Bunjil Place; Timber Design Award Winner
Bunjil Place, by FJMT Studio, is an example of a new form of community and civic building in Australia. It is not a single-use or single facility that tends to divide and separate a community by interest, education, or culture, but an inclusive hybrid form of a public building, reflecting and embracing the diversity of the country. It is a library, a performance theatre, a public gathering space, a place of exhibition, gallery and display, flexible and experimental space for events, lectures, debate and celebration. Bunjil Place, with an area of 24500 m², is a help point, a service center and a place of work and collaboration. Above all perhaps, it is a place where all of this overlaps and interconnects and at the center is the interconnecting fluid form of the foyer gathering space, a non-hierarchical space that unifies the complex.
The sources of inspiration are that of Cathy Adams’ 2001 artwork, “The Meeting of Many Paths” and ‘Bunjil’ the Eagle; both central themes to the culture of the Boon Wurrung people of the Kulin Nation, the traditional owners and inhabitants of the land. The hybrid uses and gathering are sheltered under an iconic soaring roof. Like Bunjil’s wings, this sinuous element symbolizes not only the traditions of the past, but provides a contemporary vision of the future, movement, technology and innovation. The emblematic roof provides a sheltered central civic space protected from the noise and pollution of the highway to create a welcoming celebration and back-drop for community life, gathering, external performance and interaction.
Bunjil Place has won numerous awards such as 2019 International Architecture Award, Timber Design Awards 2018 (Excellence in the Use of Timber Products), Global Architecture & Design Awards 2018, Australian Engineering Excellence Awards 2018, International Design Awards 2017, etc.
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