View from the roof into the selected Turning Circle case study precinct
Turning Circle Project - Enabling new creative ecologies
Over the last decade sites of creative production have been priced out of Melbourne’s CBD, leaving a commodification of cultural consumerism. Without substantial and permanent creative communities and activity, creativity in the city becomes a diminished experience for everyone. One of the key issues at stake is recognising and protecting the value of creative endeavour as pivotal to the urban experience we desire, and not as a pathway for building land values, only to be displaced when another use can pay a higher rent.
When Covid-19 hit, the knock-on effects of lockdowns and working-from-home impacted demand for CBD office/commercial space. Turning Circle Collective saw an opportunity to draw on this unexpected reduction in demand to build a vision for Melbourne where culture in its most robust form—its production as well as consumption—could be invited into sections of the city and become the backbone for growing new local economies and long-term precincts. Along with increased pressure to cut corporate expenses, working from home experiences illustrate the possible long-term shift away from the CBD by a substantial working cohort. Employee surveys suggest only 60% wish to return to CBD workplaces [1]. The resulting contraction in demand is likely to see increasing vacancy rates, rent reductions and a drift by existing commercial tenants from lower quality buildings to better quality spaces for similar rents. These “leftover” spaces are the current focus for the Turning Circle Project.
About the Turning Circle Collective
Turning Circle Collective is Wendy Lasica, Michael Trudgeon, Robert Buckingham and Millie Cattlin and between us we have performed leadership roles in fashion industry, architecture/design, urban planning, live arts/performance producing and touring, creative space programming, festivals management and programming and academia and teaching. Two of the collective, Michael and Robert, were part of a previous program to attract creatives and makers to vacant CBD office spaces in 1980, during another of Melbourne’s boom and bust economic cycles. Moving into Stalbridge Chambers in Lt Collins St, they joined a group of emerging artists and designers working across a broad range of disciplines, many of who went on to develop international reputations, lead major organisations, and take up professorships.
While the City of Melbourne helped enable opportunities for creative entrepreneurs, there was no top-down plan. Rather a belief that the city needed to be a lively and productive hub to build a compelling identity that would allow the city to compete globally as a desirable destination. It was this collective aspiration that infused the city and added to the very essence of the Melbourne experience and creative identity we recognise and celebrate today.
About the Turning Circle Project
Turning Circle Project is a plan to revitalise Melbourne in response to the Covid-19 pandemic, with the aim of supporting the social, cultural and economic vitality of the city through the creation of a new central creative precinct.
The creative production arising from the work of artists, young design start ups and creative entrepreneurs undoubtedly generates desirable cultural capital in the short term but it is also the nascent bedrock for founding new industries in the long term.
This transformation would be shaped by a series of principles:
- Small scale and locally-led interventions that allow for slow organic development over time
- Commitment to development of long-term neighbourhoods that include affordable housing and new local economies
- Development of a prototype with the ability to adapt and repeat the intervention approach
- Development of an exit strategy for the initiators to ensure precinct self-management
View from the roof into the selected Turning Circle case study precinct
About the Turning Circle Project case study
The ideas for the Turning Circle Project have been tested as a case study to build a prototype of creative precinct revitalisation. While our ambition is for the city as a whole, the effectiveness of any on-the-ground intervention will be pegged to its responsiveness to local conditions.
In thinking about a suitable CBD location, a series of criteria emerged that both shaped the initial choice and are of key importance for future precinct development:
PUBLIC REALM
High quality public realm provides places for connecting people, spaces and activity - the web-like network envisioned for the precinct. The new Market Street Park suggested a central public space providing for both spontaneous and programmed activity to occur. Along one edge is a new amphitheatre built into the ground plane at Collins Arch, with further spaces for rest, engagement and stimulation.
BUILDING DIVERSITY
In order to attract a mix of creative activity, there is a need for a range of available space options. There are a significant range of building types, scales and levels of amenity suitable for a range of secondary or alternate uses including performance and entertainment spaces (Collins Arch), design studios (Reed House) and production spaces (parking garage).
EXISTING CREATIVE ACTIVITY
Turning Circle Project will complement existing creative activity, engaging with existing tenants and communities in partner programs to strengthen the precinct networks. A key Melbourne cultural institution, the Melbourne Immigration Museum sits on the southern border of the precinct – with an annual program of exhibitions and events, indoor and outdoor. Other existing cultural tenancies include architecture practices, urban design/placemaking practices, book/online publishers, peak bodies for performing arts
MIXED USE
A mix of uses is a vital condition to creative revitalisation as easy access to diverse resources is essential for emerging creative practice and can be built upon and intensified at the micro-scale. Existing uses within the case study precinct include high-rise residential, hotels, office buildings, co-working, big corporate and small organisations. There are also a mix of day and night uses with high-end and small-scale hospitality offerings.
