How The Sydney Metro Could Inspire An Improvement In Australian Architecture

Anthony Burke knows good design. And he knows why it matters. The UTS architecture professor is the host of the ABC’s Grand Designs Australia and has spent a career examining and celebrating the best that design has to offer. So Guardian Australia asked him about his personal bugbears and favourite features in Australian home design, and why it is that so many people got so excited about Sydney’s new train stations.

What most annoys you in terms of trends and features of new Australian homes?

Just that. Trends and features over fundamentals.

Acres of carpet in giant open plan living spaces, more bathrooms than occupants in any house, a fascination with surface rather than substance, poor construction and any house that does not genuinely attempt to connect to its landscape or context are all bugbears of mine.

I think our houses are generally too big; they are, in design terms, a bit lazy in this sense. We’d benefit enormously by cutting maybe 20% out of most new builds, and I’d rather see smaller, more intensely designed homes that are personal and quirky than large spaces. It’s simply quality over quantity for me. I do think this is something that is changing though.

Are you seeing any trends in Australian homes which excite you?

Yes, indeed. Two things in particular. The first is the refocusing on materials in light of environmental performance. We’re seeing a comeback, of sorts, of some very old building techniques, like rammed earth and hempcrete, which is changing the texture and geometry of our homes in interesting and exciting ways. Also, the application of new materials into construction as a result of trying to improve environmental performance. Both these bring with them a refocusing on the craft of construction and a need to rethink building processes precisely because they are not typical. So it’s not just banging up a frame on a slab, but something like care and craftsmanship, and that gets me very excited.

You know a beautifully made home when you see it – actually, you feel it when you’re in it. That kind of building craft does not have to be big or ostentatious, and it is out there, but can be hard to find.

The second is less tangible, but perhaps more important. I genuinely feel people are searching for a new “spirit of home” in design today, which is very exciting. It’s hard to pin down, and I confess I’ve not fully worked this out yet, but what I hear in various versions is the idea that a home, any home, should be about more than the pragmatics of life. In some way it should make you feel good; physically, morally and emotionally. It might be about calm, or security or about family, but there is a sense of design with an emotional intelligence. It’s hard to say in our current housing crisis when, for many, any roof would be a blessing, but our homes are more than just a roof over our heads. Architecture at its best it elevates the ordinary (like making a cup of coffee) into something personal and extraordinary, a little ritual perhaps. I think architects and homeowners are searching for this through design with new energy. Maybe it’s a post-Covid thing, but I feel what our homes mean to us is changing after that experience.

How will Australian homes need to adapt to be livable for the long-term future? Is this kind of adaptation happening fast enough?

This is a big question. I think we’re at the start of maybe 20 years of experimentation and innovation in architecture at the moment, simply because we can’t keep on with business as usual. So, the external pressures on the Australian home, like cost of living, costs of construction, building for different family profiles (multigenerational, single parent, ageing population) are there and driving new thinking. I see sustainability, the changing climate and the move to work from home all requiring real change in the way we think about the Australian home. And the design community is responding.

Already I see sustainability right at the centre of most homeowners conversations – not an add on, but an essential. Whether driven by energy prices or a sense of responsibility, this is a big positive change. I see Australian home types broadening away from the typical family home again, to models where multigenerational living is celebrated, where small communities of action are springing up (to share a common garden or bike shed, for example) which is inspiring.

This kind of adaptation is under way – perhaps not quick enough, but the trailblazers are out there all around Australia working this out for the rest of us.

What do you think defines excellent residential architecture?

Excellent residential architecture to me is about creating inspiring contexts for the lives lived within. The best architecture subtly orients our attention to the things that matter and in this sense its job is to foreground our relationships; with nature, with each other, with the community, and turn them into something beautiful to experience every day.

Changing focus here, the recent public response to Sydney’s new metro has been overwhelming and incredibly positive. What does this say about how public architecture can make people feel?

The Sydney metro has been a wonderful success. An unusual coming together of real needs being met, political will across complex stakeholders aligning, and a commitment to a quality design approach, something beyond the pragmatics, which has resulted in such a great outcome that has been broadly recognised by the public.

This was an opportunity to rescript the city to some degree, to offer Sydney a new type of positive civic space and to invent an update on an old and familiar type of infrastructure (subways/metros). It shouldn’t surprise us that this level of commitment to the future of the city and regard for the experience of the users makes us all feel so much more positive about where we are collectively headed. Somehow its captured a sense of the future, but one with people at the heart of it, rather than real estate. I can’t help but feel it’s the project we needed right now. When was the last time you recall Sydney (or any other large Australian city) having such a unanimously positive response to a piece of infrastructure?

I do think people are looking for serious change in the approach to the environment around us, and yes, there is an appetite to see design charting new approaches to our public domain. We want to be excited by our shared spaces and I think we’re exploring again the possibilities of what the city could be, much like the attitude at the beginning of the 20th century, and again in the 50s, but this time under the pressures of climate and culture.

How does Australia fare, internationally, in terms of its attitude to and investment in public architecture?

Very mixed. I’d say we’re very good at residential, but we’re still generally quite timid when it comes to public architecture. We seem to be hitting some wins with the design of urban spaces and landscapes, but perhaps when it comes to buildings, architects are not cutting through. The role of design at this scale becomes very pragmatic and overly value engineered, at the expense of an aspiration for broader cultural or community benefit (the intangibles that you can’t measure on a spreadsheet).

Perhaps in this respect we’re still suffering from the Sydney Opera House experience – a truly extraordinary world class building that took a heavy political toll on all involved, with media coverage at the time all about cost overruns, the public purse and who to blame. That political lesson has not been forgotten 50 years later. Consequently, more often than not we end up with safe mediocre design, practical but uninteresting, buildings we’ll use but not be inspired by or love in a way we should.

There are some exceptions which I can think of, but we need more confidence in Australia about the public benefits of good design. I’m optimistic the success of the metro will boost this type of thinking.