*Okay, strictly speaking this is a "stuffed animal" rather than a "squelette," but the Victorian ruins were plenty skeletal, and it looks like the Australians really did it up brown.
*Thanks to Matt Ward of Australian Design Review.
"In 1866 Edward Bell designed a new water reservoir along the ridge served by what is now Oxford Street. Completed in 1878, the unusual structure comprised two major chambers of brick vaults spanning between steel beams supported on Ironbark columns. The reservoir was only in use for 20 years...
"... the architects saw a rare opportunity to create a unique space in Sydney, a sunken subtropical garden set amongst the ruins of the collapsed western chamber. This single decision is the great success of the project; it creates a powerful contrast to the conserved eastern chamber where the mass of the brick vaults loom overhead. Almost every other design move is subtle, with the new insertions silent and subservient to Bell’s work of 1866. Through a process of evolution over the course of numerous adaptive reuse projects, TZG has perfected the art of material dialogue – the conversation is always in hushed tones, voices are rarely raised...."
