Walk on Thru: Meet architect Adam Haddow

By Alex May

When apartment buildings have names like Henry, Alba, Ivy and Jasper and the exteriors are covered in tiles with four-leafed clovers and playful red boxes, this clearly is not a generic apartment development.

Architects like SJB director Adam Haddow and Andrew Frost are the design minds behind the St Margarets hospital redevelopment on Bourke St in Surry Hills, one of the largest inner city apartment sites and perhaps one of the boldest.
“Most inner city projects have developers that decide it’s better to put a big fence up around the outside and build a swimming pool in the middle of some apartment buildings,” explains Haddow, who has worked on St Margarets for the last four years.
“They create a gated community where people live in the same apartment building but don’t talk to each other – a place that has good security but where people aren’t really part of a community.”
Haddow says that when the hoardings come down from the St Margarets site – which is across the road from the old Beresford Hotel and Edward Eager Lodge – the north-eastern pocket of Surry Hills will come back to life.

SLICK SPACES

The St Margarets development will include four slick apartment buildings around a thriving public square, complete with its own art gallery in an old chapel, town clock and outdoor cafes.
The apartments in Alba are already complete, and the rest are expected to be ready by September. There will be new streets and public thoroughfares through the development to create an urban village.
“This is about a community that walks and talks and arrives places. It’s about being a hub for the Surry Hills community,” architect Andrew Frost says.
“This won’t be a development where all the same demographic moves in. There are 38 square metre one-bedroom apartments in the same building as penthouses that will be owner-occupied which means it will be as diverse as Surry Hills.”
Both architects have an interest in “civic architecture” – or creating spaces where the community can interact with the public buildings.
“There isn’t really anything else like this in Sydney but there are lots of places in Europe that have interesting spaces like a bocce court in between two buildings or a laneway that comes alive with people and market stalls,” Haddow says.
“The only place that I can think of in Australia that is similar would be Federation Square in Melbourne.”

GOING INSIDE

Most of the 214 apartments on the St Margarets site have been designed to incorporate work spaces, as well as living spaces.
“We have cross over apartments so people can work downstairs but then go upstairs to their living space, a bit like the Asian shop style houses,” Haddow says.
“Every apartment is different – they aren’t all out of the same box. There are different ceiling heights, different floorplans and different views.”
Frost says his architectural research found that professionals, such as designers, writers and business people, who work from home contribute to the diversity of the area.
“Cafes and restaurants become boardrooms and meeting rooms and it makes a place come alive during the day if people work there,” he says.
The former maternity hospital which was run by the Sisters of St Joseph has now been reborn as the Alba building, with the soaring ceilings and ocean liner-style features like porthole windows incorporated into 53 slick inner city apartments.
“Every building has its own personality and its own presence, which reflects what Surry Hills is – you’ve got the gorgeous heritage lines of Alba and then the geometric playfulness of Jasper,” Haddow says.

THE LIBRARY DRAWCARD

Haddow and Frost created a simple document about Surry Hills and interesting spaces when they first began work on the St Margarets site four years ago.
“Because I’m from Melbourne, I didn’t really know what made Surry Hills special so the first thing I did was spend a fortnight trawling through the streets and discovering interesting spaces,” Haddow says.
He then went on to research European urban renewal projects and discovered that projects with a public library often had success creating a lively community atmosphere.
The architect convinced the developers to donate the large basement space in the Alba building to the community for use as a library.
”The idea behind putting in a library is that it brings people in to the site but they don’t have to buy anything when they are there – it really makes it a great space for the community,” he says.
Bligh MP and now Sydney Lord Mayor Clover Moore has shelved plans to use the space as a library following a community survey that found St Margarets was not the best location for a new library.
Haddow is upset, but philosophical about the library decision.
“The library was just such an innocent, nice idea so it’s disappointing that it’s not going ahead, but I have come to realise that you can suggest a whole lot of things, but only about 30 per cent will come through to the end of a project,” he says.