The wonders of Ivanhoe heritage design
Somewhere in the past decade, the original Ivanhoe Town Hall had a complete make-over and the council delivered a well designed complex that consists of a new style library (a great facility), a small gallery (ok but not great), the meeting rooms for the council, and the main building became a venue – a large hall space for weddings and a range of cultural events (looked good!!)
Here’s a couple of photographs:
Late last year a sign appeared and the work commenced to take down the portico.
According to the sign, this was to meet the requirements of Heritage Victoria.
That notice sounded as though the council was forced into doing this demolition and to undertake the subsequent design/ reconstruction.
Being new to Melbourne (since late 2023) and visited this site a few times, I considered the original make-over was a good job and that the portico was a not too bad a design solution. It shone at night and allowed patrons cover for their arrivals and exits.
But alas it disappeared and we waited to see what a wonderful design solution would replace it. I do think that Heritage Victoria was doing an over-reach and that the council should have shown them the door!
The council surely has other priorities for their spending.
And then in March, the new work was completed.
The material is mainly a very plain bronzed metal, not unlike would be used for shop fronts or possibly toilet blocks. There is no matching decoration; meaning given the style of the original building, there should have been some matching decorative features. The signage is hard to read from some directions.
As for it function as a portico, it is a complete failure!
No longer will this protect people on arrival if it is raining – as it does often in this city especially around dusk.
The result is pathetic. If anyone thought the first solution was a bit of dominant feature that may have distracted from the architecture of the original, I disagree. It could have been better, possibly used some bricks to match. But the design of the orginal portico was not bad. And it worked as a portico.
This new one is pathetic.
It looks as though someone did not have enough money to build it out of relevant and matching materials and instead chose to use industrial style materials and design. The building has this thing attached to the front that is out of character with the building.
It is an underwhelming ugly thing stuck on the front that will no longer function as a portico to protect people on arrival.
I suspect that most people will not take too much notice of this poorly designed thingy as the architecture of the original building behind still looks great. The original architects knew something about design and would be shocked to see this piece of trash now stuck to the front.
I rated the original architectural solution as 4 out of 5 stars.
The new non-functioning attachment I would rate as 0 out of 5 stars.