Fundamental to Parks Victoria’s design brief were three key elements: the celebration of Gariwerd (Grampians) with landscape as hero, recognition of the scale and diversity of the terrain through a variety of site responsive designs, and design strategies for construction and maintenance in response to the trails’ remote nature.
A key aim of the brief was to amplify the immersive hiker experience with an appropriate level of comfort. The brief called to focus on arrival experience, site appreciation, awareness of site-specific conditions, and enabling social interaction between walkers whilst still maintaining a level of privacy and a sense of remoteness. The brief was limited to the essentials of tent platforms, communal areas, communal hiker shelters, and toilets, while two sites - Gar and Werdug - provide additional Camp Huts, offering an extended accommodation experience.
The brief also called for a basic level of walker safety and utility. The shelter and amenities structures were required to collect water on site, provide solar-powered battery charging stations to support mobile phone reception for navigation and emergency contact, and treat wastewater on site using grey water systems.

Project Innovation/Need

The architecture solutions offer protection from the elements whilst enhancing the experience of, and connection with, Gariwerd. The isolated nature of the trail and its campsites necessitates a specific design strategy that facilitates remote construction and minimizes ongoing maintenance. In response, the design of the shelters adopts a unitised structural module which allows a degree of prefabrication, improving both economy and the ease of construction in remote areas that are limited to helicopter access.
Designed to bring campers together while offering privacy, the Communal Hiker Shelter provides a central breezeway link with an enclosed gathering space and separate food preparation area. Large sliding doors and outdoor decks allow the spaces to be protectively enclosed or opened to the abundant landscape beyond. A high-level clerestory ribbon of filtered light connects with the tree canopies, whilst a solid base protectively encloses, punctuated by feature windows framing key views of Gariwerd. A selection of cladding solutions provides a variety or architectural designs relating to specific site contexts along the trail.
The project aims to increase the total number of walkers using the GPT from 13,800 in 2015 to 34,000 walkers by 2025 and is forecasted to generate more than $6 million of economic benefit for the region and Victoria as one of Australia’s iconic walks.

Design Challenge

To fulfil the design brief, the designs needed to connect with the landscape and enhance the hiking experience through a variety of diverse and remote terrain. The isolated nature of the trail and variety of campsite conditions necessitates a specific design response to facilitate remote construction and to minimise ongoing maintenance.
The design adopts a unitised structural module allowing prefabrication both for economy and ease of construction in areas with limited helicopter access. Cladding designs respond to site ecology and are adaptable to suit the structural modules, whilst materiality and detailing is robust and durable. The shelter design module facilitates flexible space planning including position of doors and decks to suit site-specific outlooks, ventilation, sun-exposure, and circulation. The robust structures and natural material palette promote durability and functionality in the tough remote environments. A considered selection of materials was used, responding to individual campsites’ nature, colours and textures. Four core types of cladding underpin robust site materiality, drawing on a mix of oxidised mild steel, sandstone, bushfire-charred timber, weathered timber, and branches of organic cladding that seamlessly embed structures within topography. Responding to the vegetation and landscape, the designs offer shelter and elementary facilities, whilst enhancing the experience of and connection with Gariwerd.

Sustainability

Campsites ‘touch the ground lightly’, minimising impact on the environment and maintaining Gariwerd’s iconic, biodiverse landscape as the hero. Accommodating a variety of users, abilities and intensities, the walk will conserve and protect Gariwerd’s beauty, achieving the highest possible grade of environmental sensitivity through the protection of site-specific conditions such as biotope preservation, overland flow management, and microclimate. The off-grid campsites are designed with mindfulness to guidelines and tracks – intuitive circulation allows for more sustainable campsites that minimise public access to dense vegetation.
The designs also minimise their impact on the environment through use of raw materials that match the environment, and allow for the structures to be enveloped by vegetation and gain the patina of the site as they age and weather over time, reducing the need for ongoing maintenance. Additionally, to protect the vegetation, the isolated situations require water collection and grey-water treatment on site.
Most importantly, the GPT will bring visitors closer to the rich Aboriginal culture of the Jardwadjali and Djab Wurrung peoples who have lived in these ranges for thousands of years.

Architecture - Public and Institutional

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. 
More Details