Pascoe Vale Primary School Gymnasium and Performance Centre

Extensive stakeholder engagement, including consultation with Traditional Owners, was at the heart of our design process for the new Gymnasium and Performance building. We had worked with the school over a seven-year period, realising the masterplan over three stages, continuing to evolve and refine our engagement with them.

Through an IAP2 framework we engaged with staff, students, parents and the broader community to establish three key design drivers for our conceptual framework: Context and Scale, Connection to Nature, and Community and Connection.

Our engagement with Traditional Owners — namely representatives from VAEAI (Victorian Aboriginal Education Association) and Aunty Doreen representing the Wurundjeri Woi Wurrung Cultural Heritage Aboriginal Corporation — was undertaken over a number of years through a series of workshops and discussions. The process culminated with the engagement of Indigenous artist Kent Morris to collaborate on the design for the entry gates to the new building, and directly informed both the selection of materials and inclusion of language through joint naming in various locations.

A delightful narrative for the campus landscape was also developed in collaboration with Traditional Owners, encapsulating a story about the epic battle between a snake, a kookaburra, and a singing frog. The culmination of this was the creation of an ‘amphibitheatre’ — a frog-shaped amphitheatre directly adjacent to the new facility.

It is through stakeholder and cultural engagement that the brief has been enriched and developed beyond its functional requirements. Kent’s description of his work captures this perfectly:

The gate represents gathering, learning and the exchange of knowledge, highlighting the importance of passing down knowledge through the generations. It also emphasises the dynamic of knowledge; the potential to engage with learning and the many possibilities available when entering through the gate. Upon exiting, the knowledge attained, and connections made can reach out in many directions.

Our conceptual framework has enabled the project to contribute meaningfully to the context and community.

Context and Scale:
How does the building respond to the campus and Cumberland Road frontage and to the surrounding suburb?
The building is located along Cumberland Road, its façade forming the school’s boundary. The concertina-plan brick wall scatters sound from the street, with a larger internal insulated cavity that enhances acoustics. The building is brick and civic in scale, referencing mid-century brick civic buildings across the suburb. The interface with the campus is domestic and scaled to students, achieved through reduced height and a permeable edge.

Connection to Nature:
How do we create a meaningful connection to outdoor space and use ESD as a passive teaching tool?
The adjacent landscape and building are sited to celebrate and protect the existing peppercorn tree, with a performance room opening to an amphitheatre adjacent to both. Rainwater harvesting supports toilet flushing and irrigation, and water-sensitive urban design features filter stormwater and inform outdoor play spaces. The bricks utilised for the façade are produced in a highly sustainable manner, fired using recycled oil rather than natural gas, from a fully solar-powered factory that operates with zero material waste.

Community and Connection:
How might the facility be used for more than sports, benefit the community and represent meaningful connection to Traditional Owners of the land?
A street-facing entrance allows the facility to be leased by the community while maintaining security. Integrated AV supports use beyond sport — for performances, fundraisers, and events. Cultural consultation has resulted in a shared landscape narrative as well as a beautiful, integrated Indigenous artwork, bridging a contemporary architectural response with a much deeper history.

To quote Kent Morris:

“The geometric designs reference the designs on First Nations cultural materials... providing a reciprocal space for exchange.”

The Pascoe Vale Primary School Gymnasium and Performance Centre is a highly functional civic asset that addresses the need for versatile educational infrastructure while supporting broader community engagement and the integration of First Nations knowledge. It does so by exceeding the brief of a traditional gymnasium, accommodating not only physical education but also school assemblies, performances, and cultural events.

Embedded with AV infrastructure and planned for maximum acoustic and spatial flexibility, the facility enables revenue generation through after-hours and weekend leasing to community groups and represents a key piece of community infrastructure. This model creates ongoing economic benefit for the school while ensuring that the building remains active and relevant beyond school hours.

