Winning Design for $478m Biomedical Precinct Revealed

Australian architects Denton Corker Marshall with international architecture and engineering company HDR Inc have won a competition to design a $478-million health precinct for the University of Sydney and Royal Prince Alfred Hospital.

The Melbourne-based architects collaborated with Arcadia Landscape and Aileen Sage Architects on the winning design for the integrated health, education and research facility.

Known as the Sydney Biomedical Accelerator (SBA), the co-funded project between New South Wales Health, the Sydney Local Health District and the University of Sydney will be built across 36,000sq m on the western boundary of the university’s Camperdown campus, near Royal Prince Alfred.

Sydney University’s biggest capital investment so far will create a facility to tackle some of the world’s most complex health challenges—including cancer and neurodegenerative diseases—and position Sydney as a global leader in biomedical research.

More than 1200 biomedical researchers and clinician scientists will work from the three buildings that will make up the facility, including about 800 university laboratory researchers and PhD students as well as 100 industry researchers.

The design competition jury commended Denton Corker Marshall and HDR, saying “the scheme delivers a world-class biomedical innovation precinct that celebrates the relationship between the university and Royal Prince Alfred Hospital campuses”.

▲ A render of the Denton Corker Marshall and HDR Inc design for the health precinct.

University of Sydney vice-chancellor Professor Mark Scott said the investment was a key component of the university’s 10-year strategy.

“The range of world-class buildings and facilities that will make up the Sydney Biomedical Accelerator will bring together the brightest scientific and clinical minds with entrepreneurs, industry and government,” he said.

Scott said $143.3 million for the project had come from the NSW government in June this year and another $20 million from the Susan and Isaac Wakil Foundation.

The architects will work with the university, Sydney health district and other stakeholders to finalise designs in the next 12 to 18 months. The facility is expected to be operational from 2026.

Denton Corker Marshall and HDR are no strangers to biomedical education and research projects.

They’ve designed the biomedical learning and teaching building at Monash University, the Aikenhead centre for medical discovery at St Vincent’s Hospital in Melbourne, a bioresources facility at the University of Newcastle, the Sunshine Coast Health Institute in Queensland, and the life, earth and environmental sciences building, also at the University of Sydney.