REINVIGORATE + COLLABORATE

Chippendale’s demographic is largely young people who either study or work full time. However, many of the buildings in Chippendale are small with impractical kitchens and working spaces.

Presented with an opportunity to expand the Chippendale community, and bring together a younger demographic, our site consisted of a historic industrial brewing factory which was established in Chippendale’s 1800s. The brief required the re-purposing of the three-story brick building for coworking spaces that could be utilised by individuals or small companies as rent-able private office spaces and open collaborative areas. Furthermore, the adjacent site to the south was to be utilised for a community function based on the needs of Chippendale. Through this observation, the program was designed with three pillars, which includedEducating > Creating > Engaging.

The idea was to consider and design a space which would educate the Chippendale community, allowing them to create and attend to a hobby whilst growing in skill, and lastly to engage the rest of the community through showcasing these skills. This led me to designing a self-sustainable community garden which could be utilised by the community kitchen below. Locals would effectively be able to be educated on both cooking and agricultural skills, which could then serve the wider community through allowing food stalls and activities to take place in the park north of our site.

Through the concept phase, I was inspired by lightweight steel structures, which could effectively ‘latch’ onto the existing building as to not disrupt the heritage and history of the existing site. This steel structure was angled strategically to allow sunlight to flood the community garden space, whilst offering an open and relaxing space which served as a threshold between the public community garden, and the more private coworking spaces.

Structurally, the building implements large steel beams to allow open and functional spaces for the ground floor kitchen. Mechanical ventilation stacks run from the kitchen up through the extension and create exposed ‘chimneys’ which expresses the architectonics of the building and its functions. This extension also serves as a solar chimney, capturing heat in its roof and naturally ventilating the connected spaces.