As part of our ongoing partnership with Monash University, our Associates Mark McQuilten and Wendy Li led a design studio giving students the tools and the permission to challenge what good apartment design really means.

The ‘Breaking BADS’ Studio, held both on campus and in Six Degrees Fitzroy office, focused on Victoria's Better Apartments Design Standards (BADS), the framework introduced in 2017 to lift the quality of multi-residential housing across Melbourne. The question posed to students was: Are those standards still fit for purpose?

Guest presentations from Six Degrees Architects, builders, urban designers, and ESD specialists punctuated the studio schedule. Site visits to our Nightingale projects and other leading multi-residential projects were a highlight.

"The next generation of architects shouldn't just inherit the rules, they should understand them well enough to improve them," Wendy and Mark say. "Working with Monash gives us the opportunity to put that into practice, and the calibre of thinking from students this semester has been genuinely exciting."

Design Studio Photography by Six Degrees
Nightingale Wilam Ganga Photography by Kate Longley

Design Studio Students:

• Yun Yue Tin

• Ashley Chee

• Christina Giovanis

• Alexandra Smith

• Lelaina Guinan

• Lik Teck Lee

• Phoebe Monello

• Luca Spampinato

• Isabella Coves

• Coral Mofkadi

• Fionnuala McKeagney-Stubbs

• Gemma Wildermuth

• Elena Horaitis

• Xinyu Tan

• Tak Wing Sham

• Maria Sunga

• Dilani Mallikarachchi

• Lauren Unger

• Qiao Ting Ang