Award of Merit:

Diadem for 180 Lonsdale Street, Melbourne

Diadem is an integrated practice which shapes brands for the built environment. Since 2000, we have helped people communicate, navigate and engage with branded spaces around the world. We plan, design and project manage signage and wayfinding strategies that connect people to place. With technical knowledge, trusted experience, in-house expertise and proven processes, we create innovative solutions that add value from the earliest stage. Our collaborative approach safeguards the interests of clients, preserves the integrity of brands, and delivers smarter outcomes for all.

About the Project

180 Lonsdale is an A-grade commercial tower in the Melbourne CBD. Diadem advised on digital activation to reinvigorate the foyer, with the objective of enticing people to linger and also assist with attracting new tenants. Building owners are continually upgrading their assets to meet the requirements of their tenants and attract new ones. These projects often result in multi-million dollar budgets, discarded fit-outs which become landfill and prolonged periods of disruption. This project explores a different model. We proposed an economical, more sustainable, quicker method of achieving the re-activation this high-profile location. 

The premise was to use technology to transform the foyer into a place of wonder, delight and engagement. A place where typically transient users could linger, be entranced and experience a calm happiness in the midst of their daily turbulence. Central to our approach was the integration of the architectural spaces, digital screens and creation of dynamic content; they were considered holistically. The screens were installed on the angled foyer walls, inspiring the concept of ‘the fold’. The moving images above and below the ‘fold’ line mirror each other. The architectural space is monochromatic, expressed with materials and finishes of multiple patterns and textures. So as not to overpower the foyer, the imagery is desaturated of colour. It is simple yet bold, animates in a languid fashion which is designed to achieve a degree of subtlety. 

Diadem commissioned the duo of Isamu Sawa (photographer/director) and Jake Reeder (cinematographer) to create bespoke artistic content for the launch of the digital screens. The digital content was generated during a commissioned studio shoot, resulting in a 15-minute ethereal and eternal loop. The commissioned content explores botanicals, water and ice and creates a micro world shown macro on the large screens. It provides viewers an opportunity to sit, contemplate and observe, focussing attention on microscopic elements that most people would never take the time to notice. 

The result is an enhanced place that activates imagination, penetrates the mundane and engages with those who wander through, or choose to stop and just be within it.

Category: Place

Designers and Project Team:
Project Manager: Travis Marshall
Creative Director: Mark Janetzki
Designer: Brett Gosbell
Documenter: Sung Chua
Photographer: Isamu Sawa
Cinematographer: Jake Reeder
Screen Supplier: Seen Technologyetch planning