February 09, 2005
progressive architecture?
A lot of the new inner city architecture in Adelaide is along these modernist lines:
Nelson Architects, Parkland Residence, North Adelaide 2000
The blurb says:
"The Parklands Residence, is a modern townhouse overlooking Adelaide's Parklands. Set in a local heritage area, the street facade explores the reinterpretation of a Grand Terrace house whilst asserting rational yet sympathetic proportions to its surrounds."
This has little sympathy with the heritage housing stock around it. It is an enclosed airconditioned machine that makes no use of the city's cooling winds. Nor does it little by way of living inside/outside spaces. It shouts money, international and arrogance. This kind of modernism cannot be called progressive architecture. It could be situated anywhere.Theris little attempt at reworking the modernist heritage.
Adealide is not a megapolis and, unlike Sydney, will never become one. I am more interested in an architecture that takes the regional character in a globalized world. In Adelaide that means the inner city cottages, keeping the heritage street facades and building a new and sustainable dwelling on the back. That gives you a different kind of townhouse; one that responds to the local heritage and environment and so develops a regional identity.
This would be one way to explore a regional identity in architecture, as it is in food and wine. It is a different pathway to the desire for security, seclusion and enclosing oneself in opposition to the hurried actuality of the city.
An example of regional architecture from Tasmania is this small single storey cottage, which enjoys waterfront Derwent River views to the South West and a canopy of mature trees to the North West:
Gilby Vollus Architects,Watchorn House, 2000