The redevelopment aims to reinvent urban life at Darling Harbour, regenerate wilderness in the waterfront and reconnect the city, returning Cockle Bay to a working neighbourhood by the water with deeper human connection and more lifestyle space.
Balarinji’s Designing with Country framework for the Cockle Bay Park redevelopment translated local Aboriginal narratives and recommended ways to authentically integrate these into the project design.
In co-design with locally-connected Aboriginal knowledge holders and creative practitioners, Balarinji identified key themes that were deeply connected to place for a conceptual approach to the project’s architecture, landscape design, urban furniture and public art. These themes included:
From this engagement process, Balarinji also provided insight into what local Aboriginal people wanted from the redevelopment, both specific to the project and more broadly reflecting the universal Aboriginal worldview and context.
The process of co-design and deep engagement established open channels of positive communication and goodwill which will allow the project design teams to continue to raise questions with appropriate Aboriginal stakeholders in a collaborative and productive manner that will best serve the local Aboriginal community and the development project.
Balarinji’s Designing with Country methodology is a cultural design framework that guides the agency’s co-design practice with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander knowledge holders, storytellers and creative practitioners to translate Place-based knowledge, spirituality, protocols, history, culture and contemporary stories for design interpretation.
