A Huge House IV

LocationMaster Induction Studio, University of Sydney
Year2025
Status Completed

A Huge House IV was a University of Sydney Master of Architecture Induction Studio centred on a proposal for the university’s first Aboriginal College: a 270-bed student residence on Gadigal Land. The studio approached student housing as both a home and an urban institution, examining how sleep, work, leisure, learning and collective life might coexist within a single architectural framework.

FIG.1Basecamp, Kien Bui
FIG.2Basecamp, Kien Bui
FIG.3Basecamp, Kien Bui
FIG.4Basecamp, Kien Bui
FIG.5Basecamp, Kien Bui
FIG.6Basecamp, Kien Bui
FIG.7Basecamp, Kien Bui

Through close studies of historical and contemporary precedents, students developed individual proposals across the scales of the room, the building, the campus and the city. Plans, large physical models, sketches and façade details were used to explore different relationships between privacy and sharing, alongside clear formal, structural and material positions.

FIG.8A Big Backyard, Elena Ng
FIG.9A Big Backyard, Elena Ng
FIG.10A Big Backyard, Elena Ng
FIG.11A Big Backyard, Elena Ng

Engagement with Aboriginal students, yarning conversations and workshops formed an important part of the design process. Rather than treating Indigenous engagement as a matter of imagery or surface expression, the studio considered Country through cultural narratives, community participation, language, wellbeing, material choices and landscape. The resulting projects proposed generous forms of collective living that could operate as both responsible campus buildings and meaningful homes.

FIG.12A Living System of Reuse, Growth, and Gathering, Sandra Yang
FIG.13A Living System of Reuse, Growth, and Gathering, Sandra Yang
FIG.14A Living System of Reuse, Growth, and Gathering, Sandra Yang

Credits

UniversitySchool of Architecture, Design and Planning
Course Masters Induction Studio
Course CoordinatorGuillermo Fernandez-Abascal
Design TutorNettie Ni