TasTAFE Agricultural Centre of Excellence prioritises practical education, adaptability, and connection to land. It is positioned on the rolling hills above the city of Burnie and is a meeting point of the outer suburbs and lush agricultural farmland.

The student-centric design emphasises flexibility to evolve alongside technology and teaching methods, integrating elements of the landscape and the integration of artwork to engage students and teachers in both classroom education and practical studies.

The Centre’s contemporary form symbolises progressive farming techniques, featuring a ‘cattle grid’ facade for privacy and solar control and rammed earth walls, depicting the red hues of the north-west farming landscape.  Local artists Edge Atelier was engaged and worked alongside the rammed earth contractor to create the layering of the different pigmented earth and the rebated portions within the wall providing the backdrop for the artist to affix the timber and Corten Steele components.

Sustainability measures include natural light, passive solar heating, and thermal mass walls made of rammed red earth to minimise energy consumption and regulate indoor temperatures effectively.

This project exemplifies a university campus consolidated into one finely detailed building, providing a beautiful learning environment that responds directly to its natural coastal environment.

Philp Lighton Architects in partnership with Wardle developed the University of Tasmania’s Cradle Coast Campus building to respond to the University’s design requirements of Community, Aesthetics, Functional, Technology and Distinctively Tasmanian.

The 5500 square meter two level building contains multiple informal and formal learning environments, as well as other specialist spaces including a 12-bed nursing simulation ward.

Sustainability was a core driver of the project and is represented through the Tasmanian decorative and structural timber elements that act as carbon storage, rainwater harvesting, low energy consumption, and a green roof containing 10,000 native plants.

Through a landscape rejuvenation project, the entire foreshore of West Park is being returned to a natural setting exhibiting water sensitive design and the encouragement of the local penguin colony to re populate the headland.