Novel Futures at Melbourne Design Week
Photos by Jason Lau
Earlier this year as part of Melbourne Design Week, Haptera Design hosted two events at the historic Norla Dome at the Mission to Seafarers to engage creatives, designers, ecologists and the public in the future design and deployment of their Novel Habitats project across the lower Yarra at Fisherman’s Bend supported by the Port of Melbourne and FB IDEAs.
The opening night included a panel discussion to launch the event welcoming over 60 visitors into the historic Norla Dome at the Mission to Seafarers to discuss the role of design in elevating biodiversity and our relationships at an aquatic level across the Fisherman’s bend precinct. Featuring panellist’s designer Shane Hunt, marine ecologist Brendan Lanham and post-doctoral research Melissa Pineda Pinto, the discussion explored a range of ideas. Traversing ideas related to the role of invasive species in novel ecosystems, to impact of design within degraded ecosystems to social and ecological approaches to repairing community relationships within these often-overlooked systems.
The exhibition Novel Natures held in the Norla Dome in the following days provided early speculations on the design approaches and development of habitats across the site. Presented as “simple gestures”, the exhibition included a large architectural model of the site highlighting prospective sites for the project and the current challenges for biodiversity. Handmade clay models curated within the Norla Dome highlighted how subtle changes in the way that we design and approach development of aquatic urban areas can have profound impacts on the recruitment and habitat provision of species and ecoservices across these sites. Each of the models presented, highlight the role of substrate and surface topologies in the recruitment of key species and habitat formers such as mussels and oysters.
Across the two days, the exhibition received visitors from architects to urban planners to interested community members each with their own story to tell about an experience of connecting with the river or site. Designer Shane Hunt and founder at Haptera Design reflecting on the event and interactions with visitors had this to say:
“across the 3 days, each visitor I spoke with emphasised an interest in reimaging our relationship with the Yarra along the Fishermans Bend precinct. By providing glimpses of what is possible, you could feel people’s perspectives start to shift towards a future that is more considerate to biodiversity across these sites”.
“Across the 3 days, each visitor I spoke with emphasised an interest in reimaging our relationship with the Yarra along the Fishermans Bend precinct. By providing glimpses of what is possible, you could feel people’s perspectives start to shift towards a future that is more considerate to biodiversity across these sites.”
For FB IDEAs, the panel and exhibition reflected a commitment to all aspects of the Fisherman’s Bend precinct moving beyond terrestrial boundaries and including the aquatic system. The project highlights the importance supporting multidisciplinary projects grounded, where design and ecology have the capacity to reimagine areas and systems that are sometimes disregarded.
This was the first event held by Haptera Design in relation to this project, and since then there has been lots of work happening in the background. Stay tuned for more updates and be sure to sign up to Hapteradesign.info.
