Studio 2

BALUTH NILLUMBIK•SITE X2•CONCEPT X3 •EVOLUTION•PHASING X3•VISUAL X2

SITE

The insipid avaricious aesthetic of the surrounding suburbia acts contextually as antithesis. Societal integration is interpreted much more deeply throughout this project than road connectivity. These living environments propogate alienated identity that is not contingent socially or ecologically.

There is lots of opportunity in the existing building stock, the existing road infrastructure is adequate to service this. By utilising these opportunitiesthecommunitymightbeestablishedinthefirstinstance,the evolving community form will relate to the place. Rather than materialise from nowhere and so isolate everyone from reality.

The surrounding environment is quite beautiful. The steep banks of the river present lots of sites to experience the beauty of the place from an insignificantperspective.Itwouldbeashametolosetheestablishedtrees, their maturity is helpful to contemplate. New buildings are best designedspecificallyonsite,sothattheyrelatetothesiteintimately,all the biulding, interaction, is fundamental for placefull relationship.

The Fisher Stables are Beautiful, they have been renovated.

• 128 Hectares, 3km river frontage.• Pre 1830s Wurrung country of the Woi Wurrung people.• 1830s & 1840s Europeans arrived and the site became

pastoral land.• 1875 Charles Fisher purchases the whole site. The Fisher

stables still stand today.• 1890s - 1908 Site was in two separate ownerships, the Cox

brothers and William Clarke, both operating stud farms.• 1908 Commonwealth Government began

manufacturing military cordite for small-arms ammunition.• 1912 Fisher Stables supplied cavalry and artillery horses

(136,000) for the army in World War I.• 1918 Sandy, the only horse to return from overseas, was

turned out to graze on the site.• 1930s & 1940s Most technologically sophisticated

chemical plant in Australia.• Tram extended from Raleigh Road to Cordite Avenue.• Approximately 8,000 people involved on site in producing

explosives to support the war effort.• After the war activities shifted to recovery and

destruction and later to assembling propellants and components for missiles.

• 1960 Production at factory changes to rocket motors and missile components.

• Mid 1980’s Production at the site ceased – some demolition and limited clean-up work continues.

• 1996 - 2006 Site vacated largely by Department of Defence employees.

• Current Approximately 420 buildings of the original 748 remain on site.

There is no capacity to discard, pick, or choose relevant histories that suit an image. It is this capacity to compartmentalise and externalise history that enables our culturealsotopermitatrocitiesinthefirstinstance.

If we are to relate to the world culturally, histories need to be understood as entirely constitutive and intrinsic, they need to be explored culturally. Only in this acceptance of past are we empowered to make decisions beyond our own interests, which is the problem currently.

SITEBy using an overlay analysis of the site, we can determine the appropriate land for new buildings, and survey the existing infrastructure against factors such as toxicity. In the overlay below the buildings that intersect toxic soil have beenremoved,itispresumedinefficienttoremediatetheseto a point of habitability.

CONCEPT

Baluth Nillumbik - Woiwurrung for Elbow of poor soil/hard land.

In choosing a Woiwurrung name for this new place, the project acknowledges the Aboriginal peoples as the traditional custodians of this country.

The risk of cultural appropriation in this naming act is considered deeply, In this project it must represent the necessity of cultural collaboration and inclusion as fundamental in the establishment of a new living environment.

A project of this scale offers real opportunity. Working at this scale the parameters of the brief vastly expand. There are many large social and ecological challenges implicated. This project explores how they might be addressed with the design of our living environment.

The common thread underlying the current ecological and social crises is in the way the western identity relates to the Other, in the essentialist ontological tradition. Our problematic societal structures, are symptomatic of this search for discreet autonomous identity. Structures like Liberal Democracy, Neoclassical Economics, and Consumerism, are all based on this self-realising, autonomous self. It is an insatiable trajectory. The self may never be realised discreetly as this perspective would neccesarily sever all relationship to the world. We see isolation from the world in pursuit of discreet selves.

The ontological infatuation, propogates duality, the focus on self differentiated, requires a category of difference. Man/Nature, Mind/Body, these dualisms propagate subject-object relationships to the environment,andconfineittoinstrument.

