Telephone +61 7 3844 1362
studio@shanethompson.com.au
47 Wahcumba St, Dutton Park
PO Box 1170 Fortitude Valley
Queensland 4006 Australia
Brisbane, Australia.
This proposal for the redevelopment of the MacArthur site (named after General Douglas MacArthur who established his headquarters in the existing building on the site) in a prime location on Queen Street in the heart of Brisbane city was determined by the important heritage environment surrounding the site and the highly sensitive central business district office market in the city.
While it was possible to develop a 6o-plus story office tower on the site, the four year development period and the speculative risk associated with this type of project was not sustainable in the Brisbane market. This proposal offered an alternative landmark development which allows for a low risk four stage development including refurbishment of the existing historic MacArthur Chambers, two new 23-level office towers, and a low rise 10-level office building, all of which would share an address to a major new public space, including restaurants and retail spaces, to be known as MacArthur Place.
Each of the four buildings was to be oriented towards the central open public space, as well as to the surrounding streets. The space will provide a pedestrian link through the site between Queen and Elizabeth Streets, not only providing an attractive additional connection between these two streets, but also a vibrant public open space in the middle of the city. The scheme is essentially composed of four rectangular building podiums whose configurations reflect the plan of the existing Macarthur Chambers as well as the surrounding street grid. The height of these building podiums - approximately 38 meters - both responds to and reinforces the dimensions of Macarthur Chambers. At the same time they relate to the dimensions of other buildings in the area, the original early 2oth century streetscape, and strongly reinforce the traditional rectilinear pattern of development in the surrounding area.
[This proposal won the MacArthur Centre Invited Design Competition.]