Groote Archipelago Housing Programme wins (twice) at the Good Design Awards!

17.02.26

Our work on the Groote Archipelago Housing Programme (GAHP) won two awards at the prestigious Australian Good Design Awards in Sydney last Friday – the award for Social Impact and the Michael Bryce Patron’s Award!

The Patron’s Award is particularly special as it celebrates the best Australian-designed product, service or project and is awarded to the entry that has the potential to shape the future economic, social, cultural and environmental aspects of our planet.

This was an inspiring example of human centred design in practice. The evidence of the engagement of people from the community, and the persistence of the team should be an example for future projects of this type. The approach led to a deep understanding of the complexities of creating culturally sensitive housing in remote Australia, and as a result an extraordinary outcome of which both the team and the community can be proud. — The Good Design Awards Jury comment:

The great thing about these awards is that they celebrate two distinct aspects of this project:

+ our seven-years spent working with the Anindilylakwa people to improve life on the Groote Archipelago through better designed housin g. By working with community over several years, we were able to enhance built environment literacy and empower people to be proactively involved in the design of their housing.

+ in 2020, TF.A launched a series of evidence-based tools to measure a project’s social impact. By applying our ‘Social Return on Design Investment’ (SRODI) kit to this project, we confirmed that the shift towards Local Decision-Making enhanced feelings of community confidence, happiness and cultural safety.

The co-design process gave people the power to choose and the power to make decisions from their own mind and heart. Decisions we’ve never made before. Cherelle Wurrawilya, Chair of the Anindilyakwa Housing Aboriginal Corporation