Theglobalmilitarisedregimeisasignificantsymptomofthepersistentfailure of Liberal Democratic structures to relate functionally with the world. Liberal structures prioritise the autonomous individual and suppress contingent understandings of identity and relationship. The nuclear weapons of this world are a huge ecological and social threatandtheirongoingstatusassortofkamikaze‘deterrent’reflectsthe preposterous and grave militaristic condition of society currently.

WESTERN METAPHYSICS“I THINK THEREFORE I AM”

DISCREET SELFHOOD SELF BEFORE OTHER

INACCESSIBLEINTRINSICETHICAL

RELATIONSHIPTO WORLD

INDIVIDUALISTICLIBERALISTSOCIETAL

STRUCTURES;CAPITALISM

CONSUMERISM

RADICALLYABSTRACT

OWNERSHIPPARADIGMS

LOSTENVIRONMENTAL

+ SOCIALCONTINGENCY

SOCIAL AND ECOLOGICALDOMINATION,EXPLOITATION

GEOGRAPHICCONFLICTKAMIKAZENUCLEAR

DETERRENCE

APOCALYPSE?

I AM

I AM

I AM

ME

ME

ME

THIS TRAJECTORY IS MOST SWIFTLY AVERTED BY ADDRESSING AT CORE HOW WE CONCEPTUALISE IDENTITY.PERPETUALLY SEARCHING INWARDS TOWARD OBLITERATION

WE SEVER CONTINGENCY AND RELATIONSHIP WE MUST REORIENT OUTWARDS

OUR LIVING ENVIRONMENTS ARE A MASSIVE OPPORTUNITY FOR SOCIAL AND ECOLOGICAL RECONCILIATIONTHEY MUST PROPAGATE AND REFLECT RELATIONSHIP

SO THAT IDENTITY IS RELATIONALCONTINGENCY IS BLISS

CONCEPT

The modern western concept of land ownership, is fallacious, domineering and dissociative. This paradigm is causative of fundamentallyabstractgeographicconflictsandinequalities.Thisanthropocentric conception of ownership propagates environmental duality and reduces environmental relationship to instrument.

The scale of modern ecological and social problems, transcends these owned abstract geographic boundaries. The capacity of any globally centralised representative power-structure to solve these problems is doubtful. Instead the problem is situated individually in the way we identify and relate to the world. We must prioritise direct relationship to one another and the environment through cultural meaning before a unity of ethic and intention can be regained.

AttheheartofAustralia’sidentityisthisconflict.Theimpositionofwestern ownership in this country has devastated the environment that Aboriginal peoples have resided in and managed for tens of thousands of years. The ongoing incapacity to reconcile or face the ongoing colonial ecological and social travesties is tantamount to the perverse incapacity of this paradigm to relate to the world. By structuring ownership in this way, the western paradigm actively severs all contingency, historicity, and relationship. This essentialist autonomous self-hood is indifferent intrinsically for the environmental harmthatitinflicts.

The measure of a sustainable paradigm is how well it sustains..... The most sustainable societal structures have long histories and are exemplifiedbytheAboriginalpeoples.Inotherculturesownershipismuch more mutual, contingency is embodied in self, place is entirety. A web of relationships communicated through story inform a rich relational self-hood in which ownership of place is far more mutual, contingent.

Our resulting current suburban form, as a product of these Liberal Capitalist structures is sterile, homogeneous, unsustainable and dehumanising. Without an urban form built of social and environmental relationship we might turn inward on ourselves completely. Suspended in these insipid apathetic suburban environments we are dissociated uncaring and depressed.

Itisclearthaturbanplanningmaintainsasignificantstakeinthemodern ecological and social crises. It can function to re-mediate relationship to place and environment physically and so re-establish ethical empathetic relationship to the world. There is a tremendous impetus now to revive it from bureaucratic squander for these purposes. Pull down the fences the commons is a gift.

ENVIRONMENT

SOCIETY

THE URBAN ENVIRON

MASTERPLANNING PROBLEM

MASTERPLANNING ASSUMES EXTERNAL PERSPECTIVE,

The Urban Environment embodies the relationship between society and environment.

A good Urban Environment then emphasizes this relational contingency.

