The 2022 World Architecture Festival has just wrapped up in Lisbon, at an event that saw Sydney’s Quay Quarter Tower receive the prestigious Building of the Year 2022 award. Commissioned by AMP Capital to be the investment firm’s new Sydney offices, the design for the angular Jenga-like building was created by the Danish architecture studio 3XN in collaboration with local architect BVN.
Located just near the Sydney Opera House and boasting priceless views out across the harbour, the Quay Quarter Tower stands 206 meters tall and was constructed using a large section of the 50-year-old commercial tower that once stood in its place. While not entirely recycled, the award-winning new design used 65% of the old tower’s beams and slabs, as well as more than 95% of its original core, all while adding around 45,000 square metres of additional floor space.
Its unusual shape comprises no less than five slightly rotated volumes stacked on top of one another, with each volume structured around a central atrium that overlooks the Sydney Harbour waters below. All five of the building’s segments feature a 2,000-square-metre floorplan, each of which contains its own large external terraces protected by sunshade hoods, while its new occupants will also be able to enjoy the rooftop garden.
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“The winner was commissioned to provide a building on a world-class site, and to retain a huge proportion of an existing fifty-year-old commercial tower,” said WAF programme director Paul Finch about the winning design. “The result was an excellent example of adaptive reuse.
“It has an excellent carbon story, and it is an example of anticipatory workspace design produced pre-COVID which nevertheless has provided healthy and attractive space for post-pandemic users.”
The Building of the Year 2022 award might have only just been handed out, but the World Architecture Festival is already gearing up for its 16th edition in 2023, set to be held in Singapore next November.
