Beyond the Masterplan

The design process commenced with thorough research of existing islands. By closely examining densely populated areas, critical observations were made through detailed drawings and studies of the island’s components. The analytical documentation included understanding and translating topography, bathymetry, built forms, vegetation, open spaces, circulation, and overall spatial qualities of existing conditions. This allowed for deeper comprehension and interrogation of the compositional elements that define the islands and locate deficiencies before the design phase.

The design research evolved to encompass carbon sequestration practices and ecological considerations, aiming to integrate them effectively into the island design. This included closely analysing sea barriers, infrastructure, ideal landscapes, and their inclusion to integrate built form and natural land dynamically.

The notion of the instant city was scrutinised throughout the semester, prevalent in regions experiencing rapid urbanisation and economic growth; often driven by ambitious development agendas. This ‘development strategy’, characterised by rapid urban development and large-scale land reclamation projects presents numerous pitfalls. Such endeavours usually prioritise speed and spectacle over sustainability, resulting in environments that struggle to adapt to rising sea levels and climate change. Instant cities fail to integrate effectively with natural surroundings, damaging local ecology and the ecosystem, and fail to create spaces that are responsive to the needs of inhabitants over time.

Contrary to this, an incremental approach to urban growth in the design process was deployed, emphasising gradual development, allowing for continual adaptation and integration of built forms with the landscape. Beyond the brief’s primary focus on human habitation, the project also accounted for the site’s natural ecosystem and dynamic evolution. This method enables a symbiotic relationship between urban infrastructure and natural elements, enhancing resilience to environmental challenges, promoting biodiversity, and supporting sustainable living practices.

The project exemplifies design excellence from its adaptability to a dynamic climate and the evolving habitational requirements of its inhabitants over an extended temporal scale. This reconceptualises architectural design as a flexible, responsive process that evolves in response to environmental and societal shifts whereas reclamation projects and the instant city approach epitomise design rigidity. Dubai’s Palm Jumeirah provides an example. Despite its iconic status, it suffers from severe environmental degradation and erosion issues. These projects adhere to a fixed plan that fails to adapt to changing climatic conditions and the shifting needs of inhabitants, where rapid urbanisation ignores demand and leads to massive underutilisation. They prioritise immediate expansion and spectacle over long-term sustainability and resilience, resulting in ill-equipped environments to manage rising sea levels and climate change. This entrenches architectural design as a static, unresponsive process, compromising ecological integration and the potential for adaptive, sustainable growth.

The last phase represents the culmination of ’36 years’ of hypothetical development, though the island continues to flourish, evolve, and expand over time. By challenging conventional large-scale land reclamation methods, small, synergistic interventions integrate landscape and infrastructure dynamically. The design prioritises the growth and metamorphosis of landforms and urban entities, ensuring spatial diversity and responsiveness to evolving needs.

User experience is central, addressing habitational requirements through strategies including agroforestry, reforestation, and living shorelines. These enhance ecosystem resilience and biodiversity while mitigating carbon emissions and strengthening natural buffers against coastal erosion and flooding. Adaptive urban planning supports mixed-use developments, promoting dynamic settings tailored to local needs.

This approach sets a benchmark for good design in Victoria, Australia, and internationally, demonstrating how incremental, responsive design effectively addresses climate change and urban development challenges. Its emphasis on adaptability, ecological integration, and community-centric design ensures long-term sustainability and resilience.

The project tackles the critical issue of climate change and rising sea levels. The design enhances ecosystem resilience and biodiversity by incorporating agroforestry, intercropping fields, reforestation initiatives, mangrove restoration, wetlands preservation, grassland conservation, conservation zones, and living shoreline establishment. These integrated strategies mitigate carbon emissions and strengthen natural buffers against coastal erosion and flooding, creating a safe and nurturing environment for residents. These strategies seek to enhance ecosystem resilience, mitigate carbon emissions, and provide natural buffers against coastal erosion and flooding, effectively addressing the environmental challenges coastal cities confront.

Embracing a series of small aggregated moves that emerge and accrete into complex interrelationships, the project reconceptualises architectural design as a flexible, responsive process. It avoids predetermined outcomes, promoting an environment where built and unbuilt elements interact dynamically. This approach ensures that the urban landscape can adapt to the evolving needs of its inhabitants and the changing climate, promoting long-term resilience and sustainability. Through prioritising the orchestration of built and unbuilt elements to create a compelling urban outcome, the emphasis is on the growth and metamorphosis of landforms and urban entities over time. As an anti-masterplan, this approach ensures spatial diversity and complexity, responding to evolving needs and contexts. The incremental growth model also addresses economic constraints associated with large-scale reclamation, promoting responsive architectural and urban design that is both resilient and sustainable. By prioritising long-term ecological health and community well-being, incremental urbanism offers a more holistic and effective strategy for developing resilient and sustainable coastal cities. The convention of zoning as a prototypical method to organise interventions is appropriated and reworked in a new context as a flexible tool, capable of accommodation change, rather than laying down inflexible guidelines. Interventions are dispersed over the site and realised incrementally.

A transformative and enduring impact is signified, benefiting the society, economy, and environment. The project’s innovative approach significantly contributes to the reputation and status of Victoria’s design and creative culture. The design underscores the value of investing in professional design processes by forefronting a sustainable, adaptable, and user-centred design. It sets a new standard for urban development, emphasising the importance of ecological integration, resilience, and adaptability. This project elevates Victoria’s design culture and is an exemplary model for international sustainable urban development.

The project’s emphasis on an incremental growth model and ecological integration ensures that materials and resources are utilised efficiently, with minimal environmental impact. Environmental sustainability is further enhanced by incorporating green infrastructure such as living shorelines, which provide natural protection against coastal erosion and flooding. The project’s design ensures ecological sustainability at every stage of its lifecycle. From initial planning and construction to long-term maintenance and eventual decommissioning, each phase incorporates sustainable practices.

Economic concerns are addressed within the proposition. Unlike conventional methods in Singapore, where land is reclaimed en masse and immediately developed, this project allows for a controlled, organic evolution of built form and ecology. Starting with marshlands or other natural features, the land can gradually transform into forests or other ecosystems, creating a dynamic and responsive urban environment. This evolutionary process promotes ecological sustainability and supports ongoing adaptation as the island grows. By reclaiming land in increments, the project circumvents the prohibitive upfront costs associated with large-scale reclamation, which typically necessitate specific building types to ensure economic viability and maximise land utilisation. This approach enables the procurement of smaller, more agile buildings that can adapt over time to evolving development needs, eliminating the constraints of a rigid master plan that dictates residential or other specific uses.