2025 Shortlisted - Apartments (Mid-Rise)
The site is a former industrial warehouse in Brunswick. The existing factory building at the front is retained and restored, with new openings cut in to accommodate a hospitality tenancy. It anchors the street presence and sets the material tone for the project.
Working across architecture and interiors, the building is organised as a large U-shape, open to the north. This creates a lush ground-floor garden at the centre, and means every apartment gets cross-flow ventilation and light from both sides – a principle we’ve carried through from our earlier work with Assemble at Albermarle Street, Kensington. The shared garden and circulation space also serves a community function, giving residents a reason to move through it rather than around it.
There are two lobbies. The main pedestrian arrival comes in through the restored factory on the south side. The second, on the opposite side, is the utility entrance – designed as a cobbled laneway with an open metal gate, built-in outdoor benches and mesh screens for climbing creepers. The communal workshop sits directly off this entrance, with bike repair facilities and a connection to the street that makes it feel part of the broader neighbourhood rather than tucked away. The main bicycle storage is directly behind it.
Four new buildings sit alongside the retained warehouse along the streetscape, clad in exposed bluestone aggregate concrete and terracotta-painted fin walls – a reference to the single-storey brick building that previously occupied the site. A white ribbed concrete and perforated corrugated balustrade sets back above, forming the upper residential levels.
The rooftop communal spaces extend the project’s emphasis on shared life. A small bookable dining room and a larger multipurpose space can be combined into one by folding back the dividing wall. Around them, the rooftop terrace has vegetable plots, outdoor seating, a BBQ area, a dog run and wash station, a communal laundry and an outdoor clothesline.
We delivered the architecture and interior design. The interiors are straightforward and robust, letting the natural light and ventilation do most of the work. The lobby interiors draw on Brunswick’s material character – colour and tile selections that feel at home in the context.
2-4 Ballarat Street,
Brunswick
An apartment building with ground-floor hospitality and workplace spaces, designed for Assemble.
The site is a former industrial warehouse in Brunswick. The existing factory building at the front is retained and restored, with new openings cut in to accommodate a hospitality tenancy. It anchors the street presence and sets the material tone for the project.
The rooftop communal spaces extend the project’s emphasis on shared life. A small bookable dining room and a larger multipurpose space can be combined into one by folding back the dividing wall. Around them, the rooftop terrace has vegetable plots, outdoor seating, a BBQ area, a dog run and wash station, a communal laundry and an outdoor clothesline.
We delivered the architecture and interior design. The interiors are straightforward and robust, letting the natural light and ventilation do most of the work. The lobby interiors draw on Brunswick’s material character – colour and tile selections that feel at home in the context.
