Decidedly cosmopolitan, 380 Lonsdale seems to have everything that Melbourne needs. This project puts the mixed in mixed-use.

380 Lonsdale is actually two towers in one. One houses a hotel, the other apartments, and both are united by a low-level podium with eroded massing that contains separate pods for office space, a business club, dining and health facilities and retail. These floating pockets break up the volume of the podium with the functions themselves. On top sits a jungle-like communal garden for hotel and apartment residents, sending foliage cascading down the façade. This untamed, green space includes pocket parks and landscaped areas, a veritable urban oasis.

The forms of the towers appear as silver ripples emanating from the heart of the site. Moulded bay windows – a contemporary update for this classic device give the building’s surface a vertical rhythm.

This isn’t just about the high life though: the building stays down to earth with lots of street level interaction, including an extension of Timothy Lane to create a new café and dining thoroughfare that cuts through the site, adding to Melbourne’s world-renowned laneway culture. This big picture planning means that the line is blurred between street, tower and laneway. 380 Lonsdale is an urban intervention that brings a touch of the tropics to Melbourne – and ticks all the right boxes for the city in the process.

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