Dezeen School Shows: a youth centre informed by music is among the architecture projects from the University of New South Wales.

Also featured is a reimagined office tower into a "vertical school" and a community centre created in a power station.

University of New South Wales

Institution: University of New South Wales
School: Built Environment
Courses: Bachelor of Architectural Studies, Bachelor of Interior Architecture (Honours) and Master of Architecture
Tutors: Melonie Bayl-Smith, Sing D'Arcy, Bernadette Hardy, Eva Lloyd, Rachel Neeson, Philip Thalis, Shaowen Wang, Torsten Burkhardt, Vicente Castro Alvarez, Alex Fotherby, Sebastian Grøgaard, Juan Larrota, Mladen Prnjatović, Natarsha Tezcan and Brian Zulaikha

School statement:

"At UNSW Built Environment we focus on architecture and design at every scale, from industrial-designed products to the architectural design of buildings and landscapes, up to urban and regional planning and policy.

"Across our different degrees, there are four common themes. Firstly, we place emphasis on sustainable design approaches that embrace circular thinking and adaptive reuse to achieve resilient and low carbon outcomes.

"Secondly, our social-impact design ethos seeks to meet the diverse needs of different groups, creating landscapes, buildings and products that are healthy and inclusive for all.

"We also equip students to use advanced digital tools and manage complex data, allowing them to make evidence-based decisions and develop smart ways of analysing and designing our world.

"Finally, many of our student projects engage with the country, which associate professor Bernadette (B) Hardy, a traditional owner of Dharug and Gamilaraay descent, redefines for First Nations people as a profound union of the physical and spiritual, deeply connected to the world's oldest living culture.

"Each year our students celebrate their work at the UNSW Built Environment Grad Exhibition, held in the remarkable setting of the refurbished White Bay Power Station in Sydney – a former coal-fired power station reimagined as a vibrant arts, cultural and community hub."

Confluence by the Floodline by Kelly Zhao

"The flood connects land, as the Wonnarua people gathered via waterways.

"This library serves as a contemporary confluence – where diverse people, cultures and knowledge meet. Organised around a central void, the design encourages movement through a cloister pattern.

"Transparency and encircling bridges create visual connections throughout all levels, allowing visitors to forge their own paths. The layout encourages exploration – every space visible, every corner discoverable.

"The existing Maitland Library (in the Hunter Valley of New South Wales) is reduced to its structural columns, preserved as memory.

"Around this skeleton a new body emerges, centred on openness and intuitive wayfinding, whilst accentuating the character of ribbed slabs.

"A light-filled pedestrian route now connects High Street to the Hunter River, enhancing the circulation from the existing riverlink and reconnecting the town with its floodline."

Student: Kelly Zhao
Course: Bachelor of Architectural Studies
Tutors: Brian Zulaikha, Rachel Neeson and Melonie Bayl-Smith
Email: ruirui.zhao[at]student.unsw.edu.au

Rosehill Library by Eva Song

"Rising above the edge of the Parramatta River, the library in Rosehill, Sydney, floats as a vast cantilever – a beacon of knowledge suspended in the air.

"Below, a lush landscape and Aboriginal artworks root the building in the country, and honour memory and place.

"Vertical circulation and exhibition spaces ground the structure, guiding visitors upwards through layers of culture and community before arriving at the elevated sanctuary of books.

"A corner cut from the form carves a clear axis from the light rail line to the water, stitching city to river, movement to reflection and past to future."

Student: Eva Song
Course: Bachelor of Architectural Studies
Tutors: Alex Fotherby, Philip Thalis and Melonie Bayl-Smith
Email: eva.song[at]student.unsw.edu.au

Edustack by Young Jiang

"Edustack reimagines a 1970s Brutalist office tower in Sydney's CBD as a K-12 vertical school that weaves learning, nature and city life into one living system.

"The design retains 73 per cent of the existing floor area while vertically stacked prefabricated modules create flexible, child-scaled spaces. Stepped terraces draw in light and greenery, transforming a dense concrete tower into a vertical ecosystem.

"Guided by Emotional Architecture, the project seeks to fascinate through curiosity and discovery; offer comfort through safety and scale; connect students and city through vertical movement; cultivate daily contact with nature and empower children to explore with independence."

Student: Young Jiang
Course: Master of Architecture
Tutors: Mladen Prnjatović, Sebastian Grøgaard and Shaowen Wang
Email: youngtrek[at]outlook.com

Cultivating Connectivity by John Jing Rong Tee

"Located beside Gordon Train Station, within the Upper North Shore of Sydney, Cultivating Connectivity envisions an urban farm that reactivates fragmented suburban space through food, learning and community.

"Drawing from Gordon's agricultural past, the project transforms an existing carpark into a productive civic landscape that intertwines aquaponics farming, co-working spaces and public gathering areas.

"By layering ecology, education and community engagement, it transforms a transient, car-centric centre into a destination for learning, exchange and cultivation.

"The design promotes circular food systems, local participation and environmental awareness, redefining urban infrastructure as a living framework that reconnects people, nature and place and serving to cultivate a resilient and socially cohesive Gordon."

