Award of Merit:

SJB in collaboration with Richard Leplastrier AO and Vania Contreras for Eucalyptusdom

Our work embodies the ambition of beauty, joy and delight and is an armature for community life. An SJB project is not immediately recognisable – it does not confine to a set of materials, style or attention-grabbing details. An SJB project is more often discreet, something that you happen upon in a broader urban context that reflects the local ambitions and gives back to the community. 

Design excellence is an ongoing process that is iterative and collaborative. Genuine, structured and purposeful engagement with key stakeholders is integrated and resolutely coordinated to ensure that design ideas and their consequences are clear – achieving consensus and facilitating effective decision making. We are an early adopter of design excellence procedures, which include our in-house design competitions – that we use to test and challenge urban design concepts and stage 1 approvals, our collaborations with emerging architecture studios – that introduce us to new perspectives and expose smaller firms to larger clients and projects, and our consistent participation in both open and invited design competitions. 

As a business, we are industry leaders in our approach to equality in the workplace. We recognise that participation requires passion to make change sustainable. We encourage our team to devote time to endeavours that enrich community life, support those in need and challenge the status quo. We are living in an age of constant demand and believe that by creating a framework that permits time to be part of the community, small incremental gestures can contribute to a better world. 

SJB is a proud affiliate of many organisations that seek to create greater equity including Parlour, Architects Champion of Change, Architects without Frontiers, CareerTrackers Indigenous Internship Program, CareerSeekers Indigenous Internship Program and Jigsaw.

About the Project

Eucalyptusdom reckons with the Powerhouse Museum’s long-standing relationship with the gum tree, presenting over 400 objects from the Museum’s Collection alongside new commissions spanning fields of design, architecture, film, applied arts and performance. The collaborative process drew on the vitality and interconnectedness of the forest, creating a richly layered, multisensory experience.

Category: Place

Designers and Project Team:
Interior Design Team: Richard Leplastrier AO, Adam Haddow and Jack Gilmer (Interior Architectural and Spatial Design), Vania Contreras, (3D Spatial Design and Documentation)
Powerhouse Embedded Artist: Agatha Gothe-Snape
Curators: Sarah Rees, Emily McDaniel, Nina Earl
Project management: Anna Gardner
Lighting design: Nick Schlieper
Soundscape Composition and Design: Jane Sheldon
Joinery and fabrication detailed design specialist: Queen and Crawford
Landscape design: Craig Burton
Build: Art Services NSW and the Powerhouse Museum Workshop
Visual Identity: Ongarato
Commissioned Artists: Nicole Barakat and the Rohingya Women’s Development Organisation, Dean Cross, Julie Gough, First Nations Fashion and Design, Ashley Hay, Vera Hong, Jonathan Jones and Dr Uncle Stan Grant Snr AM, Nicholas Mangan, Anna May Kirk, Luna Mrozik-Gawler, Jazz Money, Lucy Simpson, Yasmin Smith, Wukun Wanambi, Sera Waters, Damien Wright and Bonhula Yunupingu and Justine Youssef