MPavilion 2022 launches in Melbourne

(Image credit: Casey Horsfield)

published 8 December 2022

MPavilion 2022 has opened to the public, launching today at Melbourne's Queen Victoria Gardens – and this year, it brings a splash of colour and an ethereal quality to the park's greenery, thanks to its bespoke design by Bangkok-based architecture studio All(zone), led by design director Rachaporn Choochuey.

MPavilion 2022 detail showing ground structure and floating canopy roof

MPavilion 2022 by All(zone)

MPavilion 2022, under Choochuey's direction, is fun and engaging, while also bringing something new to the table – as it experiments with materials never before used in Australia. Conceived to celebrate the outdoors, as well as the idea of community and coming together, the structure features a distinctive canopy, made of fabric and expert tensile architecture. Part of the material is crafted from a cutting-edge STFE membrane supplied by French manufacturer Serge Ferrari, which is as transparent as glass but ten times lighter, its creators explain. Its use is a first for the country.

'Working on the MPavilion project with so many talented individuals has been an incredible journey. MPavilion is special because even though it’s called a temporary pavilion, it’s actually even more complex than a building. We focused on how the MPavilion would accommodate lots of different activities, and the engineering and manufacturing has been a huge step forward for us in understanding the possibilities of fabric-based architecture,' says Choochuey.

Beyond its material innovations, the pavilion features a bottom layer made of a waffle of coloured fabric. It's light and moves with the breeze, filtering the sunlight and mimicking the gentle rustle of tree leaves. Underneath it sits a kiosk, painted with carefully selected Dulux shades.

'When I first met Rachaporn and her design team, I quickly realised that we shared goals of harnessing architecture and design to make the world a better place for the future. Focused on solutions for upcycling and reusing buildings, sites and materials, All(zone)’s lightweight interventions complement MPavilion’s vision of fostering dialogue on how design and architecture can help create better cities for the people who live in them,' says Naomi Milgrom Foundation founder and the project's commissioner Naomi Milgrom.

mpavilion.org

allzonedesignall.com

Ellie Stathaki is the Architecture & Environment Director at Wallpaper*. She trained as an architect at the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki in Greece and studied architectural history at the Bartlett in London. Now an established journalist, she has been a member of the Wallpaper* team since 2006, visiting buildings across the globe and interviewing leading architects such as Tadao Ando and Rem Koolhaas. Ellie has also taken part in judging panels, moderated events, curated shows and contributed in books, such as The Contemporary House (Thames & Hudson, 2018), Glenn Sestig Architecture Diary (2020) and House London (2022).