Student: John Jing Rong Tee
Course: Master of Architecture
Tutors: Shaowen Wang and Torsten Burkhardt
Email: john_jing_rong.tee[at]student.unsw.edu.au

Bulanaming by Gabriel Snoch

"Bulanaming reintegrates the country back into multicultural Marrickville, an inner western suburb of Sydney, in a way that is accessible to all and includes infrastructure that creates places of learning and community centred around the experience and growth of knowledge around the country.

"This design reflects these intentions with the inclusion of Indigenous co-operative housing tailored to the different needs of Indigenous families, allowing for flexibility and community building.

"Other tenures include built-to-rent combined with co-work to cater for young families in need of a flexible work-life balance, as well as social housing.

"The social infrastructure designed for the ground-level public domain also mirrors these values with landscaping that works with the country, whilst catering to the needs of the ever-growing, diverse community of Marrickville.

"This includes markets, a community centre, a suburban nursery, an Indigenous cultural centre and food and beverage venues."

Student: Gabriel Snoch
Course: Master of Architecture
Tutors: Vicente Castro Alvarez, Juan Larrota and Shaowen Wang
Email: gabriel.snoch02[at]gmail.com

White Bay Creation Library by Ella Rogut

"A creative reuse and artmaking ecosystem, constructed for and by the community, providing access to a range of free creative resources through the central tools library and various communal makerspaces surrounding it.

"Constructed around a modular frame made of repurposed construction scaffolding, new additions are designed to be easily disassembled and reused in future projects.

"Library members can build their own spaces with a simple DIY wall system that snaps into the scaffolding grid, giving them ownership, freedom and autonomy in the space."

Student: Ella Rogut
Course: Bachelor of Interior Architecture (Honours)
Tutors: Bernadette Hardy, Eva Lloyd and Sing D'Arcy
Email: ella.j.ro[at]gmail.com

SCRAP (Sustainably Cultivated Restored Artist Places) by Natasha Carter

"SCRAP empowers Sydney's youth.

"SCRAP began because of a genuine concern about the way in which the built environment approaches sustainability, the environment and the country.

"To reduce future impact, SCRAP not only utilises recycled or repurposed materials, but is built entirely for deconstruction.

"This means all materials can leave the site as they entered, ensuring continued use and recycling.

"The carbon emissions required to create SCRAP will also be offset within seven and a half months of use, through carbon sequestration, solar energy and an in-built material recycling system on site."

Student: Natasha Carter
Course: Bachelor of Interior Architecture (Honours)
Tutors: Bernadette Hardy, Eva Lloyd and Sing D'Arcy
Email: natashaca01[at]gmail.com

Echo Point by Brooklyn Jack

"Echo Point transforms the White Bay Power Station into a place where community agency truly matters and weight is lifted off country.

"This design gives young people space to move, speak and create. A skatepark they can call home, a forecourt where youth gather and organise, a rooftop garden to re-energise and a ground-floor arena built for activism.

"By restoring native plants and reconnecting water to soil, Echo Point shows how design can hold activism at its core.

"It shifts an industrial site into a living canvas for community regeneration, a place where power is shared and voices are heard."

Student: Brooklyn Jack
Course: Bachelor of Interior Architecture (Honours)
Tutors: Bernadette Hardy, Eva Lloyd and Sing D'Arcy
Email: brooklynlouisejack[at]gmail.com

Dialectics – Merging Contradictions by Ariel Jacob (AJ) Terno

"Dialectics, or the White Bay Power Station Youth Audio Centre, is defined by contradictions, from those formed in adapting a post-industrial brownfield site and its relationship to the country, to the programmatic tension inherent to the brief, where the contradiction of creation and consumption shapes spatial experience.

"It's also a project for understanding myself as a designer, reflected in reconciling contradictions at a meta level: my own approach to design and the irony of construction drawings never to be constructed.

"At its core, Dialectics seeks to bridge these self-imposed contradictions to reach an understanding somewhere between each position."

Student: Ariel Jacob (AJ) Terno
Course: Bachelor of Interior Architecture (Honours)
Tutors: Bernadette Hardy, Eva Lloyd and Sing D'Arcy
Email: aj.terno[at]gmail.com

Brio by Eulogia Lau

"'Brio', an Italian musical term meaning 'with spirit and brightness', inspires this project as a dynamic central hub for youth creatives that embodies the vibrancy of youth culture while celebrating music and art forms that engage with sound in innovative ways.

"By connecting the 'sweet' and the 'salt', the traditional and the contemporary, Brio creates grander harmonies as a spiritual healing place to ignite inspiration, foster creativity and cultivate a deeper connection.

"More than a creative hub, it becomes a sanctuary where youth can explore, experiment and find meaning through the universal language of sound and art."

Student: Eulogia Lau
Course: Bachelor of Interior Architecture (Honours)
Tutors: Bernadette Hardy, Eva Lloyd, Sing D'Arcy and Natarsha Tezcan
Email: eulogialau.cy[at]gmail.com

Partnership content

This school show is a partnership between Dezeen and University of New South Wales. Find out more about Dezeen partnership content here.

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