Myuna
The Myuna Development is situated in the heart of Canberra CBD and is the amalgamation of five existing sites which are occupied by an entire city block. The development takes advantage of its three street frontages; Northbourne Avenue, Mort Street and Cooyong Street. Also present on the site is Veterans Park, situated on the southern portion and located along Bunda Street.
The building tower comprises a west wing of 11 storeys and an eastern wing of 9 storeys with a full height atrium volume connecting these two commercial pods.
The central atrium provides a 15.5m x 60m private square on the ground floor plane, available to the tenants for a multitude of uses. The floor plates and bridges are contained with only simple glass handrails, maximising the interaction between levels and the ground plane.
The main entry to the building and multi – storey underground car park are located on Mort Street. A secondary entry to the main atrium space fronts Veterans Park and is flanked by retail space to the ground floor plane, activating the edges of the site and taking full advantage of Veterans Park and its active pedestrian flow. Further potential has been created for a entry to the atrium via Northbourne Avenue, flanked by the retail spaces.
The base of the two north south wings of the building are recesses at ground level, forming a varying colonnade space, responding to potential use, location, orientation and surrounding urban patterns. This recess is broken along the north and south elevations by the expression of the vertical core elements between the building wings. This is a deliberate exercise to express the internal functional planning of the building and also assists in reducing the visual bulk of the overall form.
Contrary to providing a colonnade space along Northbourne of minimum required depth which does not continue in the built fabric north of Cooyong, the opportunity has been taken to vary the depth of this space, fading from 3.4 metres to zero metres, creating a useable spaces, and a visually more exciting and interesting streetscape.
As such, the colonnade to Northbourne Avenue, commences as a deep space at the southern end in response to the potential retail use, and the intent to create useable undercover outdoor spaces. The spatial pattern further fractures along Northbourne, creating a direct entry point to the building central atrium or tenanted space. The colonnade then further reduces in depth, until it terminates by the use of "projecting" bay windows between the column grid. These are currently used for the air exhaust/intakes from the required on-grade substations and shopfront display windows.