Ngurra: The National Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Cultural Precinct

A winning design concept for a long overdue cultural landmark, Ngurra expresses the significance of First Nations’ history and traditions in Australia’s national conscience. 

Ngurra is a word for home’, camp’, a place of belonging’ or a place of inclusion’ in many different Aboriginal languages around eastern parts of Australia. The design concept for the Ngurra Cultural Precinct houses two distinct spaces: The National Indigenous Knowledge and Cultural Centre, and the National Resting Place. 

Set within an undulating landscape, the design captures the drama, beauty and spontaneity of the beautiful wild grasslands of Ngunnawal and Ngambri Country. The organisation, flow and movement of people throughout the design has been drawn from observation and meditation on the movement of animals through the landscape, a movement that has occurred for millennia. 

In a similar way to how significant buildings like the Sydney Opera House have become a physical symbol of modern Australia, we sought to propose a bold and compelling concept that rightly places and expresses the significance of First Nations’ history and cultures in Australia’s national conscience.

Mark Loughnan, Head of Design and Principal at Hassell

Welcoming all visitors, the design concept for the National Indigenous Knowledge and Cultural Centre incorporates a large, organic and embracing canopy, gently held aloft over a central plaza, framing and bowing towards Bulajima, Mount Ainslie, marking the presence and arrival to the precinct. 

Held between the sky and the earth, the central plaza creates a new cultural and community room for Canberra, a place of welcome for ceremony, community events and functions.

The National Resting Place is designed as a private ceremonial building, an indentation into the rolling ground that forms a soft counterweight to the floating form of the Cultural Centre’s canopy. 

The respectful eastern entry plaza makes it recognisable and a powerful symbolic reminder of historical truths yet ensures a private space for cultural sensitivities and moments of reflection. 

The Repatriation Space lies in the centre of this form, in direct relationship to a secluded and sacred inner courtyard, allowing a highly protected place for ceremony, for song, sorrow and love. 

Client

Australian Institute of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Studies (AIATSIS)

Location

Ngunnawal and Ngambri Country
Canberra, Australia

Status

Unbuilt

Year

2023

Scale

30,666sqm (National Indigenous Knowledge and Cultural Centre) 5,407 sqm (The National Resting Place)

Collaborators

Djinjama, COLA Studio, Edition Office

Design team

Mark Loughnan, Jon Hazelwood, Adriano Denni, Anthony Thevenon, Michael G White, Clare Mayberry, Lauren Geschke, Ann Bainbridge, Simon Rich, Joe Loughnan

At the beginning of this project we asked that our Ancestors guide our hands and minds in the design, and we believe they have done so. We know that Country has led our design team, and we believe this is the legacy of our project; Country, kin, and community embedded, guiding, fore-fronting First Nations culture.”

Danièle Hromek, Director of Djinjama

Image by WAX
Image by WAX
Image by WAX

Image by WAX

Image by WAX

By elevating Country as the highest priority, future sustainability is inherently incorporated as Country nurtures and cares for all in return. It will be grounded in First Nations knowledge, in actions and decisions that support and sustain life – human, plant and animal.

We have identified opportunities to provide low-energy outcomes in relation to energy, water, waste, materials and transport, all while enhancing the integrity of the architectural vision.

There is also an opportunity to apply the Bizot Green Protocol to areas with close control environments and lead the assessment of embodied carbon. The Protocol provides science-based guiding principles for museums to reduce their carbon emissions, while supporting long-term preservation of cultural objects.

We have considered their interaction with land and culture. This can be seen through the expressions of harvesting daylight and moonlight to illuminate internal spaces, creating views to sky and land, using the land as a heat sink to help modulate thermal environments and optimising the thermal performance of the built form. 

The landscapes and gardens of the Precinct have the potential to be an ongoing horticultural legacy for Canberra. They could be used as a catalyst to create a First Nations led nursery, a base for First Nations landscape contractors and Indigenous education or as a commercial operation that provides employment, education and income. 

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