Welcome to the Bower Studio webiste. Over the past four years David O'Brien has run a Masters-level architecture studio at the University of Melbourne in which students consult with indigenous communities and design and build structures to improve their built environments. Click the images below to view each of the individual years' projects.
In 2011 the focus has shifted to Western Australia, where students built an early childhood learning centre for the community of Wakathuni, near Tom Price.
2010 saw students building media centres for two communities in Darwin.
In 2010 the Bower Studio team built 'HausWin' pavilions in both the Bumbu and Serongko communities in Papua New Guinea.
In 2009 students worked to make a derelict house in the Gudorrka community habitable and enjoyable.
2008 was the first year of Bower Studio. Students began the project by exploring possible design solutions.
CONSULT/DESIGN/BUILD/CONSULT/DESIGN/BUILD ...(ETC)
AS PART OF A PUBLIC SPIRITED INSTITUTION, THE MELBOURNE SCHOOL OF DESIGN IS COMMITTED TO ENGAGING WITH KEY ISSUES WITHIN THE WIDER COMMUNITY. OUR COMMITMENT TO ENGAGING WITH THE ISSUE OF SHELTER IN MARGINALISED COMMUNITIES BOTH WITHIN AUSTRALIA AND ABROAD HAS ENABLED COLLABORATION BETWEEN STAFF, STUDENTS, GOVERNMENT, INDUSTRY PARTNERS, PHILANTHROPY AND LOCAL COMMUNITIES TO COLLECTIVELY ADDRESS THIS URGENT NEED.
Through education the university is able to effect transformational change in society. This is made possible through the alignment of various stakeholder groups to address common social problems. Community groups, NGO’s and service provider organizations have recently demonstrated an increasing interest in working with the university in joint partnerships where expertise and common goals are shared. For these stakeholder organizations the oblique problem solving skills used by students and their academic mentors generates creative solutions to problems that are not otherwise obtained by traditional approaches. The benefits to our students are also significant. By engaging in such community development programs we transform the way in which our students think, creating the opportunity to ‘give back’ to society whilst building capacity in areas for which there is urgent unmet need. Many of these students will go on to transform industry, by demanding an increased commitment to corporate social responsibility for the benefit of the wider community.
At the Melbourne School of Design we see our projects as an ongoing process of consultation, designing and building, with each facet informing the others. We are well placed to do this. Our students are highly motivated to use their skills to address complex problems facing society. In the last four years, three such projects have evolved with groups of Melbourne School of Design students – one in rural Thailand, another in northern Australia, and a third beginning in Papua New Guinea. In all cases students consult with a variety of stakeholders, design and then build shelters at full-scale alongside local workers. Working with partner organizations they address ‘real-world’ problems and engage with issues of sustainability in their many complex forms – cultural, environmental, economic and technical.
This website highlights the second of our on-going projects located in Australia’s ‘top-end’. For four years now groups of Melbourne School of Design students have worked with indigenous communities in Darwin and northern Western Australia. At the community’s request early projects looked at providing design ideas for housing ‘long-grassers’ – generally itinerant young men traditionally held responsible for many of the problems facing indigenous communities. Once the students had proven their capacity to engage with the community and the various local support organisations, the Department of Families and Housing, Community Services and Indigenous Affairs (FaHCSIA) and Territory Housing set aside $60,000 in funding to recycle one of the derelict shelters in the Gudorrka Community. The steel-framed shelter was in appalling condition with no bathroom or cooking facilities and no outdoor shaded areas. Sixteen students, two staff and local men and children ‘blitzed’ the shelter over a ten-day period and recycled it into a respectable house. The new residents – one had been born in the shelter three decades earlier – were eager participants in the process and are delighted with the outcome. The renovated house had significantly less environmental impact than a new house, cost significantly less and was completed in a vastly shorter time-span. It also linked the indoors with outdoors to provide greater levels of comfort and a closer connection with the land.
The transformation was beginning. This project did not end there – the students then used their experience to design additional facilities for this community and the neighbouring Knuckeys Lagoon community. Both communities and local government funding agencies reviewed these designs and one project, Silas Gibson’s ‘Media Box’ – a shipping container fitted with computers and a homework center – was selected for development. In 2010 another group of students arrived in Darwin to install the media boxes in both the Knuckey Lagoon and Gudorrka communities. The students worked alongside a group of local trainees and in ten days built shade structures, landscaped, built outdoor furniture and helped the facility ‘fit’ into the community. At the same time they could consult with the community, see what is required and visualise how this might be achieved. At the end of the ten days the students each prepared a booklet of design ideas, some of which went on to inform 2011’s Gumala 0-5 Centre for the Wakathuni community in Western Australia. With this now complete, students have turned their attention to the need for new housing throughout the Pilbara region; our involvement with Gumala Aboriginal Corporation is ongoing.
The intent in all of our engagement projects has been to use the design and construction process as a way to stimulate further discussions with the community groups involved. Marginalised communities are not well used to making decisions about their environments and their shelter. Traditionally they have had little or no choice. The process of talking, designing and then building together opens up many opportunities for a more useful dialogue which then enriches the ideas, processes and outcomes for the next project and so on. Successes and failures become more ‘real’ when viewed from a more level playing field and methods to improve outcomes more easily understood. More broadly speaking the outcomes from the projects are used to contribute to wider discussions about sustainable housing and shelter for groups living in tropical climates.
Projects of this complexity do not come about easily and there are many partners contributing to their success. For the projects documented in this website we would like to thank the Wakathuni, Gudorrka and Knuckeys Lagoon communities, Gumala Aboriginal Corporation, Darwin Regional CDEP, Yilli Rrueng Housing, FaHCSIA, Ironbark Employment, Indigenous Community Volunteers, Amity, the Aboriginal Development Foundation, Territory Housing, Department of Education, Employment and Workplace Relations, our generous philanthropic supporters and our industry partners including Thrifty Car Rental, LiteSteel Technologies, Surdex Steel, Modwood, CSR, Bluey Technologies, Danpalon, Vinidex, Bowens, Bunnings Warehouse and Bluescope. We also appreciate that the University of Melbourne has awarded a group of students financial support through the Knowledge Transfer Student Awards.