Waterloo Metro Quarter
Waterloo Metro Quarter
A community building and public art strategy that responds to Waterloo’s rapidly changing urban fabric while recognising and celebrating it’s rich history, resilience and foundations.
Location
Gadigal Country Waterloo, NSW
Client
Waterloo Developer (Mirvac & John Holland Group Joint Venture)
Completion
2019 - ongoing
Collaborators
Nadeena Dixon Lorna Munro Carmen Glynn-Braun Dennis Golding Tess Allas Sebastian Goldspink Amanda Jane Reynolds Murawin Aspect Studios Event Engineering Hassell Bates Smart Woods Bagot John McAslan + Partners
Photography
Jonathan Cami Andrew Brinsmead Mirvac
Through a process of extensive collaboration spanning more than six years, Aileen Sage was engaged by the Waterloo Developer to work with community members, local curators, artists and precinct landscape architects Aspect Studios, delivering a highly integrated public art strategy for the precinct, as well as the design of a community podium building located at the centre of the development, addressing Badumurru Place.
Sitting above Waterloo metro station, and set within a precinct of residential towers alongside commercial and communal facilities, the artworks weave through the public domain, telling stories of Country and community.
The community building is enveloped by a protective layer evoking the possum skin cloak, translating stories around the ongoing contemporary practice of cloak-making. The building frames and filters views and light through screens of masonry and mesh, with metal scales that sparkle in the sun — reminiscent of the Golden Orb Weaver, which orients its web to catch the morning and afternoon light.
‘Yenma Nura (Walking on Country)’, Nadeena Dixon
‘Matriarchs’, Lorna Munro
Smoking ceremony for the opening of Badumurru Place
‘Beneath Concrete Currents’, Carmen Glynn-Braun
Referencing the idea of a possum skin cloak, traditionally worn for warmth and protection, a patchwork of facade types is conceptually sewn together across the podium, responding to the different climatic and functional requirements of the spaces within.
The future podium community building addressing Badumurru Place.
Future artwork by Dennis Golding (visualisation by Choi Render).