Site Office is a landscape architectural consultancy specialising in the design of innovative and high quality public spaces.  For the past 7 years, we have been working steadily on a range of projects with a strong public realm focus, exploring different strategies designed to improve the quality of many urban spaces within the city.  We are advocates of innovative landscape design solutions that become the catalyst for change within the urban environment.

We are particularly interested in the myriad of wonderful and often unpredictable ways in which people inhabit and use public space. The beauty of public space is it’s multiplicity and complexity; as such we explore design strategies that avoid simplification and reduction and seek to draw out the inherent richness and diversity of the site and its inhabitants. Our work focuses strongly on developing functional designs that offer multiple and new ways of experiencing public space. We are also interested in the overlap and interaction of different uses that often results in spontaneous and unexpected interactions. 

We understand the importance of public space in promoting positive connections between people, particularly in an era that is increasingly focused on the individual rather than the community.  Our design projects seek to engender a strong sense of community ownership and pride in the site, to ensure the ongoing success of the design well after the designers have left.

Award in Urban Design, Victorian Architecture Awards, Australian Institute of Architects, 2009
St Kilda Foreshore Promenade, City of Port Phillip

Best Landscape Design, Whitehorse Urban Design Awards, 2009
RSPCA Kennel Courtyards, RSPCA, Burwood

Award in Design, AILA Victorian Chapter, 2008
RSPCA Kennel Courtyards, RSPCA, Burwood

National Landscape Architecture Award (Design), AILA 2008
Special Jury Citation: Small Project Innovation
Raglan Street Parkland, Port Melbourne, City of Port Phillip

Merit Award in Design, AILA Victorian Chapter, 2007
Future Garden, Royal Botanic Gardens, Cranbourne

Commendation Award in Design, AILA Victorian Chapter, 2007
Raglan Street Parkland, Port Melbourne, City of Port Phillip

Premier’ Design Awards, Shortlisted entry, 2006
Diversity Garden, Royal Botanic Gardens, Cranbourne

Chairman’s Premier Award, Architectural Excellence in the South East Awards, 2006
Future Garden, Royal Botanic Gardens, Cranbourne

Best Environmental Building or Landscape, Architectural Excellence in the South East Awards, 2006
Future Garden, Royal Botanic Gardens, Cranbourne

Parkland Design Award, Parks and Leisure Australia (National Award), 2005
Keast Park Master Plan, City of Frankston

Commendation Award in Design, AILA Victorian Chapter, 2004
Mount Street, Heidelberg, City of Banyule

Merit Award in Planning, Keast Park Master Plan, AILA Victorian Chapter, 2004
Keast Park Master Plan, City of Frankston

Open Space Management Award , Parks and Leisure Australia Victorian Chapter, 2004
Keast Park Master Plan, City of Frankston

Merit Award, Urban Masterplans, AILA Victorian Chapter, 2002
Mount Evelyn Urban Design Framework, Shire of Yarra Ranges

PUBLICATIONS ABOUT:

‘St Kilda Foreshore Promenade’ in Melbourne Design Guide, Alphbet Press, 2009.

‘St Kilda Foreshore Promenade’ in Sunburnt - Australian Practices of Landscape Architecture, Descript Publishing, May 2009, pg 19-20.

‘St Kilda Foreshore Promenade’, review by Julian Raxworthy, in Landscape Architecture Australia, May 2009, pg 48-53.

‘Diversity Garden - A Botanical Transect’ in 1000 X Landscape Architecture, Verlagshaus Braun, 2009, pg 30.

‘RSPCA’, review by Peter Bickle, in Architecture Australia, 2008.

‘Dryness’, J. Raxworthy, in Scape International Journal of Landscape Architecture, 2008.

‘Raglan Street Parkland’, review by Dimity Reed, in Landscape Architecture Australia, February 2008, pg 58-61.

‘A New Formalism’, Catherine Bull, in Landscape Architecture Australia, August 2006, pg 40-43.

‘Peninsular Garden’, Belle, December / January 2006/07, pg 111-117.

‘Making Connections’, Review by Richard Holt in Architectural Review, No. 95, December 2005, pp 98-101.

‘Courtyard Garden’, in Inside Out, October 2002, pg 114-119.

Design Competition for a Pubic Place, Edited by Stephen Frith, National Capital Authority, Canberra, 2001, pg 54.

