Quay Quarter Lanes is the rejuvenation of a city block in the heart of Sydney City at Circular Quay. The project comprises a collection of new and restored buildings and laneways. Three new buildings designed by SJB, Silvester Fuller and Studio Bright complement the site’s heritage wool store Hinchcliff House, restored by Carter Williamson and the Gallipoli Memorial Club, restored by Lippmann Partnership. Stitching the new and old is a public domain and landscape design by ASPECT Studios.Featuring rich, velvety materials, Young Street is made of luxurious brick, with deep reflective window reveals sitting above the glazed commercial office façade below. This richness and contrast respond to the historic masonry of nearby Bridge Street. Steel awnings with polished brass soffits are draped from the facade – creating an active pedestrian-scaled yet intimate street experience.

The base of the building incorporates a public arcade creating a connection through the site with boutique retail, cafes and dining tenancies, topped with three levels of light-filled boutique commercial office spaces overlooking the revitalised laneways.

The facade treatment modulates according to the building’s mixture of uses. The three-level podium is glazed floor-to-ceiling so its commercial tenants can engage and be part of street life. Deep steel window frames and the building’s polished brass awning lends intrigue and luxe to the podium. A material step change occurs above, with the eight residential levels fortified behind 80-cm thick walls of Roman ochre brickwork. These are punctuated with deeply recessed window openings of varying dimensions for orchestrated outlooks and privacy.

Eight levels of apartments are perched high in the city skyline with landscaped rooftops and private views of Sydney Harbour. Dwellings enjoy a thick perimeter wall, accommodating window seats and orchestrated framed views of Sydney landmarks. Double-storey voids give selected living rooms a sense of luxury, rare in inner-city multi-residential developments.

The building balances the necessary quietness and privacy of the residential component with the activation and street presence of the commercial and retail of the podium. It gives back the ground plane to the city in material detailing while creating quiet, protected space for the residents above. To its north, the building meets Hinchcliff House reverentially. The three-story podium is extruded in a paler brick to appear as a smaller structure that leaves a tiny laneway space between the two. Modelled on Nurses Walk in The Rocks district, the one person-wide laneway links Young Street and Loftus Lane.