Mikki Brammer, editor at large for Metropolis Magazine summarizes, Designed by John Wardle Architects, the new home of Australia's oldest music school breaks way from the monastic model of the conservatory.
The study of music entails a dedication to practice that can be especially isolating. So when local firm John Wardle Architects envisaged a new design for the Melbourne Conservatorium of Music,
Australia’s oldest music institution, the firm had a key underlying
objective: The building, located within the University of Melbourne
campus, shouldn’t feel like a monastery.
Instead, principal Stefan Mee says he and his team designed the
70,500-square foot structure to strike a balance between inward focus
and the world outside. It needed to feel relaxed and intimate—more
greenroom than concert hall, more backstage than main stage, as he puts
it—and encourage students to feel part of a community...
That understanding of interactivity goes beyond fellow students.
Bell-shaped portholes, hinged panels, disguised windows, and an oculus
on the ground level allow passersby a glimpse inside the
Conservatorium’s various learning and rehearsal rooms. Some observers
may even detect a musicality in the shapes and patterns of the
building’s concrete facade, on which 66,000 small ceramic tiles cluster
like notes on a music staff. “We like that abstract clue to somebody on
the street about what might be happening inside,” says Mee.
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Source: Metropolis Magazine