COLLEGIATE, CONNECTED AND LIGHTFILLED:
A NEW CAMPUS LIBRARY FOR THE 21st CENTURY
A desire for a library incorporating worlds best practice, designed for the needs of
today’s students, has produced a stunning new Library on the University of Western Sydney’s Penrith
(Kingswood) campus, 50 kms west of Sydney’s central business district.
Allen Jack+Cottier, with an evolving brief from the university, developed the final design, integrating architecture with interiors and graphics to create a cohesive building. ( Original consent approval prepared by BVN Donovan Hill.)
‘Perhaps the biggest change in universities over the past few years is the increasing focus on
collaboration, social interaction and student welfare as integral to education, coupled with access to
technology. So today’s libraries are much more social and connected and interactive spaces than they
used to be, while also providing places for quiet study.” Said Mark Louw, Director, Allen Jack+Cottier.
The new Library consolidates facilities from two campuses into one new building and accommodates
centralized administrative services from five other campus libraries. It provides abundant natural light,
spaces for group and private study, placing the traditional book stacks at the heart of the library. It forms
the central core around which a network of functional spaces is located.
The building’s ‘square’ plan, informed by the campus master plan, provides a landscaped courtyard to
the north. The plan allows for the consolidation of spaces such as bookstacks, reading areas, amenities,
meeting rooms and vertical circulation zones to be arranged around a central atrium space.
Within the atrium space the differing functional relationships and the rich layers of collaborative work and
study settings are visually and distinctively expressed to ensure intuitive way finding. Day lighting occurs
to both sides of the open reading areas and the book stacks which flank it. Furniture and fittings are high
quality, tacile, colorful and durable, creating an environment that feels more like a large living room than
an institution.
The campus buildings, predominantly built in the late 1970’s, are built in red brick. This remained a brief
requirement to maintain visual consistency. A textured red brick palette was selected to read as an
additional skin applied to the building rather than being anchored to the ground plane. All openings are
framed by dark bronze sunscreens responding to the buildings orientation and providing further detail
and texture.
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