Architecture Workshop
Project Location:
Oriental Bay, Wellington
Categories:
HIGHLY COMMENDED: Outdoor Infrastructure
Project Description:
This project ‘to polish the jewel in Wellington’s crown’ (as the Request for Proposal put it) primarily involved adding coastal control structures to maintain a larger city beach. The storm water system was also replaced and new larger outfalls, which did not flow across the sand had to be integrated with the beach control structures. The Oriental Parade promenade, which follows the line of the heritage sea wall, had to be upgraded and new amenities added to an already overcrowded space. Architecture Workshop collaborated with Tonkin and Taylor, civil and coastal engineers, and the Isthmus Landscape group.
A continuous glue-laminated pinus radiata lamella was draped over the concrete roof.
The lamella folds down to form a vertical wall to shield the entry to the unisex toilets from the new pier and beach beyond. The ends are stepped to show the materiality of the glue-lam and the end grain is protected with red paint. The glue-lam was fabricated by Hunters and treated with Drydens Wood Oil.
The timber wall filters the coloured neon lights at night, which are activated when the WC is in use.
The construction height is kept to a minimum for the amenities block so as not to interrupt view lines from the promenade. This low scale combined with the vertical emphasis of the timber colonnade acknowledges the architectural quality of the Freyburg Pool building behind (it also allows an elevated urban plaza to proceed in the future).