Melbourne is a Design City and now we need to use design to solve our most pressing issue.  Best of all, we don’t need to invent the solutions, many are familiar – we just need to deploy them.

For example, concrete can be replaced with cross-laminated timber that is renewable and textural. It is well suited to cellular construction and capable of form that might evoke memory and a sense of place. Chunky timber is something familiar and meaningful to us all. To turn the ship around we need to start using materials like this at scale, but it is good to know it’s nice up close too.

This installation is a sampler for our more ambitious ‘A New Architecture’ pilot project: a hotel that will allow as many people as possible to experience the initiatives that enable zero carbon ‘grid positive’ construction. We are working with Finding Infinity to create Hotel Optimismo, a new building that gives more than it takes, both environmentally & culturally.

A New Architecture is part of A New Normal, a project led by Finding Infinity that challenges Melbourne to become an entirely self-sufficient city. This is explored through a series of installations and talks by Melbourne’s leading architects and designers in a former office building at 130 Collins Street. For additional events, please check back to this website or A New Normal’s website: www.normalise.it

The future need not feel unfamiliar.  Come and join us at this table to start the conversation.