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A Post-Carbon Pedagogy

Angus Gregg

MArch

Whither Nomadic? Vagabond Structures as Critical Agents

Junyi Li

MArch

The architectural school starts as an encampment, demanding an alternative, bottom-up architectural education, then over the time frame of 5 years, gradually taking over the Cockatoo Island. With the structures self-built by students, the school will remain in a constant hostile relationship with its environment.

Another (Anarchist) ArchSchool

Zexun Li

MArch

Left: A view of one of the school’s gathering spots where students come together to discuss interventions in school buildings, 2001.
Right: A view of the student-built addition to the school gallery, with a revised model of the new workshop building, 2018.

Architecture as Pedagogy

Iris Guo

MArch

Amid the ever-evolving construction site, three permanent facilities anchor the school: a staff office for support, a warehouse of reclaimed materials, and an archive to document the project's ongoing progress.

Mess in Progress … Designing a Building Yard

Tiffany Chin

MArch

Atmosphere Design School

Jinu Park

MArch

A flexible, light-filled design studio fosters creativity and collaboration, with open workspaces and communal areas, providing students an adaptable environment to explore and innovate architectural ideas.

The New Sydney School

Max Stephen

MArch

Cascading garden platforms on a restrained concrete structure provide a plentitude of opportunities for social exchange amongst collective subsistence responsibilities - gardening, library maintenance, and cooking - evoking shared livelihoods.

Towards a Collective Production

Vivian Su

MArch

Hand-drawing is championed within the new timber addition to the existing warehouse. Adequate acoustic separation, access to light and air and a distinct materiality distinguishes this specialised space from other programs.

Embodied Practice+Pedagogy

Sally Shin

MArch

Reviving Affordable Living: A Modern Small Homes Service for Sydney’s Missing Middle. Exploring flexible, sustainable housing solutions on Cockatoo Island, bridging design and community through adaptable, hands-on architectural education

Homes for All: The "New Small Homes Service"

Thuy Quynh Le

MArch

‘Desert Islands’: A School of Architecture on Cockatoo Island / Wareamah

Teddy Wang

MArch

Located on Cockatoo Island, this project envisions a School of Comparative Linguistics and Cultural Anthropology in Architecture, integrating linguistic diversity with architectural design to create culturally resonant, inclusive spaces.

Lingua-Driven Architecture

Parsa Aliyazdani

MArch

Transdisciplinary Architecture School

Tiffany Nguyen

MArch

Towards a Praxis

"Craft without theory is nothing. [Ars sine scientia nihil est.]" So declared Jean Mignot at an expertise of Milan Cathedral in 1400. The long history of disagreement over how ars and scientia are best translated is an index of the importance of praxis—the application of theory to practice, or the relationship between architecture and the world of ideas.

At the culmination of their tertiary education in architecture, students of the Praxis studio were invited to contemplate how the next generation of architects should be taught. Each student designed a small school of architecture on Cockatoo Island (Wareamah), informed by the history of architectural education and by research into a contemporary field of knowledge—privileging technê, practical knowledge, or epistêmê, theoretical knowledge, or holding both in happy union.

Multiple of the schools reprise the linguistic turn in architectural theory. Others are oriented towards the climate crisis and imagine new political economies emerging from participatory design and construction, turning Cockatoo Island into a perpetual building yard. Still others are decades-long alternative histories, or a posthuman future in which architecture is a collage of the fruits of natural and artificial intelligence. Each is imbued with a unique pedagogy and underlying model of praxis.

Towards a Praxis