Amazing space: architects honoured

UNSW's leading architecture academics and an on-campus creation have figured prominently in the Australian Institute of Architects NSW Architecture Awards.

The Institute honoured architecture firm HASSELL, chaired by the Faculty of Built Environment's Professor Ken Maher, with its top public architecture prize, the Sulman Award, for the stations on the Epping to Chatswood rail line.

In its citation, the jury said the four stations "set a new benchmark for transport design in Australia", with the "elegant and innovative" spaces able to comfortably accommodate peak-hour crowds while being neither "desolate nor foreboding" when patronage is light.

Dean of Built Environment, Professor Alec Tzannes, with his firm Tzannes Associates, received the Institute's Wilkinson Award for residential architecture for the Bilgola Residence, on Sydney's northern beaches.

It was the fourth Wilkinson Award won by Professor Tzannes, an achievement rivalled only by leading architects Harry Seidler, also with four awards, and Glenn Murcutt, with five.

The Architecture Awards jury said the predominantly concrete, glass and steel house had a "commanding presence on its site" while being "remarkably sober and robust".

UNSW's new student housing, UNSW Village on the Kensington campus, received the Architecture Award for multiple residential housing.

The Architectus-designed precinct was praised by the jury for its "warmth and delightfulness" and as representing "a positive attitude to student housing in our time".

For more information, and details of more UNSW prizewinners, read the Faculty of Built Environment news article.

UNSW Media Office: Peter Trute | 02 9385 1933 | p.trute@unsw.edu.au