Located on a steeply sloping site along Ivanhoe's iconic Boulevard, Ivanhoe Grammar School's Sports & Aquatic Centre is a world-class sporting & education facility that manages a complex brief within strict planning controls and a sensitive residential & landscape context.

This purpose-built Sports and Aquatic centre features a 50-metre pool with a variable depth floor for learning to swim and a movable boom for flexible modes of use. The centre includes four basketball/netball multi-purpose courts and associated amenities, new teaching spaces, a gymnasium and multipurpose rooms to cater for all round student learning and wellbeing.

Innovative Solutions

Working within the strict town planning constraints of an earlier development plan provided an opportunity for an innovative solution.

The design saw the courts drop below ground level, stacking them on top of one another, with additional rooftop courts to activate the roof and open up views from within the campus across the Yarra River and the city beyond. This visually connects the building with the main school oval and maximises land value with active student learning and recreation spaces.

The 6-level Sports & Aquatic Centre sits up to 25m below natural ground level. This allows the building to read with an intimacy of scale and sensitivity to context. This belies the sheer size of the internal spaces and prioritises the building's contribution to the landscape, the human & built scale of the campus and the broader neighbourhood.