As a top down structure the Masterplanning model seeks objective access to ecological data.

In accessing this objectivity however it must preclude relationship.

The masterplanning model cannot address the relational aspect of the environment

it produces urban environments that re�ect only a few designers.

The residents are not re�ected and so are alienated, they are dissociated.

Instead this project proposes to combine

The ecological capability of the top-down Masterplanning model

with the relational focus of an emergent systems approach.

To produce an Urban Environ

that re�ects and propagates relationship

and contingency.

CONCEPT

This site, so damaged ecologically, has blood sewn in its soil. It is testament to the capacity of humanity to turn inward into abstraction, and away from the world. The absolute detriment of this ecologically and socially.

The overwhelming narrative is of the detriment permitted in suppression of environmental and social relationship, by searching inwards for identity, we suppress the external, contingency of self, we can exploit, we can marginalise, we can wage war, we can destroy.

Thenewdevelopmentmustmemorialisethissignificance,acknowledge it as an impetus to move away from this devastating individualistic paradigm. We can no longer compartmentalise and discard history if we are to reestablish ourselves as relationally constitive and so ethically compelled.

The priority of this project is to promote inclusive and diverse social and ecological relationship, propelled by the necessity embodied in this landscape. A community founded on relationship is as as strong as its weakest link.

As an emergent development, the community is engaged directly. Theresultingplaceisadirectreflectionofthesecommunalinteractions and relationships. The social identity is entwined and contingent on place and other.

ENVIRONMENT

CULTURE

ECONOMICSCAPITALISM

EXPLOITATIONWAR

How to emancipate reality from the devastating stranglehold of Neoclassical Economics?

Its status as the central societal device is a radical abstraction.We must liberate our living environs from this delusion.

EVOLUTIONThe graphic to right is generated via the bottom-right Grasshopperdefinitionandexploreshowthecommunitymight expand, this is represented by the circles, where radius, is the volume of existing buildings. Height correlates to proximity to other buildings, existing density.

Thereareinnumerousotherfactorsthatwouldinfluencetheevolution of the community. Density and Volume are two largephysicalinfluencesinaschemethatconsiderstheexisting built infrastructure.

The graphics in the following pages have been produced withthebelowgrasshopperdefinitionandshowconnectivity between existing buildings, plotting more over time according to furthest proximity on buildable land. The proximity diagrams are valuable representations of potential desire lines across site according to existing infrastructure and help inform how things might evolve and how they might be further enabled.

PHASE 1Phase 1, Survey and remediation of the site under guidance of planning body to the point that it may be occupied, a community introduced. Some elements:

• Remove Fences as the existing are overly hostile. A reconfigurationofownershiprendersexclusionaryfencingredundant. There is some pragmatic scope for enclosures; agriculture, privacy etc But it shouldnt be the dominant aesthetic.

• It is important to retain some exclusivity from surrounding suburban environment to emphasize the departure from the existing paradigm, strategic plantings along boundaries might insulate the site. There is good potential for bridges crossing the river to the parkland reserve to North.

• Excavation and remediation of creeks focusing phytoremediation of runoff watersheds. Reserves around creeks, create ecological corridors throughout site.

• Phytoremediative planting along creek beds and toxic zones, trees to be planted by community to re-mediate andmemorializespecificareasoftoxicity.

• Survey land and existing building stock for potential usability.

• Intensive remediation of buildings, removal of toxic materials as determined by toxicity overlay.

• Government funding for removal of waste equated with reduced cost in construction and initial investment.

• The parcel-age concept is made redundant in the restructure of ownership, the commons is encompassing and compels ecological and social relationship.

• Establish platform for application, to be assessed initially by an establishing body, eventually by cooperative.

• Salvageable materials to be kept, Recycled building materials depot to be established on asphalted site in south.

PHASE 2Phase II, Habitation of site, establishment of cooperative.

• People move to site on application, assessed by initial planning body according to cultural social and ecological criteria prioritizing diversity and inclusion. Criteria to eventually be devised and assessed by community Cooperative.

• Applications are formatted against a conceptual constitution of the project that is produced and amended inclusively by the community,

• Initial residents establish and join Cooperative, Once a membership threshold is reached the site is handed across to Cooperative to purchase from Federal Government. The dualistic problem of ownership is circumvented as stake is in community and so relationship, rather than individually in the land.

