With such a wonderful diversity of organisations, how can we design home for each, and a community for all? Our approach is to think of the LGBTQI organisations as houses, and focus experience of these houses inside the organism of the building, around a protected street and town square. We see the mix of individual and collective spaces as an idea of house + village.
The building embraces its context. The paving spills out onto the chaos of Fitzroy Street, welcoming passers-by through a narrow, protected entry. The view to an internal garden draws you in - moving rst through a tight, Melbournian laneway, the space expands to a tall, internal garden.
There are discreet entrances off Jackson Street, and multiple ways to move through, up, across, around and on the building. The joy and colour of the project is found in the experience of moving through the building.
Pride House contains safe spaces that enrich our experience of place. Varying degrees of public / private, individual / collective and introverted / extroverted spaces lter our environment, and connect us to a context that we might otherwise miss. The idea of architecture as a facilitator - as the place for community, re ection and growth - is embodied in the design of Pride House. The building will be welcoming, fully accessible, and will give the community a sense of engagement, of nourishment and belonging.
No rainbow on the front facacde may seem strange, but the materials on our houses represent the rainbow. We use real materials, not just an applied paint colour - materials we can recall from our childhood, with embodied memory, texture and associations. Our differences are part of what makes us.
Difference is noble. We come together to celebrate our collective differences. There is strength in numbers, safety together, and community in diversity. Pride House is a resource, where the opportunity is to design a space for the collective, where the individual can nd their place and ourish.
Ongoing consultation with people of the LGBTQI , Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities will only improve our house + village concept. The users will be the authors of their spaces, while the architects will be curators.
The diversity of the brief is the opportunity that excites us. The composition of programs in a single building is a great challenge, and our ambition is to celebrate the diversity of this by composing each part into an inspiring whole.
Our approach is to work directly with the client and treat each project as a unique challenge. In doing so, we offer individual possibilities and thoughtful responses to people, place and brief. We ask users to be the authors of their spaces and their city. We work directly with clients to to ensure we understand their wants and needs. It is through this collaborative approach that the richness in our work emerges. We ask for open participation from clients and encourage them to draw, research, question and engage. Where others may see compromises, we see client participation as an exciting enrichment of this process.
As well as our direct interaction with stakeholders, the design should encourage and enable cooperation between the user groups, to allow for shared multi-
use spaces and facilities, and create a common vision that bene ts individual aspirations as well as those of the broader LGBTQI community.
The Pride House as a resource is integral to the success of occupation and engagement with the building. We aim to provide a safe, stable environment, affordable work accommodation, specialist facilities, and spaces to celebrate and collaborate.
The brief, and Consultation / Design Ideas documents were a catalyst for
our design approach to this building. Themes of culture, safety, inclusion and celebration set the tone of the overall concept, while speci c needs of privacy, stability, exibility and consultation informed the programmed spaces. Our approach of a collection of ‘houses’ grouped around a ‘semi-public street’ and ‘town square’ addresses the dichotomy of the varied spaces encapsulated in this building. We aim to provide the structure, both physical and social, for the collective housing of the organisations who will nd their new home at Pride House. We see the users as authors of their spaces, and the architects as curators.
The result of ongoing conversations will be the identi cation of further opportunities to enhance the collective experience of Pride House. The ‘street’ and the Forum are vertical and horizontal spaces that tie the ‘houses’ together. Organisations will be grouped around shared spaces, and the distribution of organisations will be curated to expose to the wonderful diversity of people, activity and ideas that make Pride House an uplifting place to be.