Local winners in Victorian Architecture Awards

PROJECTS from across the Geelong and Surf Coast have taken out top honours in this year’s Victorian Architecture Awards.

Part of the Australian Institute of Architects’ National Architecture Awards program, the annual event celebrates and inspires best practice in the field.

Architect Multiplicity was judged the best in two award categories for their Aireys Inlet She Sells Sea Shells, winning the Interior Architecture and Residential Architecture – Houses (New) awards.

The award-winning beach house is decked out with bunk beds for the kids and a shared bathroom while carpet dons the walls, not the floors.

Interior Architecture chair Amelia Borg said the house has an interior that challenged domestic norms, while remaining liveable.

“She Sells Sea Shells stood out to the jury as a rare and deeply evocative example of what contemporary residential interiors can achieve when ambition, experimentation, and delight are given equal footing.

“From the moment you enter, the space invites you into a world that is at once relaxed and rigorously considered.

“What appears at first as a modest plan slowly reveals a spatial and material richness that rewards close attention and repeated use.”

It was not just breathtaking houses taking home awards, with the Geelong Laneways: Malop Arcade by architect NMBW Architecture Studio with ASPECT Studios also recognised.

Winning the Small Project Architecture category, the arcade takes over the space of what was once a two-storey shop in Malop Street.

The project was the development of a new pedestrian network, part of an initiative with the Victorian State Government and the City of Greater Geelong, working to repurpose selected properties in the region as public arcade gardens.

Small Project Architecture Jury chair Holly Board said the arcade was a subtle yet impactful transformation.

“Through adaptive reuse and alteration of a two-storey building, NMBW has created a generous, poetic pedestrian link and public space that stitches together the laneways of Geelong’s CBD.

“Through detailed forensic investigation by the project team, this exemplary project has carefully and meticulously revealed the site’s unique layers of history.

“With a nod to the memory of the original building, new elements – noticeably a galvanised steel earthquake structure – stand in deliberate contrast to the existing brick, timber and bluestone fabric.”

The Otway Beach House was also recognised in the awards, winning the Residential Architecture – Houses (New) award by Kerstin Thompson Architects.

The statewide awards were presented last night (Friday, June 27) at the Victorian Architecture Awards Night in Melbourne.