Placed among East Melbourne’s wide streets, stately Victorian homes and parkland is George and Powlett – a yet-to-be completed collection of eleven apartments, designed by Powell & Glenn.
While modern in design, there is an Arcadian feel to the façade that connects George and Powlett to its heritage surrounds.
Designed as a space to be lived in, at the same time, the architects say they have crafted a space where residents will experience architecture as an art form.
The apartments are balanced between light, landscape, fine art and space, the graceful trees, the private gardens and the curved entrance covered in vines, the recurring jungle theme ahs been purposely designed to create a sense of depth to the building’s Victorian-era setting.
With two and three bedroom apartments one the first four floors, there is a penthouse spanning the entirety of the fifth floor – all designed to provide copious amounts of natural light in the context of an urban sanctuary.
According to architect Ed Glenn, the entire design stradles both form and function.
“We have selected materials that patinate rather than deteriorate, and we have used a palette of colours that exists in the natural world, to give the property an authentic and timeless beauty,” said Glenn.
"One of the big challenges with indoor-outdoor spaces is that in Melbourne, they work beautifully at certain times of the year, but you don't want to be living next to a wall of glass through winter. Great spaces control the composition of the glass and garden outlook, as well as space for paintings and space for quiet walls," Glenn said.
Other materials used inside the apartments include raw timber and stone, which provides a further connection to the plants and vines on the outside. Unlike many modern mid-rise designs, the level of customisation available gives the opportunity for residents to work with the architects to create a floor plan to suit their lifestyle as well as selecting their desired finishes for their new home.
While this makes the apartments somewhat bespoke, the over-riding theme of these apartments is that each one features a strong, seamless connection to its own landscaped, private garden terraces-in this case, designed by Myles Baldwin Design.
“People are happier when surrounded by nature. As this layered landscape climbs and twines around the building, the residents will delight in the ambient nature of the garden,” says Myles Baldwin.
"We use landscaping to give projects a sense of depth and a connection to the natural world. When you connect the internal spaces to garden outlooks the atmosphere and light changes with both the time of day and the time of year. Myles Baldwyn is particularly well known for creating evocative gardens that you are able to ' enter into' rather than just being pragmatic screening devices," Glenn said.