 

PUBLICATIONS BY:

‘A Conversation with Site Office’, in Kerb – Journal of Landscape Architecture, Issue No.17, November 2009, pg 85-89.

‘Public Space : Is Good’, in Review 05, Queensland University of Technology, 2006, pp 23-30.

‘Useless Landscapes’ in Architectural Review, No. 95, December 2005, pp 66-67.

‘Territorial Infrastructure’, in The Mesh Book – Landscape / Infrastructure, Edited by Raxworthy & Blood, RMIT University Press, Melbourne, 2004.

‘Rising Damp’, in Kerb – Journal of Landscape Architecture, Issue No.12, November 2003.

‘Bed of Salt’, in Architectural Review, No. 081, September 2002, pp 16-17.

‘Landscape as Text(ure)’, in Kerb – Journal of Landscape Architecture, Issue 10, December 2001.

‘Embodied Infrastructure – The economics of composite urban structures’, Mesh Conference Proceedings, December 2001.

‘The topological twist in landscape architecture’ in Kerb – Journal of Landscape Architecture, Issue 06, April 2000.

‘Black Stump ; Landscape, Aboriginality & Disclosure’, in Architecture Australia, January 1998, volume 87, no.1, pg 72-75.

‘Representing Landscapes Digitally’, in Landscape Australia, pg 34-39, May 1998.

 

Address: level 5 165 flinders lane melbourne vic 3000 australia

Telephone: phone 03 9639 0391 fax 03 9639 0595

Email: General Inquiries office@siteoffice.com.au

Mount Street Park, Heidelberg, Banyule City Council, 2002/03

Site Office completed the design and installation of this VicHealth sponsored project to enhance a small park in front of Heidelberg Station. The purpose of the project was to improve the park through the design of art and landscape works that reflect the local character of the area and engage with this community.  A low, sinuous concrete seating wall wraps its way around the park, in between existing mature trees.  Embedded within the wall are a series of led message boards that include oral histories, poems and prose. The messages scroll through the park, providing movement and animation to the space at night. This project recieved a Commendation Award in Design at the 2004 AILA Victorian Chapter Awards.

Photography :Trevor Mein

Raglan Street Parkland, Port Melbourne, City of Port Phillip, 2005-7

Located on the Ingles Street truck route, Site Office has designed a small park that incorporates an acoustic noise wall, shade structure and furniture elements.  The purpose of commission was to create a neighbourhood park with high amenity, while being shielded from the visual and acoustic pollution generated by adjacent truck route.  A timber noise wall weaves along one edge of the site, responding to the dynamic movement of the traffic, while protecting indigenous plantings on the other side.  The project received a National Landscape Architecture Award at the 2008 AILA National awards, and a Commendation Award in Design at the 2007 AILA Victorian Awards.

Photography : Ben Wrigley

Future Garden - A Garden of Dilemmas, Royal Botanic Gardens, Cranbourne, 2005

The history of horticulture is characterised by the continual investigation into the artificial manipulation of plants. Techniques such as cultivars, grafting, hybrids and plant genomics all seek to alter the naturally occurring form of a plant in some fundamental, synthetic way. In Australia, there are now many varieties of native plants that have undergone different levels of manipulation, resulting in ‘native’ plants never actually found in the wild. Yet such manipulation is also fraught with moral dilemmas, representing both the possibility of enormous advancement and the fear of irreversible genetic pollution and loss of plant provenance. The Future Garden is an exploration of the reality and dilemmas posed by this investigation into synthetic plant production, dispelling the notion of ‘bush’ garden. It becomes a synthetic, cellular landscape comprising of Australian plants that are the direct result of science not nature. This project recieved a Merit Award in Design at the 2007AILA Victorian Chapter Awards.

 

Diversity Garden - A Botanical Transect, Royal Botanic Gardens, Cranbourne, 2005

Historically, white Australians have tended to characterise the land as empty rather than full. Yet, interestingly, we have some of the most botanically diverse areas on the entire planet. This diversity is largely based on the ancient, nutrient deficient soils which have forced plants to become highly specialised, forging tight symbiotic relationships with surrounding plants, fauna and terrain. The Diversity Garden is a botanical transect through the 85 bioregions of Australia, representing the enormous diversity of geography, climate, flora and fauna. Each bioregion is defined by a thin strip of material composed from plant and mineral matter representative of that bioregion. The garden draws attention to notions of native and indigenous plants, making important connections between plant type and geographic origin. This project was shortlisted for the 2006 Premier's Design Awards.

