Powerful partnership
Two architecture practices from different generations, TAG Architects and iredale pedersen hook have combined their skills to complete two unique projects in the custodial sector.
While everyone knows that ‘two heads are better than one’, in the case of iredale pedersen hook and TAG Architects’ joint projects, five heads have proven better than two. The two architectural practices have been operating individually with great success for almost 15 years each, but their decision to collaborate in 2007 marked a new era for both companies.
The three men behind iredale pedersen hook – Adrian Iredale, Finn Pedersen and Martyn Hook – met at the Curtin University of Technology. They parted ways after graduating, each setting up independent architecture practices of their own, but after some time spent working in other countries returned to Australia and began doing some projects together. They teamed up to become iredale pedersen hook architects (IPH) through a joint submission to work on projects at the Perth Zoological Gardens in 1999.
Iredale says that IPH has been defined by the versatility of the three architect’s combined thinking. “We’ve practised in a lot of different regions and within a lot of different cultures,” he begins.
“What really defines us is our capacity to listen, observe and understand, and then to respond with what we call ‘appropriateness’. It’s a pretty broad region that we operate in and often pretty extreme, where a site visit to one of our projects will often require us going into remote desert areas and staying over two nights. We fluctuate between city and desert as places of operation, doing everything from animal enclosures to government buildings, and that variety has a massive impact on how we think.”
The Architecture Group – better known as TAG Architects – is made up of Jurg Hunziker and Michael Spight. They met in the late 70s and ended up working together in a number of different practices over the following years, in countries including the UK and Switzerland. They finally formed TAG in 2001, after which they began to specialise in public and community projects in the education and custodial sectors.
“The simplest way to define us is that we don’t treat any project like any other previously – we look at every project on its own,” remarks Spight.
“Our work is always very close to brief and site specific. The majority of our work has been urban-based, but in recent years it’s been more regional.”
Hunziker and Spight met Iredale by chance in the late 90s and kept in touch until an opportunity arose that was relevant to both TAG and IPH’s areas of expertise. The West Kimberley Regional Prison was to be a custodial facility, like so many that TAG had worked on, but one designed specifically to suit indigenous people, an area in which IPH excelled. Recognising their complementary capabilities, TAG and IPH put a joint submission in to the project tender in 2007 and began working on it in 2008.
West Kimberley Regional Prison
The West Kimberley Regional Prison was a unique project, says Pedersen, because it was the first time anyone had designed a custodial facility from the ground up to benefit indigenous people, with all levels of security within the prison from minimum to maximum.
“It comprises a women’s prison for 30 women and a men’s prison for 120 men, and we were initially briefed to treat it like a utopian aboriginal community that just happened to have a security fence around it,” he continues.
“So that’s pretty unusual – in fact, when I was first told about it I thought someone was kidding me – because unfortunately, in Australia we don’t have a history of providing good outcomes for aboriginal people.”
The village-like complex comprises 44 buildings of ‘self-care’ accommodation, as well as a women’s shop and a men’s shop. The prisoners budget their own finances, buy their own food from the shop with which to cook their own meals, and attend training workshops in the facility during the day. The concept arose from a desire to provide better outcomes for indigenous families of the Kimberley region, who make up about 50% of the area’s population.
“One of the most critical things about this project is that something like 80-90 per cent of permanent inhabitants of the Kimberley, which is one of Australia’s remotest areas, are aboriginal people who don’t wish to leave the area; non-indigenous people tend to come to the Kimberley to work before moving back down south,” Pedersen begins.
“This meant that previously, indigenous people sent to jail would be moved perhaps 2,500km from their home to a prison in the southwest, severing ties to their families and loved ones. This new prison helps alleviate that difficulty.”
The project had both environmental and cultural challenges. The remote Kimberley region has very high temperatures and humidity, and is susceptible to intense electric storms, bush fires, torrential rain and destructive cyclones. IPH and TAG had to design the prison to handle these environmental stresses, as well as to cater to Aboriginal people. Preliminary consultation with Indigenous Elders helped the architects to re-interpret the community’s traditional custodial models, focusing on offender rehabilitation in an environment sympathetic to cultural needs.
“We wanted to make a difference – to create a facility that really addressed some of the indigenous community’s social issues,” says Spight. “We knew the project would be a challenge, and we wanted to step up to it.”
Step up to the challenge they did, and the result was a unique village-like prison that won several awards. These include two Awards and one Commendation at the national AIA Awards and at the WA Chapter Australian Institute of Architects awards and an International Architecture Award from the Chicago Athenaeum – Museum of Architecture and Design and the European Centre for Architecture Art Design and Urban Studies. This included the David Oppenheim Award for Sustainable Architecture and was selected from 874 national entries.
Kununurra Court House
TAG and IPH’s second collaboration was on the Kununurra Court House, a project similar to their first in requiring a justice facility designed to meet indigenous needs. The Magistrates Court and Jury Court facility is under construction at present, due for completion in April 2014 and for occupation in August. Its design was heavily influenced by the small, picturesque town it inhabits.
“Kununurra is unique in the way in which the town fits within an incredibly powerful and vivid landscape, and that is something we’ve tried to introduce into the architecture in a meaningful way,” comments Iredale.
“We’ve tried to introduce the landscape in a spatial expression and experience, which involves good design and allowing people to have a sense of always being connected to their place – connected to the exterior even when they’re inside a building. For example, we provided a secure external environment in which people could wait to enter the court room, so that those waiting would have a sense of familiarity and comfort not normally experienced in a courtroom facility.”
These waiting areas were also laid out in an informal fashion that allowed people to wait privately or with their families, thus allowing them greater comfort still.
On both the Kununurra Court House and West Kimberley Regional Prison projects, IPH and TAG took care to orientate the buildings so that all the windows brought in light and looked out onto close and distant landscapes.
“We tried to introduce natural light into the court, so that even though we live in a world where everything is done with technology, you still have the idea that you’re in a room that’s affected by the outside world, due to slight changes of light and a natural environment to look at,” Hunziker explains.
Mutual respect
The two companies have no further joint projects in the pipeline, but remain as eager as ever to collaborate if another project comes along that’s suited to their different but complementary abilities. They agree that teaming up on the West Kimberley Regional Prison and Kununurra Court House projects enabled them to produce the best possible results.
“In the two projects we’ve worked on together, it’s obvious to us that the skills and commitment from both sides have gone well beyond what a singular architecture practice would have produced,” remarks Hunziker.
“We think that’s quite exceptional and we’re really proud of the work that’s resulted from the collaboration.
We were brought together by an absolute mutual respect that has grown as we’ve worked together, and we hope that this partnership will continue in the future.”