The Turning Circle Project case study precinct in central Melbourne
Our creative vision
Through analysis of open-source data, we have created maps visualising a future for the area that links spaces within buildings with public realm and existing activity. Our vision for the precinct sees creative micro-clusters spread across buildings and the public realm; web-like relationships that become the substructure of the precinct. We see ourselves as seeding this process, then exiting and allowing it to take on a life of its own.
We used stakeholder conversations to examine our assumptions and test their appetite for the future we could see. Landlords’ aspirations for the area showed strong support for the idea of precinct activation over individual site activation. The area has not held a strong identity for some time. Although one block (now Collins Arch) was the Western Market from 1841 until its buildings were demolished in 1961, the area has been more of a place to pass-through than a destination.
Further to this, our own experience with creative production tells us that a heterogeneous mix of practitioners is vital, so a range of scales, experience, skills, disciplines, and ages is critical. All tend to learn from each other and often stimulate or inspire each other to experiment and collaborate in new ways. This activity is vital to developing new approaches and new work. This requires the co-location or proximity of a real variety of spaces, pegged at different standards of amenity, finish and cost, with the inevitable connected social and hospitality spaces to make meeting and discussion easier.
In our approach to the Turning Circle case study area we are proposing a micro-scale mixed use approach, where floors of individual buildings are selected for different programs of a bigger creative production ecology. One such floor could be an experimental prototype facility, a floor in another building could house a design and theatre management space, while both are linked to a ground floor exhibition space and an outdoor performance and hospitality area.
The Turning Circle Project case study area. This diagram illustrates how existing vacant spaces connect with opportunities for programming in the public realm. The coloured dots suggest how small interventions could contribute to a network of activity. Some dots are buildings with vacant space, and the remaining dots indicate sites in discussion for public programming.
What next for the Turning Circle Project?
Turning Circle Project has long term aspirations. Identifying vacant spaces and matching these with appropriate creative endeavour is only part of our method. Programming events that can connect the spaces, the activity occurring in those spaces and other activity already happening in the area, will connect this creative production to local residents and workers. Developing opportunities to link studio spaces in the precinct with organisations outside the area is another part of the process.
Space, connection and programming will develop most effectively with strong partnerships and relationships among the many stakeholders. Ultimately, local partners and creative participants could join with government agencies to manage precinct activity, ensuring that the voice of the creative community has agency in those decisions. Turning Circle Project is an iterative process shaped by the experience and the people contributing to it. We started with assumptions, saw an opportunity and identified a possible precinct.
What unfolds in 2021 will be followed up in a second Cities People Love article later this year.
Collins Arch is identified as a location to be activated with programmed events. Source: Woods Bagot.
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Wendy Lasica
Wendy is an award-winning theatre producer, developing and touring new work with internationally renowned theatre makers. At the beginning of her career, she worked extensively in New York, including founding The Field, an organisation supporting the development of emerging artists. Wendy has also been a board member and director of multiple live arts organisations. More recently Wendy retrained as an urban planner and in 2014 established a niche practice working at the intersection of cities and culture. She also teaches RMIT Interiors design studios and has tutored at University of Melbourne in Urban Design Theory.
Michael Trudgeon
Dr Michael Trudgeon is a founding design director at Crowd Productions, a Melbourne based design studio, incorporated in 1983. His practice focus is on designing strategies to prototype new spatial solutions and user programs for commercial architecture projects and sustainable product service systems. The practice has completed numerous significant built projects including national roll-outs of cinema complexes, financial services networks and major exhibition installations. Michael is a professor of design in the School of Design at RMIT University and co-ordinator of the Master of Design Innovation and Technology Major Project program, the final design studio program. He has he taught into the Masters of Architecture design program in Melbourne and overseas. He has taught masters and undergraduate students in architecture, interior design and industrial design since 1985 at RMIT, the University of Melbourne and Monash University.
Millie Cattlin
Millie is an experienced designer and architect, having completed a Bachelor of Design (Hon.) and a Masters of Architecture at RMIT University. She is the co-founder and co-Director of These Are The Projects We Do Together, an organisation focused on temporary projects, experiments and installations that utilise lighting and projection as integral parts of design outcomes.
Robert Buckingham
Robert has a long association with the Australian design, fashion and retail sector as well as government and arts organisations through his work with Craft Victoria, the establishment and leadership of the Fashion Design Council of Australia, and Melbourne Fashion Festivals. Robert has his own strategic planning consultancy, Mr Buckingham, and has led multiple endeavours to promote contemporary art, design, architecture, urban planning, civic engagement and cultural collaboration.
Cities People Love (est. 2020) is a social enterprise organisation dedicated to the creation and curation of urban research that can engage and empower communities to influence policy and practice.
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