 

St Kilda Foreshore Promenade, City of Port Phillip, 2004 -09

Site Office and Jackson Clements Burrows have redesigned 700 metres of the main promenade along the St Kilda foreshore from St Kilda Pier down to Brookes Jetty.  The design involves the widening and topographic articulation of the edge of the promenade to encourage a greater range of uses to occur along the foreshore promenade. This project recently won an Award in Urban Design at the 2009 Victorian Architecture Awards (Australian Institute of Architects).

Photography : John Golings, Site Office & JCB

Britannia Mall, City of Whitehorse, 2005

Site Office has recently completed a major upgrade to this external shopping mall in Mitcham.  The design consisted of replacing the central brick paved portion of the mall with a series of floating timber seating deck modules.  The floating decks allow for greater water permeability, encouraging vastly improved growing conditions for the existing under performing trees situated in the mall.

Photography : Ben Wrigley

Keast Park Master Plan, Seaford, City of Frankston, 2003/04

Site Office completed a comprehensive master plan for Keast Park, a 2.5 hectare public park situated at the northern end of the Seaford foreshore on Port Phillip Bay. The project explored creative ways to synthesize the underlying ecology of the sensitive foreshore environment with the functional requirements of the public park, in particular the need to accommodate a broad range of functions, including the Carrum Bowls Club, the sea scouts, public toilets and change facilities, a multi-purpose community space and a small café. This project recieved a Merit Award in Planning, at the 2004 AILA Victorian Chapter Awards.

 

Monte Carlo Reserve Master Plan, Avondale Heights, City of Moonee Valley, 2007-8

Site Office has recently completed a comprehensive master plan for this suburban park located on the junction between the ancient basalt Keilor Plains and the deeply eroded Maribyrnong River basin in Avondale Heights. The primary experience of the park remains a direct and enduring result of the evolution of the site, as rain water slowly carved out the gully from plateau to river. The master plan explores ways of representing the presence of the ephemeral water course that formerly traversed the site (but was filled in during the subdivision of the park and adjacent properties in the early 1980s). The design of the park explores ways of recreating this texture and experience not by mimicking natural processes, but through a careful understanding of how people experience and interact with the site and the elements.

RSPCA Headquarters, Burwood, 2005/7

In 2005 the Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals embarked on a $10 million redevelopment of their headquarters in Burwood.  Since then, Site Office working in conjunction with NH Architecture, have been working on the landscape design for the project, developing a landscape that is a physical expression of the goals of the RSPCA and the positive relationship between humans and animals. The landscape is both highly symbolic (in what it says about our relationship with animals), as well as highly experiential (in how animals and humans interact bodily with their environment). This project won an Award in Design at the 2008 AILA Victorian Chapter awards, as well as an Architecture Award in the Sustainable Architecture category at the 2008 RAIA Victorian Architecture Awards.

Photography : Peter Bennetts, Site Office

 

Barkley / Hopkins Street Planters, Footscray, City of Maribyrnong, 2008

For more than 100 years, the Kinnears rope factory on Ballarat Road was one of the largest employers within the Footscray area. In 2002, the Kinnears rope factory closed its doors for the last time, ending exactly 100 years of continuous operation in Footscray.  The design of the tree planters along Barkley Street pays respect to the Kinnears legacy by returning rope to the main street in Footscray. The planters take the form of bundles of rope woven together to form a protective basket supporting the trees.

Photography : Ben Wrigley

Debney's Park, Flemington, City of Moonee Valley, 2009

The design of the southern section of Debney's Park creates an active play and community space designed to promote interaction of people from culturally diverse backgrounds and respond to the complexity of public life in this location.  It recognizes the importance of developing healthy lifestyles that in turn help facilitate healthier communities.  It responds directly to UNICEF’s declaration that “the well being of children is the ultimate indicator of a healthy habitat, a democratic society and of good governance” (UN Conference on Human Settlement, 1996).  The design acknowledges the importance of play in the physical and emotional development of children, encouraging children to leave their houses and actively engage with their physical environment.

Mall in Wantirna, City of Knox, 2008

Site Office was receently asked to prepare concept design ideas for this outer suburban shopping strip. Work in progress.