Named after the Noongar warrior, Yagan Square is a project of local and state significance for the city of Perth and Western Australia. Located at the east end of the new MRA Citylink development, it seeks to physically reconnect the entertainment/cultural precinct of Northbridge with Perth’s CBD (and the Swan River).
Located on the former wetlands, a place of hunting and gathering and of ceremony and cultural gathering, Yagan Square has been conceived as a natural meeting place and point of convergence for Perth CBD, Northbridge and the new Perth City Link development. In addition, it is located within the ‘arms’ of the historic ‘Horseshoe Bridge’, at the crossroads of the Perth Central Railway Station, new City Busport, Perth Underground Railway Station and future Light Rail infrastructure.
Designed to work at an intimate scale as well as for large organised festival events, the city square’s hard and soft landscape provides a welcome respite from the day to day workings of the city. Focussed around a large ‘meeting place’ performance amphitheatre, organically shaped shade structures, indigenous flora, a dynamic water feature and an iconic digital tower, Yagan Square will accept over 70,000 visitors a day, becoming one of the city’s great attractions. The design concept imagines Yagan Square as an integral and active part of the city, knitted into, and extending the existing circulation systems and street fabric of its surrounds, while forming new relationships and ways of experiencing the city. The square has been designed to host major festival events, as well as cater for day to day busking, performances and activities.
Yagan Square emerges out of the ground, a tilted platform with geological references of fissures, cracks and gullies eroded in the middle to create an informal meeting place, that breaks free from the ground in the south west corner. A semi underground space is formed by this gesture, a deep ‘cave-like space that is protective and carefully removed from the exterior city bustle. Moments of wonder are embedded in the concrete soffit, passages of light and view connect the children’s play space above to market hall customers below.
The architecture, landscape and art is intertwined and embedded with cultural stories and references developed in consultation with Noongar representatives (organized by SWALSC), the traditional custodians of this land. It forms part of a living and evolving culture echoed by the evolving city of Perth, it is intentionally ambiguous and consequently generous, allowing visitors to interpret, find, create and complete their own narratives.
Layers of material bind spaces, strata of stone and metal, rich tactile material extracted from Noongar land then capped with weathering steel (Corten Steel) that continues to change with time, developing new surface patterns from the movement of stormwater. Yagan Square is a collection of dynamic experiences but one of timelessness and one that speaks of the past, present and future a place that may have always existed and with a naturalness that perhaps suggests the city was built around it.
Material Used :
1. Bluescope REDCOR Weathering Steel – Facade Cladding
2. Austral Verde Granite – Facade Cladding and Paving
3. Tamala Limestone – Facade Cladding
4. Donnybrook Sandstone – Facade Cladding
5. Juperana Granite – Facade Cladding and Paving
6. Pilbara Red Stone – Facade Cladding
7. Jarrah Timber – Decking, Soffit and Balustrade cladding
8. el Zinc – Facade Cladding – Graphite
9. AAF Anodised Aluminium – Shade Canopy – Diamond Light Polished
10. Dulux Luxafloor – Sealer to polished concrete floor – ECO2
11. Custom Coral Precast Concrete – Amphitheatre Landscape – Precast Innovations