• The intention is that residents will utilize existing building stock commercially and residentially and then once a community is established new residents will devise and construct new infrastructure and buildings, in agreeable areas.Radicalmixedusedevelopmentwithsitespecificzoning.

• There are at least 200 initial tenancies with a goal of expanding to 2000 residents over 10 years - around 200 additional people a year to be accommodated on site. The goal is radically integrate work and living on site. As it gets denser Coop contracts will get more competitive, increasing required turnover of tenancy.

• Forms of cooperative contribution are diverse and inclusive.Social,andartscontributions,fiscal,adminetc.Atbasecontributionsfinanciallyfundthepurchaseof the site and Infrastructure such as renewable energy earthmoving equipment, hardware, etc.

• The cooperative to be managed direct Democratically. With a random forfeit proxy vote for ecological stakeholders.

• Cooperative forums to take place in outdoor setting, amphitheater etc. Ensuring decisions are directly contingent on environment, place. In a designed amphitheater to north of hill (see detail)

PHASE 3Phase III, describing some potential elements. Subject to community uptake.

• Establish some communal eating cooking areas throughout centers.

• Stacked shipping container social housing. • Pre-fabricated housing manufacturing.• Coop establishes a caravan park, for visitors, people

getting established in community, or in need of emergency accommodation etc.

• Recycled Building materials depot/Industrial recycling for Melbourne. A commercial venture perhaps.

• Larger vacant parcels open to bigger forms of development.Couldbefinancedbythecooperative.A social housing development could be a broader government investment.

• people invest in the community rather than themselves, private development is deemphasised as rather care of oneself is extended to others intrinsically, Contribution couldbequantifiedinsomewayandrenumeratedto allow people to move on appropriately. The emphasisismuchmoreonNon-profitcommunitybasedorganisations.

• Community School for all ages emphasizing mutual learning rather than teaching. Classes in building, horticulture, philosophy e.g. Could act as a community hub, incorporate a library.

• Hardware store run by Cooperative for building materials, a tool library, community workshops.

• A Market with local produce run by the Cooperative.• Community garden, local produce.• Urban agriculture or aqua-culture.• Renewable energy generation, Wind and solar.• Development of gravity batteries.• Cooperative grants for cultural work, an arts center.• Artist residencies, a gallery.• Community festival on hill celebrating place, community.

DETAILAlthough not employing the traditional masterplanning approach,thereisstillscopeforspecificdesignedinterventions within the project, at a smaller scale. A circular reserve has been placed on the hill of the site, by focusing the site around this elevated perspective, the heart of the community as relationally connected (seen from above) is elevated symbolically and physically above the parts. The relational foundation of the site, precedes the discreet constituents.

The design includes two spiral sculptures on top of the hill, the intention of these are to induce transcendental experience in the environment. One sculpture spirals into the ground, so that the viewers perspective both narrows in on itself and is directed upward the stars. The convex spiral is place on the highest point on site, as you move to the top your perspective is less obstructed by the trees until at thetopyousuddenlyfeelinsignificanceinthedepthoftheworld.

The Amphitheatre, is to hold community Cooperative forums and theatre, festivals and Art etc. By staging forum and cultural events in the environment decisions and history is directly contingent on place, deepening relationship socially and ecologically.

The intention is not to design the ‘beauty’ on the site but rather to induce the transpersonal experience beyond a subjective concept of ‘beauty’ that absorbs the self, thereby propagating intrinsic relationship to place and other. Everything is beautiful, and interactions predicated on this experience are necessarily beautiful.

DETAIL

View from S overlooking Lunar sculptures, withoout vegetation.

View from N toward hill. without vegetation DETAIL PLAN A - Showing Phytoremediative planting at mouths of creeks, processing toxic runoff from the site before it enters ocean.

DETAIL PLAN B - Showing Circular Park Reserve on Hill, with amphitheatre, sculptures, and approximatetreeplacementforspecificsitelines.

DETAILS

VISUAL

Perspective to South of Amphitheatre and spiral sculptures in background.

The following page shows perspective from within concave sculpture and two hand sketches.

VISUAL