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 Tree Sprawl Consolidation and Expansion of Open Vegetated Space Projects in the Urban Territory of Merri Creek, Melbourne Exhibition & Publication A collaboration between RMIT University, School of Architecture and Design; MCMC, Merri Creek Management Committee; and CERES Community Environment Park; supported by RMIT School of Architecture and Design through the SRC Funds Exhibition at CERES Community Environment Park, cnr Roberts and Stewart Street, East Brunswick, Melbourne, June 2011 Opening: Saturday 11 June, 9.00 am to 1.00 pm Exhibition CERES Market, Saturdays 11, 18 and 25 June, 9.00 am to 1.00 pm + Merri Table & Bar Café’/Restaurant at CERES, until Friday 1 July Wednesday to Friday 12.00 to 9.30 pm; Saturday 1.00 to 9.30 pm; Sunday 10.00 am to 3.00 pm Exhibition Curator + Publication Editor: Mauro Baracco Exhibition Design: Mauro Baracco, Mohammad Afiq Shazwan Abd Samat, Pia Socias Publication Design: Emily Wallace The works in this exhibition and related book are a selection from projects completed between 2008 and 2010 throughout design studios coordinated by Mauro Baracco in the Master Course of the Architecture Program at the School of Architecture and Design of RMIT University. They document design investigations into the consolidation and expansion of existing open spaces in Melbourne – leftover, brownfield and green reserve areas. Aiming to regenerate these and other types of open environment, these projects also tackle human population growth and the associated problematic consequences that currently affect Melbourne and Australian urban areas in general, and believe that urban densification must include and rely on careful attention to the in-between space, and that this space should be vegetated. Driven by these assumptions, these projects are informed by an alternative approach to some current metropolitan planning that constantly reduces natural systems and amenity of the landscape by filling open space or designing in isolation so that existing open space is for the most part leftover as a 'negative void' from the setting up of clear distinctions between built space and vegetated space. Different from the recurrent outcomes generated by this thinking and its predisposition to conceive hierarchical forms of differentiation between built and unbuilt spaces, with the former always inevitably favoured in any figure ground, these projects not only regenerate and expand open space, but also combine urban densification and incitement of living, working and community programs with the rehabilitation of open vegetated space. The case study area explored to test this theoretical framework is the catchment of Merri Creek, in the north metropolitan context of Melbourne, including not only the vegetated corridor directly connected to this waterway, but also parklands, infrastructures and various different urban contexts that more extensively surround Merri Creek’s east and west sides along its entire course – from the north springs in Wallan to the south end at the confluence with the Yarra River in Clifton Hill. The projects documented in the exhibition and related book are located in urban and open areas of Kalkallo, Craigieburn, Somerton, Epping, Broadmeadows, Campellfield, Thomastown, Coburg and Clifton Hill. The exhibition fit-out is conceptually related to the ideas of green revegetation and community interaction. The book is published by School of Architecture and Design, RMIT University, Melbourne, Australia. It includes texts by Mauro Baracco and Luisa Macmillan, and reviews and images related to 10 projects completed by: Jennie Lang, Ottavia Franzini, Dayne Trower, Mohammad Afiq Shazwan Abd Samat, Maja Hansen, Edwina Thompson, Frankie Piesse, Emile Clare, Pia Socias, Emily Wallace. Contributors: Mauro Baracco, architect, was born and educated in Italy, where he lived and worked as a practising architect and an academic at the Turin Polytechnic and the European Institute of Design in Milan. He moved to Melbourne in 1996. He is a Senior Lecturer in Architectural/Urban Design and History/Theory of Architecture at RMIT University, and a director of Baracco + Wright Architects. He has completed a PhD on the architecture of Melbourne architect Robin Boyd. His projects and writings have been published in books, journals and magazines, and shown in national and International exhibitions. Luisa Macmillan has been Manager at Merri Creek Management Committee for the past nine years. During the 1980s she was a lecturer in environmental studies at RMIT, in the then Department of Landscape, Policy and Design. Prior to that she was with the Water Studies Centre at Chisholm Institute of Technology (now part of Monash University). She has a B.Sc (Hons) in freshwater ecology and a M.App.Sc in river conservation. She has a particular interest in improving the condition of urban streams and their role as habitat corridors. For further enquiries contact: Mauro Baracco mauro.baracco@rmit.edu.au + 0403 829388 | ||||||||
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