The project is the culmination of a sustained, seven-year collaboration between Kosloff Architecture, the school, Traditional Owners, and the wider community. This extended engagement informed both the campus masterplan and all subsequent stages of implementation, including three distinct buildings and landscape design by GLAS Landscape Architects. This depth of relationship enabled authentic, iterative dialogue and embedded cultural knowledge throughout.

A key outcome of this approach is the inclusion of artist Kent Morris’ entry gates, an artwork that represents a highly successful integration of First Nations knowledge within a Victorian School Building Authority (VSBA) project and exemplifies the value of early and extended collaboration.

The building is unequivocally user-centred. It responds directly to the needs of students, staff, and the broader community through its spatial flexibility, accessibility, and operational strategy. Its design prioritises inclusivity and cultural respect, incorporating feedback from First Nations representatives as well as the school community.

This has resulted in a building that is functional, robust, and welcoming, supporting school pride and connection, and the transfer of knowledge, while also delivering measurable benefit through community use and school revenue.

The Pascoe Vale Primary School Gymnasium and Performance Centre exemplifies how public educational infrastructure can deliver broad social, environmental, and commercial impact. By enabling after-hours community use and generating revenue through strategic leasing, the building redefines the role of school facilities as shared civic assets. This approach demonstrates how state schools can be both fiscally responsible and socially generous, fostering stronger local connections and increasing the building’s utility. The project also establishes a benchmark for culturally respectful engagement, embedding a significant work by Barkindji artist Kent Morris into the architecture, an outcome of deep collaboration with Traditional Owners and provides an achievable and compelling model for future public projects. Environmentally Sustainable Design principles have informed every element of the design from the siting of the building and landscape elements to protect and retain existing significant trees, as well as the selection of low carbon impact materials. It has created significant new landscaped areas that conserve water, whilst also supporting the regeneration of existing landscapes through the incorporation of only native planting. The project was delivered as part of a long term masterplan for the campus which was established at the outset, and is the type of long-term, multi-staged development that enhances Victoria’s design culture by foregrounding process as much as product. Delivered over seven years in collaboration with Kosloff Architecture and GLAS Landscape Architects, the campus reflects continuity, community consultation, and design excellence. The collective recognition across all stages, including nine awards and shortlistings, culminated in the Henry Bastow Award for Educational Architecture in the 2025 Victorian Architecture Awards. The project contributes meaningfully to the state’s architectural legacy, showcasing the value of slow, iterative design and sustained engagement with both place and people.

Energy Efficiency and Consumption The new built form prioritises passive environmental performance through the strategic placement and extent of glazing. High-performance double glazing, external shading, and insulation exceeding NCC requirements contribute to a robust thermal envelope and reduced reliance on HVAC systems, lowering operational energy use and costs.

Passive design principles informed all aspects of the building envelope, ensuring durability and comfort throughout the year. This reinforces the school’s broader commitment to sustainability and provides students with a tangible demonstration of energy transition and the value of a zero-emissions future. Selection of Building Materials and Process External materials include brick, selected for durability, low maintenance, and recyclability at end-of-life.

These common systems supported broad contractor availability and competitive pricing. The bricks utilised for the façade are produced in a highly sustainable manner, fired using recycled oil rather than natural gas, from a fully solar powered factory that operates with zero material waste. The primary structural frame of steel and concrete was designed for near-full utilisation per AS3600 and AS4100, reducing embodied carbon.

Material selection followed sustainability criteria, with performance values included in the material schedule. Substitutions had to match or exceed these benchmarks. Non-renewable materials were used only when no renewable alternative was available. Low-VOC and natural finishes were prioritised. Adhesives are Best Environmental Practice PVC certified and phthalate-free. Vinyl products were selected for low VOC emissions and sustainability certifications.

Protection of Land and Ecological Systems All significant existing trees were retained and designed around. The small number of smaller trees removed for construction were reused as nature play elements and garden edging. Rainwater harvesting supports toilet flushing and irrigation. Water-sensitive urban design features, including swales, capture and filter stormwater, directly informing the design of varied outdoor learning and play spaces.