THE Wonthaggi Guide Park has won a 2023 National Landscape Architecture Award.
The prestigious awards took place on Thursday night, October 19 at the Adelaide Festival Centre, as part of the 2023 AILA Festival of Landscape Architecture, a week-long event in Adelaide from October 19-22, 2023.
The Wonthaggi project, which graduated from the regional Victorian awards to the national event, took out the Landscape Architecture Award for Play Spaces
Here’s what the judges had to say:
“Guide Park Playspace demonstrates the impact of high-quality play space design for regional locations. Designed for a diverse user demographic and including integration with the nearby aged-care facility, it is an exemplar of how play landscapes can cater to a broad cross-section of the community.
“The project shows how play can connect communities to past stories as well as to potential futures. In response to community desires, the area’s coalmining history is recognized throughout the design, with alternative industrial futures also included.
“In this landscape, storytelling intertwines with play, with a minimal and sensitively selected material palette that allows for many imaginative uses.
“Guide Park Playspace is built in Wonthaggi, Victoria on the land of the Bunurong people.”
Project credits are awarded to: Landscape architects - Orchard Design and SBLA Studio, Structural and civil engineers - Deery Consulting, Landscape contractor - Planned Constructions and Photographer - Copper Door Studio.
Bass Coast Shire Council also deserves credit for awarding the contracts for the $1.77 million project, supported by the Victorian Government with a $700,000 grant from Sport and Recreation Victoria and $350,000 from the Growing Suburbs Fund. The new playground opened in February this year and hardly an hour goes by that there isn't someone playing there.
Local MP Jordan Crugnale supported the application and advocated for the funding.
The National Architecture Awards were part of the 2023 AILA Festival of Landscape Architecture: UN/EARTH held in Tarntanya / Adelaide from October 19-22, 2023.
The National Landscape Architecture Awards serve as a unifying platform for the industry, celebrating yet another year of remarkable accomplishments in shaping Australia's landscapes.
All state recipients, including international and Climate Positive entrants, of Awards of Excellence, Landscape Architecture Awards and Regional Achievement Awards progressed to the 2023 AILA National Landscape Architecture Awards.
The new park includes:
• a regional scale playspace including a mine themed slide tower, flying foxes, a trampoline, carousel, gentle exercise area and nature based play.
• Supporting infrastructure including a drinking fountain, bike racks, pathways, fencing and an accessible barbecue.
• New garden beds, mature trees and irrigation works.
• Changes to the internal road configuration to create more parking and improved vehicle access.
