On a site of some cultural significance in south-east Melbourne, Woods Bagot have teamed up with Oculus and developer Milieu, as well as interior designers K.P.D.O. and Flack Studio, to create a vision for significant new residential development. Elsternwick Gardens, set to begin construction in 2025, will comprise three residential groupings: Gordon Place, Ripponlea Terrace and The Garden Pavilion, all tied together by some central and thoughtful landscape design.
The project will present as a series of buildings as well as a series of gardens, as opposed to any kind of monolithic, walled-off, single-building offering. According to Peter Miglis, Director at Woods Bagot, it’s all about crafting a humanised and diverse set of spaces that place community, balanced privacy and nature at their heart.
“I think people are looking for spaces that are humanised, that they feel comfortable in, and a diversity of spaces that can be created,” he says. “High-rises have their places, but they can be a very simple, straight gesture; people are looking for a richness in their experiences that is derivative of being in a home.”
Miglis touches there on a key feature of Elsternwick Gardens – density. This is a series of relatively low-rise buildings up to six floors, an approach whose scale allows for variety in site master-planning. Indeed, Oculus, as landscape architects, have been involved from the beginning. As Miglis puts it, “what really is the hero in this project is the landscape, and the buildings become this beautiful backdrop to the landscape that sits in the foreground.”
More specifically, the landscaping involves not just an abundance of greenery but effectively a series of pavilions – connected enough to cohere as one whole site, yet differentiated enough to form distinct places in their own right. “It gives a level of intimacy and tranquillity to the whole project,” says Miglis. “By having two buildings pulled away, we’ve created a real generosity in the site, allowing light, landscape, air and preserving sightlines.”
The human heritage of the site, meanwhile, presents further variety to work with and riff off for the designers. On Wurundjeri Woi Wurrung and Bunurong Country, it was also the former grounds of ABC Studios. As such, an arts program has been integrated into the design, with Broached Commissions leading this aspect while March Studio takes responsibility for the pavilion design.
“The buildings weren’t historically significant, but we always knew, from a heritage point of view, that there was a cultural story to tell about ABC’s influence in society,” explains Miglis. Broached Commissions will work with artists to flesh out points of cultural interpretation, while the overall design seeks to form some dialogue with the wider built environment context. This latter aspect means taking cues from the prevalence of mid-century modernism architecture nearby to prioritise the framing of views from inside-out.
“It derives its inspiration from film and cinematography,” explains Miglis. “The idea is to create these framed apertures back out to the views as well as creating privacy. [The mid-century modernism] also means using real honest materials that are quite robust and low-maintenance.”
Elsternwick Gardens is expected to appeal widely across age demographics. “I think it’s comforting in that we want to create these sustainable communities by including various generations,” adds Miglis.
With buildings placed in a porous manner around the perimeter of the site, the gardens are able to reach into the centre and form a continuous whole with nearby Rippon Lea Estate. “People just connect with landscape and the biophilic qualities [of design], even to the extent that it becomes part of your experience in the terraces,” says Miglis.
