All images by Natasha Mulhall Photography
Y2I is a new accommodation model for homeless or at-risk youths, with an upskilling focus, curated communal spaces to enhance social connectivity and a sense of belonging, and an easily accessible, welcoming Youth Hub offering support and training services. The supported environment is underpinned by education and real-life learning to enable and empower residents with employable skills that are future-proofed; ensuring independence, relevance and sustainability in the workforce. This is overlayed with an expression of individuality creating a sense of identity.
Y2I's presentation to the public domain acknowledges its urban repair role through reinstating the street edge and eroding its form to ease urban transitions. The perforated 'veil' offers vibrancy, shading and privacy while still allowing expansive views to dominate. Abstracting the contextual palette, overlayed with colour psychology, led us to developing a custom orange that represents optimism, warmth and rejuvenation.
The push-and-pull form descales mass and creates amenity internally. ‘Break-out’ nooks populate naturally lit ‘internal streets’ that expand and contract creating engagement opportunities - the lungs and social connectors of the building.
Expressed housing modules heighten individuality within the composition, referencing the surrounding heritage brickwork, where each brick has individual character within a cohesive whole. The translucent skin adds vibrancy, abstracting the orange hues of the contextual heritage palette while offering shading and privacy for the building’s occupants.
26 individuals aged between 16 and 24, call Y2I home.
Urban contextual drivers, empowering independence and fostering social cohesion in an uplifting, domestic environment underpin the design.
Y2I presents an ‘Urban Marker’ while acknowledging urban repair through increased density, street-edge reinstatement and form-carving to transition from city scale to residential. Street activation is generated with a social enterprise café, elevated 3-point basketball court and street-level entries servicing the Youth Hub and apartments.
Reclaiming an underutilised site and embedding a life-changing social program, Y2I demonstrates how considered design can facilitate social cohesion while underpinning sustainable urban growth.
Y2I shows that budget-constrained, complex briefs on challenging sites can lead to uplifting, empowering places to live, building positive communities
Integrated with its urban context, Y2I presents a city ‘marker’ and gives residents a sense of identity, transforming the site into a vibrant, activated contribution to the city.
