Office in the Clouds

After having a city tour on Monday July 20^th, Tuesday rolls around and it’s time to visit the office I’ll be working in later this year. Excited and a bit nervous I push in through the large revolving door at the base of Melbourne Central Tower. A posh stone and stainless steel lobby welcomes us on the other side and we’re directed to take two elevators up to arrive at Design Inc’s reception area. The firm inhabits the top two floors in one of Melbourne’s tallest buildings. The space was actually deemed unleasable due to the shape created by inward slanted curtain walls. It was being used as mechanical and maintenance space before Design Inc seized the opportunity to take advantage of such prime real estate.

As you may be able to imagine due to my build up, we were greeted by an expansive view out across Melbourne once the elevator doors slid open on level 51. John MacDonald, a director of the firm, is waiting for us at the front desk and produces a smile as Michael and I shake his hand. I had organized for us to have this opportunity and I was fully engaged in making a good first impression on one of my future bosses.

John led us around the office briefly pointing out a couple of projects in the works. All the while the whole group was trying to take it all in and figure out how the hell I’d landed a position here; I was baffled myself.

We marched back upstairs from whence we had come and situated ourselves around a large conference table to be briefed on a couple of local wonders Design Inc had produced in recent years. First up was the K2 Sustainable Housing complex. An amazing public housing project that shames anything you would find in the US that fits the same category. This was followed by CH2 (Council House 2), which is an expansion for the original Council House in Melbourne. It was the first building in Oz to achieve their highest sustainability award and continues to inspire new projects to outdo it.

We had a tour of CH2 later that day and the tour guide voiced his hope that one day people will scoff at CH2 as a primitive work of sustainability. It ‘s interesting having so many of these sustainable projects funded by the government. By having the government lead the way, the move towards a sustainable future is seemingly forced onto private organizations to keep up. Our tour guide actually pointed out that many corporations had already approached them about the building so that they might incorporate the same kind of systems into their own buildings.

Such great work, and yet John was so humble about it all. That’s actually been a reoccurring theme that I’ve noticed about the Australian architects we have met. Their egos aren’t enormous ballooning behemoths! It’s quite refreshing. Unfortunately, since visiting the office and being awestruck I’ve become a bit unhappy to find that they will not be paying me as an intern but rather awarding me a small bonus at the end of my term. Money’s not everything, but I need to eat!