Designed as a collaboration between DKO Architecture, Breathe Architecture and Milieu Property, Breese St was informed through careful study of the requirements of urban living anchored in nurturing community and championing sustainability. The architecture fits the narrative of Brunswick’s industrial heritage of the past while leading to a sustainable future.

The development sees the creation of 59 one, two and three-bedroom apartments. To encourage and strengthen community, the design team split the 59-apartment development across two buildings. This translates to two cores where there are no more than five homes per floor. The purpose being that smaller communities are better communities, as when you start to have a vast number of neighbours you start to lose that personal feel. It is exactly the same as getting to know your neighbours that live on the same street.

Breese St is fossil fuel free with a 7.5 NatHERS energy rating. The building is 100 per cent electric, powered by renewable energy from 30kW PV solar system and supplied by 100 per cent GreenPower. Air-conditioning goes unneeded and heating is hydronic. The material palette includes recycled timber flooring and carbon-neutral bathroom tiles.

The architecture seeks to enrich the inhabitants’ lives by creating a community they feel proud of. Neighbours connect, not over the fence in this instance, but while tending gardens on the rooftop. This ‘backyard in the sky’ includes native plants, beehives and a community vegetable plot. Barbeque, outdoor dining areas and communal workspaces again encourage chance encounters and social interactions. The building’s orientation optimises thermal efficiency with the façade articulated with deep reveals and solar shading to the north and west. Nearly all apartments are dual-aspect, to the street and to the landscaped courtyard, allowing for natural cross-ventilation.

Finishes: Signorino, National Times Tiles, Robertsons, Nexus. Fittings & Fixtures: Brodware Appliances, Harvey Norman, Novas.

Photography: Tom Ross