Last month, the NSW government released a housing pattern book: a collection of pre-designed low-rise options available for public use. Intended to increase housing accessibility and affordability while building density, the patterns will be available at heavily subsidised rates for the next six months.
What’s in the Pattern Book?
The pattern book, released on the 16th of July, contains eight pre-approved designs for low-rise housing. These include ‘semis’, terraces, row homes and manor homes – all design types with increased density, containing multiple dwellings per lot.
One of the semi designs included in the pattern book, designed by Anthony Gill Architects.
Some of the patterns were commissioned directly from local architecture firms, while others were added following an international competition. Firms featured in the book include Anthony Gill Architects, SAHA, and Sam Crawford Architects.
Each pattern also comes with a landscape design guide to encourage native gardens and community building, and an accelerated planning pathway. Under this pathway, homes from the pattern book could be approved start construction within just 10 days of a council application being lodged, significantly cutting down development times.
For the next six months, the pattern book designs will also be available at the heavily discounted rate of just $1. Afterwards, they will cost $1000 a pop – a price still far lower than that of the average architecturally-designed, estimated at $20,000.
Housing Density: Rebuilding the ‘Missing Middle’
NSW in particular has faced much criticism lately for its problematic housing industry, with prices soaring and housing availability struggling to keep up with demographic needs. Premier Chris Minns has described housing as “the defining challenge of this age, [a] problem that breeds other problems.”
On the one hand, project homes proliferate across the state, dominated by low density, free-standing, bulky single dwellings – the biggest houses in the world. On the other hand, high density high-rise apartments are disparaged for disturbing suburban character. On both ends of the density spectrum, housing is often poorly designed, with less than 5% of new homes built annually having any architect input.
The ‘missing middle’ of housing designs – low rise but higher density dwellings like the pattern book’s terraces and semis – can compromise between both sides of the development debate.
Housing solutions have featured heavily in state politics of late. Both Minns and NSW Liberal leader Mark Speakman have attempted to ramp up support for housing development in Sydney suburbs. Naturally, both have also faced backlash for opposing such development in their own electorates.
Minns describes the pattern book as “a practical step to make the housing system fairer”. The NSW Planning and Public Spaces Minister, Paul Scully, has also endorsed the initiative’s capacity to “tak[e] the guesswork and the delay out of home building.”
Some architects have criticised the pattern book as encouraging less sustainable housing solutions, or insufficiently addressing accessibility needs. But on the whole, the consensus seems to be that the book is a positive initiative that can help “democratise good design”.
Cover image: terraces designed by Sam Crawford Architects, included in the pattern book.
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