Pier Street

The fundamental design philosophy driving the design of the building can be summarised as functional simplicity. The final building will house a broad range of owners and tenants from students through to empty nesters, young couples and small families. These will come from a range of backgrounds and experiences and this requires a design response which is scalable and adaptable.

The architectural materials and forms have been developed which are simple, earthy and textural. A warehouse style aesthetic is the over‐arching stylistic approach which allows the rawness and simplicity of exposed materials to be complemented with pops of colour and materials.

This design direction allows for a simple studio apartment targeted at the entry level, which shall have the same textures and materials response as the higher end two bedrooms higher up the building. There will be opportunities for owners to add colours and textures to a simple warehouse aesthetic with exposed services and materials, thus personalising the spaces in the building. This will also create a fine layer of texture and materiality to break down the scale of the building though functional usage.

Critical to the success of this design approach is the architectural commitment to the functional drive of these aesthetic shifts. The break‐up of the elevations is facilitated by simple planning shifts which create staggered building forms through a function shift, not ‘bolt‐on architecture’.

New innovations have developed to complement and expand on the initial concept design. These include common break out spaces on the studio floors to complement internal spaces with shared spaces that activate the façade. The design has introduced a roof space (sky park) where the entire Pier Street community can socialise with each other and interact with common garden and green spaces. A communal gym is proposed in this common space and an additional functional space has been introduced which could accommodate a variety of uses including facilities to host a small outdoor cinema nights.