Projects
Long Reef Surf Club
Catalyst Project
‘Demonstrates creativity and innovation in landscape architecture..’ Jury Report
Winner of the 2023 AILA NSW Award of Excellence for Small Projects Winner of 2023 AILA National Landscape Architecture Award for Small Projects
Close-knit communities
Along the affluent strip of Sydney’s northern beaches, Long Reef Beach is relatively low key. Its unique claystone headland, rock platforms and sand dunes support a significant aquatic reserve. Gai-mariagal and other clans would have camped and hunted along a wildlife corridor stretching to Narrabeen Lagoon. The Long Reef Surf Club upgrade was 20 years in the making, spearheaded by a club president whose tenacity helped secure multi-agency funding for the job. Adriano Pupilli Architects designed the surf club building and Tyrrell Studio designed the public domain system, pulling together the social and environmental systems of this special place.
Long Reef Surf Club aerial view
We explored options for robust, permeable paving that could accommodate trailers, surf craft and windblown sand. We mapped major desire lines, then looked for opportunities to invite the environmental flux of the wider site into the heart of the club.
Located on the land side of the dunes, sand blows across the site constantly. We convinced our stakeholders to embrace the site conditions, showing how their operations could thrive within the life of the dune system.
Four pavilions frame a small courtyard with extensive functional requirements. The courtyard had to be habitable on quiet weekdays and chaotic weekends, absorbing the ebb and flow of life at the beach.
Coastal infrastructure
The design challenge was balancing the needs of the 750-member community club within a sensitive coastal dune ecosystem. We designed an innovative paving system to withstand high use and robust seats inspired by coastal infrastructure. Diverse grasslands cover rooftops and hug walls to merge the new buildings with the dunescape. Our design demonstrates a new form of public beach infrastructure, one that welcomes the flow of people, plants, water, wind and sand.
Our planting design brings diversity of species back to the dune. Rooftop grasslands provide greencover and foraging for local birds. Spinifex and Themeda stabilise slopes while Coastal Beard Heath and Melaleuca offer habitat.
Fine details in joints, edges and brass make the courtyard feel like a protected garden behind the dunes. Water is collected from the building roof and reticulated to the dune gardens through a custom brass downpipe, bowl and rill.
Each seat tilts up from the ground plane, with thin concrete blades that intercept windblown sand, protecting pathways and allowing dune plants to establish.
Over time the courtyard can support an emergent dune system, bringing people into conversation with natural processes. Drifting sand is not to be cleaned or swept away, rather it is welcomed and celebrated as part of the raw energy of coastal life.
A blend of social and environmental systems
On weekends, the courtyard is pumping. Fluoro-pink nippers swarm over and up walls while clubbies commandeer the BBQ area. There’s a tangible sense of pride in the new facility. On a grey weekday, you can hear the chirp of crickets against the hum of the sea. A bush turkey might join a lifeguard on patrol and superb fairy wrens investigate the new groundcovers. Sensitive to its surroundings, the design is robust enough to withstand intensive use for years to come, over time truly becoming part of this beautiful landscape.
Honed sandstone lozenges slot into the permeable paving like a satisfying jigsaw puzzle, creating accessible pathways.
Seasonal planting palette, colours and flowering phases embrace and celebrate the seasonality of the dune landscape.
Mature Pandanus trees and deep eaves give shade and protection on hot summer days.
The design welcomes windblown sand as it blows across the site. The pavers are designed to blend with the drifting sand for a seamless transition between surfaces.
The planting beds are arranged to define key pathways, with broad seating edges and dune planting.
Nestled behind the dune and protected by the pavilions, the courtyard is the heart of the surf club.
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