Kerstin Thompson Architects (KTA) have won the Bundanon Trust’s national competition to deliver the masterplan for the 1100-hectare property west of Nowra.
Subscribe now for unlimited access.
$0/
(min cost $0)
or signup to continue reading
The plan is to create world-class creative learning centre for school students, visitor hub, residential quarters and a new gallery to house the $37.5 million Arthur Boyd art collection.
New Zealand-based Megan Wraight has been announced as the landscape architect who will work in partnership with KTA.
Central to the masterplan will be the design of a new Boyd Art Gallery to house more than 3800 items featuring more than 1300 artworks by Arthur Boyd plus works by leading Australian artists including Boyd peers Sidney Nolan, Charles Blackman, Brett Whiteley and John Perceval, as well as contemporary works drawn from participants in the trust’s artist in residence program.
In a unique architectural competition, there was no final design submitted, rather a philosophy, process and vision.
KTA was chosen from a shortlist of six architecture firms including Virginia Kerridge Architect; Room 11; Peter Elliot Architecture + Urban Design; Jackson Clements Burrows Architects; and Chenchow Little Architects.
The full team includes Kerstin Thompson Architects, Wraight + Associates with Craig Burton (landscape architecture and ecology), Atelier10 (ecologically sustainable design) and Irwin Consulting (structural and civil engineering).
The group will work closely with Bundanon Trust staff, Shoalhaven locals and other stakeholders.
The development will lead to substantial regional economic benefits including $51 million of spending and 142 jobs during the construction phase, with an additional $10.4 million and 59 jobs to flow into the economy once the site is complete.
The masterplan will increase visitation by more than 100 per cent and secure Bundanon as a leading cultural and tourist attraction in regional Australia, while delivering substantial economic benefits to the Shoalhaven region.
The masterplan development provided an opportunity to further the conversation between art and environment that permeated Arthur Boyd’s works.
Ms Thompson said they were delighted and honoured to have been appointed as architect for such a culturally significant project.
“Arthur Boyd’s vision indelibly changed the way we perceive the Australian landscape; through his work our senses are sharpened to the intensity of its colours, textures and moods,” she said.
“The masterplan offers the chance to conjure a design in keeping with Boyd’s distillations of the Australian landscape; its beauty and harshness, contours, light, colours and tones.”
Bundanon Trust CEO Deborah Ely said it was proposed to appoint an architect that was attuned to Arthur’s values, rather than select a firm based on a single design concept.
Gifted to the Australian people by Arthur and Yvonne Boyd in 1993, Bundanon Trust encompasses the Bundanon Homestead site and the Riversdale site, currently welcomes around 40,000 visitors each year.
The trust was placed on the Commonwealth Heritage List in 2015 in recognition of Bundanon’s important landscape, architecture and significance to Australia’s art and cultural history.
Riversdale is one of four sites on the 1100-hectare property and is separate from the Bundanon location that houses the 1866 homestead and other historic buildings.
The site also houses the award-winning Boyd Education Centre designed by acclaimed Australian architect Glenn Murcutt, Wendy Lewin and Reg Lark.