Marian College Design Warehouse
Project Details
Architects
Minx Architecture
Address
196 Glengala Road, Sunshine West 3020
Cost
$ 3,500,000
Project Overview
The Design Educators at Marian College envisaged a new facility that would provide collaborative, flexible, connected, multi-functioning space. The Design Warehouse concept was formulated through an inclusive and comprehensive briefing process. The project embodies the idea of collaborative interdisciplinary teaching and learning in the art, design and technology subjects.
Five-year strategic planning priorities for Marian College have included the construction and/or refurbishment of learning spaces that are flexible and adaptable and allow for collaborative learning and teaching. As far as possible spaces have been designed and built to be multi-purpose and to provide agility for the College to respond to emerging curriculum priorities. The College also operates based on collaborative teaching and learning teams; teaching teams meet at least fortnightly to plan curriculum and assessment and to grow professionally from the shared knowledge and expertise of Colleagues. The pre-existing linearly designed building limited the opportunity for this collaboration to extend from planning to teaching and was an inflexible, fixed-function space.
The Design Warehouse has provided open plan learning spaces which support collaborative teaching and also collaborative learning. The light and open spaces encourage students and teachers to move between classroom spaces. The philosophy of learning at Marian College centres on personalised learning for every student that builds from their passions and capabilities, fostering engagement and developing talents. Students have flexibility about how they can choose to work, which encourages engagement and supports meta-cognitive thinking about how each individual student learns best. The Design Warehouse has certainly enabled the College to meet some of its core priorities within the Design and Technology curriculum area.