Land (In)equalities: Retrofitting for Nature-Inclusive Suburbia

Melbourne’s low-density expansion has produced one of the world’s most spatially extensive cities, spreading across 10,000km². In response to housing affordability pressures, low-rise housing continues to consume the city’s fringe—often on agricultural and ecologically significant land. This growth occurs on unceded Boonwurrung Country, where development has displaced biodiversity, fragmented ecosystems, and severed ancient cultural and ecological connections.

This design studio is focused on Cranbourne, a rapidly urbanising suburb on Melbourne’s south-eastern edge. Here, remnant bushland at the Royal Botanic Garden supports over 215 native species, including the endangered Southern Brown Bandicoot. Yet low-rise, homogeneous housing encroaches to the very edge of this ecological refuge, disrupting critical wildlife corridors.

Working alongside students in the Master of Architecture, studio participants investigated how architectural design can retrofit and restructure existing and emerging suburban developments to be community oriented and nature-inclusive. Proposals explored new housing typologies, reconfigured subdivisions and integrated ecological infrastructure such as water-sensitive urban design, biodiversity corridors and microclimate-responsive public spaces.

View the Master of Architecture studio.

Studio Leaders: Anna Gilby and Catherine Murphy