More than a dozen architecture firms from across Australia and overseas will vie to design homes for five Sydney sites set aside by the New South Wales government to help alleviate the state’s housing crisis.
The 15 finalists in the government’s pattern book design competition were announced on Monday, culled from the portfolios and expressions of interest of more than 200 entries.
Although pattern books to build mass housing have been sporadically used since colonial times, this is the first time the NSW government and not private enterprise has been the instigator. The idea behind a pattern book for building is to provide a fast track for construction by pre-approving selected designs, thereby cutting through red tape and lengthy development applications.
After submitting site-specific designs in October, five winners will be selected to build their low- and medium-rise designs across the five metropolitan sites, of which only one has so far been revealed – Sydney Olympic Park. Two sites have been earmarked for new terrace housing and three sites for low- and medium-rise apartments.
The projects will be delivered in partnership with the government’s social housing arm, Housing NSW, its affordable housing arm, Landcom, and the Sydney Olympic Park Authority.
Although these five projects will not be fast-tracked through approvals themselves, it is expected the winning designs will be publicly available, with the fast-track benefits attached at some point next year.
According to data provided by the Department of Planning, Housing and Infrastructure, average local DA assessment times in NSW increased from 83 days in 2021-22 to 106 days in 2022-23. The 10 councils with the longest average assessment times in 2022-23 took between 172 and 281 days.
The acting executive director at the Government Architect NSW, Paulo Macchia, said the criteria of “liveability, buildability, replicability, cost effectiveness and sustainability” were all taken into account by the jury.
“We do need them to be cost sensitive, but that does not mean they will all be ‘capital A’ affordable, as they would be if managed by a community housing provider,” he said.
“But we do want them to be ‘little a’ affordable – sensible in terms of the costs that they incur.”
The designs must also be what Macchia described as “tenure blind”.
“That means that when you look at the dwelling, whether it’s an apartment building or a terrace house, it should be fit for purpose for everybody, and not have any stigma associated with it,” he said.
“You won’t be able to tell if it’s market, affordable or social, because it’s designed to fit into the character of our streets.”
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The call for entrants to the pattern book competition attracted architecture firms from around the world. Three international firms – one from London, one from New Zealand and one multinational operating in Germany, Italy, India and Sydney – are among the finalists. The remaining 12 are based in NSW, Victoria and Western Australia.
A further six student teams from the University of Melbourne, the University of Sydney and Western Sydney University were also named as finalists, although their designs will not be eligible to vie for a place among the five chosen to build their final designs.
A statement from the NSW minister for planning and public spaces, Paul Scully, said student teams had been invited to participate “to make sure young people are contributing to the future face of their city”.
The winning designs, judged by a five-person competition jury chaired by the NSW government architect, Abbie Galvin, will be announced in November.
The shortlisted finalists in the professional category are:
