The crowded inner city context; which included a 4 meter high wall running the length of the site on the northern (sunny) side; the very particular planning constraints that govern buildings in Melbourne; the low cost of timber and the high level of skill available in the local building industry – informed the building’s massing, the profile of the curved cross section, neighbouring setbacks and material resolution.

Our aspiration was to maximise light penetration throughout. The sunshells, along with the translucent danpalon panels in the facade and the central courtyard facilitate this. The additional benefits of cross ventilation encouraged by the building’s shells further developed the cross sectional profile.

We certainly researched buildings of this typology; but Sheppard Robson’s prototype was not among them. The thread concerning authorship of a curved sectional profile is absurd; implying forms as simple as an elegant response to the sun, wind and rain are somehow copyrighted – and that as architects we work by assembling a three dimensional pastiche of fashionable projects rather than thinking about our work from first principles.

For the record – we didn’t copy anyone – we researched carefully – we applied what we learned – we responded to the site at an intellectual and intuitive level – and we crafted a site specific response that is intrinsically tied to the projects’ context.

It was never my intention to open a ‘which is best debate’.
Besides, you are not comparing like for like here – Tandem’s has the advantage of having a real world context (and presumably – end user client).
Sheppard Robson’s is a prototype built at inovation park at the Building Research Establishment, with the sole aim of attaining the most stringent sustainability criteria. As such it is entirely site specific, but destined never to aquire the magic only a ‘home’ can posess…. unless the opportunity arose to build a real world derivative….

Of course one has to expect people to be ‘inspired’ by great ideas…
even so, such blatant similarity in form, structure and materiality is pushing it bit…
Hang on a minute. The name too?!
What on earth are Tandem thinking?
They may be the other side of the planet, but did they really think this would go un-noticed?”

I agree with Martin wholeheartedly.

This building form is not unique or autonomous, as most building forms are not. I think we need to be a little more restrained when making claims like “blatant similarity” that won’t “go unnoticed.”

I think your design is more contextual and more effective in it’s setting than that of Sheppard Robson. It seems to me that your form was derived by site much more than his which seems (from the pictures) to be plunked down in a rural or suburban context. I want to congratulate you on a beautiful design that plays with light, space, and place in a way that all architects should respect.

If the similarities between the 2 projects are indeed purely coincidental then I am truely fascinated by them.

But what is this in the end? The word that comes into my mind is: Favela