Communities in Australia and California share connected experiences as they face climate-related threats, especially fire. But how much have we really learned about designing places that will serve us well during times of disaster? Californian RCH Studio’s director Greg Kochanowski and Hassell’s San Francisco principal Richard Mullane discuss how the global design community can support disaster […]
Last year, green magazine and MINI invited architects to explore the potential of laneways as part of MINI LIVING – INVERT 3.0. The architects were provided with a brief to design an independent dwelling on a piece of land carved from a suburban Melbourne block. The goal was to create affordable housing in the inner […]
It’s the Aussie dream to have the big house with all the amenities, a garden and a pool, but in our current property market, James Legge from National Sustainability Award winning-practice Six Degrees says for many of us, it’ll never be anything more than that – a dream. In the latest ABS Residential Property Price […]
Sydney-based Cox Architecture designer and UN Sustainable Development Solutions Fellow, HY William Chan realised early on that our built environments are vastly improved by directly including locals in the design and innovation process. Travelling to South Africa and India while studying at university, HY William Chan met with vulnerable slum communities on the very fringes […]
The World Architecture Festival shortlist of Future Projects features a handful of designs committed to creating a more sustainable future. From a tower that uses algae to produce clean air to the world’s first energy-positive airport, these projects illustrate how architects are grappling with some of the world’s most pressing challenges. They come as practices the world over […]
In this opinion piece, David Constantine discusses what we can expect from an increasingly urbanised environment and how we can make it work for us. Through my professional practice, I spend a good deal of time considering the opportunities presenting at the intersection of property, the built environment and social impact. Over recent months I’ve had a number […]
Australia’s first Passive House (Passivhaus) Certified apartment building, located 300m from Redfern station, will be officially launched by the Lord Mayor of Sydney on 17 September. Called The Fern, the 11 one-bedroom serviced apartments are the first in the country to be built using the German approach to home design that uses a combination of high-performance […]
Oli Mould, lecturer in Human Geography, at London’s Royal Holloway University, says it is time to ignore city rankings because they do more harm than good. At last count, there were over 500 rankings that pit cities around the world against each other: from the most intricately measured quality of life indices, to infographics of […]
Australia could lead the world in sustainable infrastructure with benefits for the community and business says Infrastructure Australia (IA) in the Australian Infrastructure Audit released today. The Green Building Council of Australia welcomes the report as fresh evidence to support urgent action to ensure the productivity, resilience and sustainability of cities and communities across Australia. […]
The Australian government has allocated $50 million for the Smarter Cities and Suburbs Program to encourage projects that “improve the livability, productivity and sustainability of cities and towns across Australia”. Mark Sawyer, lecturer in Architecture, University of Western Australia, takes a look at the environmental costs of smart cities. One project funded under the program […]
Last month hundreds of UK-based architecture firms signed a pledge to address climate change and now Australia is following suit with its own commitment to change. Bates Smart, Woods Bagot, Breathe Architecture and Kerstin Thompson Architects are among the 33 founding signatories on Architects Declare Australia, which is a declaration of “a climate and biodiversity emergency.” As in the UK, […]
