Dallas Brooks Community Primary School

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RESEARCH BACKGROUND: This educational facility designed by McBride Charles Ryan brought together three existing primary schools in Dallas, one of Melbourne's most deprived neighbourhoods and home to a multiracial community with roots in Turkey, Iraq, Lebanon and Sudan. The school was planned under the Broadmeadows Regeneration Scheme, funded by the Victorian State Government under its Building Futures policy. RESEARCH CONTRIBUTION: MCR developed a concept based on walled cities to provide not just a school but a community hub. Visually, the school creates a civic narrative through the school's city skyline' silhouette façade, which alludes to the city of learning within. It also connects with its community through colour and pattern inspired by the traditional dress of local ethnic groups. This work attests to MCR's ongoing practice of creating civic narratives as a way to provide connections with the greater community and context. Through the various configurations of age-appropriate learning spaces, it explores how architecture could reflect new pedagogical methods. It demonstrates MCR's history of designing educational buildings that are richly expressive and which has - over the past twelve years - questioned how architecture could spark conversation, prompt questions about the nature of knowledge itself, create a unique identity for a school and provide an inspiring, reputation-building public front that connects with the community and broader context. RESEARCH SIGNIFICANCE: The project received prestigious awards: 2014 Australian Institute of Architects (AIA) National Awards (Public Architecture); 2014 Victorian Architecture Awards (Victorian Architecture Medal, Melbourne Prize, William Wardell Award for Public Architecture); 2014 Think Brick Awards (Finalist, Horbury Hunt Commercial); and 2015 Architizer A+ Jury Awards (Finalist, Plus Category: Architecture + Learning). It was extensively published in professional architecture and design media outlets.