15 July 2009

ARMful of Awards

Melbourne's new cultural district scoops the Victorian Institute Awards.

Four of the highest honours at this year’s Victorian Architecture Awards have, perhaps unsurprisingly, been won by the Melbourne Recital Centre and neighbouring Melbourne Theatre Company by Ashton Raggatt McDougal.

Awarded for successfully crossing design boundaries, the recital centre and MLC buildings were awarded with the 2009 Victorian Architecture Medal, the William Wardell Award for public architecture, the Marion Mahony Award for interior architecture and the Joseph Reed Award for urban design.

“The robust sculptural facades have already become iconic and the changes to traffic and pedestrian patterns at an urban level have transformed the area into an active domain,” the jury said.

NSW firm Durbach Block Architects for Headquarters Sussan Sportsgirl in Richmond won the Sir Osborn McCutcheon Award, for commercial architecture.

While BVN Architecture and Gray Puksand P/L took out both the Commercial Architecture Award and a Regional Prize for the Bendigo Bank Headquarters.

The Harold Desbrowe-Annear Award for residential architecture went to the Letterbox House, from architectural firm McBride Charles Ryan, who also won the same award last year.

Click here to view the full list of winners.

Australian Institute of Architects
architecture.com.au/vic

Hero and 'puff' image - Melbourne Recital Centre. Photography: John Gollings