Architecture - Masters

THE BRIDGE

The Bridge is a multi-metabolic research centre designed to provide flexible and adaptable spaces that increase the level of amenity, placemaking and socio-economic connections across the township of Imbil and surrounding Mary Valley areas. In response to the needs of the local community, this research centre is a long lasting and adaptable solution that bridges the gaps between humans, flora, fauna, and systems.

Sarah Peet

Building in vegetation

PLACEMAKING

The community of Imbil embodies a strong sense of place, connected with their heritage, history and country. However, they lack the facilities to express their own sense of self within the local built environment. The Bridge has been designed as a built form that can be taken hold of by the local community, creating a higher level of facilities and amenity in the community to attract people who want to live, work, and connect. In this way, The Bridge can become a place of expression and an embodiment of the local sense of place.
Timber balcony

TIMBER

The Bridge is an integration between the local hoop pine plantation and the timber industry, creating a seamless space that celebrates local economy and provides opportunity for future community growth. An exoskeleton structural design allows for hoop pine to be the primary material used on the floor, ceilings and wall systems, reminding users of how each space connects them to their country and place. An integrated floor program allows for public use across every level, invoking collaboration, movement, and a celebration of the building’s unique identity.
Steel frame on building

METABOLIC DESIGN

To create a sustainable research hub that contributes back to context, The Bridge is constructed with a low metabolic exoskeleton (long lasting), allowing for high metabolic and adaptable (short lasting) spaces to be created within this exoskeleton. A steel frame structure and dual concrete core connect the cantilevered design directly to the ground, allowing for the inner walls to be constructed with a light weight design and reusable materials. Inner walls can be adjusted, recycled and moved within the 50 year lifecycle of timber, creating new spaces to suit the changing needs of the users and local town; while the outer structure and floor plates remain structurally sound within a 200 year lifecycle – creating a design with a high level of both permanence and flexibility.
Field station.

RESEARCH AND HABITAT

The Bridge is a hub to a local Kenilworth field station, Habitat 3, which focussed on the integrated relationship between humans, flora and fauna. This station was designed as biodegradable architectural intervention that connects humans to the lifestyle and ecosystems of the flora and fauna in Imbil State Forest, approaching architecture as a seasonal, degrading and highly sustainable built form solution that mutually benefits the environment in which it is placed. The Bridge approaches this with a new sense of permanence, in a building were sustainability is creating from its connection with community, and embodiment of a sense of place. These dual architectural solutions nestled in the existing vegetation of both Imbil and Kenilworth creates opportunity to bring isolated communities together, benefit the local economy and the socio-economic viability of each town through a shared focus of restoring the health of the natural environment.

Sarah Peet

Sarah strives to create elegant and engaged designs which put the community first. Through her work as an Urban Designer in local government, she aspires to better embed architectural interventions into their particular context.