Few sites offer the chance to connect an urban promenade so directly with the rhythm of the open beach as the Indiana in Cotteloe.

The project begins by recognising this edge condition as both physical and cultural: a place where generations of West Australians have gathered, celebrated and shaped their identity along the shoreline. As expectations for the Cottesloe beachfront evolve, the redevelopment seeks to create a contemporary civic landmark rooted in the memories and experiences that define the place.

Our conceptual approach is founded on a reading of the site through light, shadow and the informal energy of beach culture—qualities captured in the paintings of George Haynes, which became early design totems. From this emerged a spatial language shaped by four elemental ideas: cave, ground, canopy and horizon. These forms respond to the dune landscape, the westward ocean outlook and the atmospheric shifts of the coastline.

The built form is consolidated into a single sculpted mass that preserves natural dunes to the north and protects culturally significant areas to the south. Its base appears carved and eroded like coastal rock, creating sheltered spaces for recreation and community life, while the elevated pool and upper levels form a fluid, continuous skin that responds to sun, wind and views in all directions.

The result is a building shaped by the forces—environmental, cultural and experiential—that make Cottesloe unmistakably itself.