What if Sydney’s empty office towers could hold the key to solving its housing affordability crisis? This research investigates how underused commercial buildings can be cost-effectively transformed into high-quality, flexible affordable housing.

This is the first research report to compile a global catalogue of precast panel refurbishment projects, aiming to inspire a shift in how aging public housing stock is viewed and managed.

In Canberra, adaptive reuse has been applied to museums, galleries, hotels, and student accommodation, primarily through interior modifications. However, office-to-residential conversions remain rare due to strict building regulations, and no such projects exist in the Canberra CBD, despite its potential.

In the age of the Anthropocene, Heliotope seeks to explore the creative possibilities for glass gleaned from the circular economy.

The Alastair Swayn Foundation – RMIT Architecture Affiliated Fellowship at the American Academy in Rome provides an extraordinary opportunity for early and mid-career Australian architects, landscape architects, and design professionals to advance their practice on an international stage. The Fellow is awarded an eight-week residential experience at the American Academy in Rome.

A research, sculpture, podcast and event series investigating circular design in the built environment. Hilary captures conversation with those who have tried and tested systems; from grassroots to the complex, for designing in waste, and out single-life use of construction materials and services.

The project aims to showcase design and practice-based approaches to the sustainable, adaptive reuse of historic places in Australia. Supported by the Swayn Foundation grant, and building on our research, a series of 12 interviews have been conducted with leading architects and heritage practitioners in four Australian states.

Retain, Repair, Reinvest is a strategy for evaluating the refurbishment potential of existing public housing. Ensuring housing as a basic human right.

A site-specific strategy developed by OFFICE for evaluating the refurbishment potential of existing public housing. At the core of this strategy is the retention of public housing with the commitment to ensuring housing as a basic human right.

Campsie comprises hundreds of red-brick apartment buildings. Developed in the 1960s and 1970s, they are close to reaching the end of their functional lives. Intervening in this awkward, yet quintessential housing typology could offer a possible alternative to medium-density living in Sydney’s suburbs.

This study identifies and environmentally profiles performance-based retrofit options for a typical Canberra ‘ex-Govie’ house against the criteria of energy efficiency, embodied energy and cost.