Embedding First Peoples' knowledge and culture within Australia’s built environments

Embedding First Peoples' knowledge and culture within Australia’s built environments

RMIT University’s Yulendj Weelam Lab from the Architecture and Urban Design School are partnering with design professionals to create a reconciled future for Australia's built environments.

Key points

  • The Yulendj Weelam Design Research Lab at RMIT University is focused on ensuring Australia’s built environment respectfully engages with and supports First Peoples.
  • Academics, Indigenous knowledge holders and design experts are working together to shape Australia’s built environment and acknowledge more than 60,000 years of Indigenous culture.
  • The RMIT team offers guidance and support to architects and designers to deepen their understanding and transform architectural and design practises to incorporate Indigenous Knowledge.

There is a growing demand in the public and commercial sectors to engage with First Peoples and embed their deep knowledge of Country and connection to place in architectural and built environment practices.

However, RMIT lecturer in Landscape Architecture Dr Jock Gilbert, said it can be difficult for design practitioners to know how best to respectfully engage with Indigenous communities.

“The challenges include a lack of cultural capacity and the tools to respectfully engage. They are uncertain about who to engage with, and professional and Indigenous timelines do not align,” said Gilbert.

To address these issues and foster an understanding of Indigenous knowledge, Gilbert and his colleague Dr Christine Phillips established the Yulendj Weelam Design Research Lab at RMIT with N’arwee’t Professor Carolyn Briggs, Barkandji scholar, Sophia Pearce, and Gamilaraay academic, Beau de Belle.

Both Gilbert and Phillips are practitioners who have a longstanding interest to embed Indigenous Knowledge into their own architectural research, practice and teaching, and have spent many years working closely with Indigenous communities.

The Yulendj Weelam Lab

The Yulendj Weelam Lab’s name is drawn from the Boon Wurrung language, meaning ‘deep knowledge’ and ‘home’.

The team includes Boon Wurrung Elder N’arwee’t Dr Carolyn Briggs AM; Barkandji anthropology scholar Sophia Pearce, and Gamilaraay architecture graduate and academic, Beau de Belle.

Reconciliation approach for architectural and design partners

Gilbert said the group facilitates collaboration and understanding of Indigenous perspectives, knowledges, and communities.

“We understand that non-indigenous design practitioners and place-makers practicing on unceded lands and on Country have an obligation to reconciliation,” said Gilbert.

“They need to develop and nurture relationships with Indigenous knowledge-holders,” he said.

Our lab leans heavily on the concept of ‘unburdening,’ where we believe it's the responsibility of non-Indigenous people to do much of this work to take the burden off First Nations Peoples.

Active reconciliation is then embedded from the beginning, as designers and architects consider the foundations of their relationship to place.

Supporting a deeper understanding of Indigenous knowledge

Gilbert said the Lab offers workshops that aim to connect design practitioners directly with Indigenous Knowledge and build relationships and an understanding of how such relationships can enrich their design practises.

We prompt individuals to ask, ‘If I acknowledge my relationship to this country and unceded land with a prior occupation for 60 to 100,000 years, what does that mean for my practise as designer?’

“Then we think about how that starts to shift the way the organisation operates; before doing a deep dive into specific projects,” he said.

“Next, we take the architects and designers out on Country for an immersive experience, meeting with Elders and others in the First Nations community.”

Spotlight on successful partnership with ClarkeHopkinsClarke Architects

ClarkeHopkinsClarke Architects (CHC) partnered with The Yulendj Weelam Lab to help build their teams’ cultural understanding and capacity to embed Indigenous Knowledge into their design practices.

Tailored workshops and meeting directly with Indigenous Elders on Country provided deeper insights into Indigenous perspectives, leaving powerful and lasting impressions on the design practitioners.

The research partnership

Spending time on Country at Framlingham and Budj Bim had a profound impact on the CHC team.Spending time on Country at Framlingham and Budj Bim had a profound impact on the CHC team.

Kath Dolan from CHC's New Business and Marketing team said the partnership was first suggested by an employee who had been a former student of Jock Gilbert and Christine Phillips.

It was a lovely personal connection from the start, which I think is a really powerful part of the collaboration.

“Jock and Christine’s compassion, empathy, sense of humour, and practicality really helped from the beginning too.

“People can feel anxious in this space because nobody wants to put a foot wrong, so they need to be put at ease. Christine and Jock’s team has done that beautifully.”

Building awareness and understandings across a large organisation

CHC had been working with Aboriginal clients since 2018, building its team’s resources and capacity through project work, internal and external events, guest speakers, and a large library of resources and advice from First Nations designers. Its 2022-2024 Innovate RAP aims to embed Designing with Country into its approach on projects, and the practice had created an interdisciplinary group of around 20 designers working in teams across the practice to build awareness and momentum. The partnership with Yulendj Weelam Lab on a series of half-day workshops helped elevate and focus their efforts and bring the whole leadership team on board.

“The collaboration with Jock and Christine helped us identify what we were doing well, what we could be doing better, and how to embed and communicate a really clear process into more projects,” said Dolan.

“We understand it’s an ongoing journey that will take time to develop and grow, but that’s what we're aspiring to,” she said.

Powerful immersive experience on Country

James Gilliland (Yorta Yorta), CHC’s Associate – First Nations Lead and a Director at IADA (Indigenous Architecture and Design Australia), said time spent on Country at Budj Bim, and at Framlingham with Kirrae Whurrong Elder Uncle Lenny Clarke, had a profound impact on the team.

The collaboration helped to give us a strong foundation and structure for what we want to achieve, and I think a key part of that was the on-Country experience.

“We met with Uncle Lenny and his family and then on the second day we went to Budj Bim, which was amazing,” he said.

The group visited a community space at Budj Bim in southwestern Victoria.The group visited a community space at Budj Bim in Victoria.

“At Framlingham Uncle Lenny spoke about how Jock and Christine had collaborated on a design for the local community that includes spaces for music and culture where community could come together and be creative and have some positive outlets.”

Kath Dolan said there was a strong emotional impact from this meeting too.

“It was extremely moving, being with Uncle Lenny and standing in the cemetery where some of his family were buried as he was talking about the intergenerational trauma many are experiencing,” said Dolan.

“It wasn’t a comfortable day but it was truth telling, and that’s so important,” she said.

“Uncle Lenny also shared the hopes he has for the community centre as a place for healing.

As a practice we need to understand all that complexity if we're going to do this properly, she said. The experience has really stayed with people, and Jock and Christine knew that it would.
CHC staff and RMIT researchers joined Uncle Lenny on Country.CHC staff and RMIT researchers joined Uncle Lenny on Country.

CHC architect and Partner Ngaio Chalmers said the on-Country learning at Framlingham and Budj Bim had given the team a more personal connection to some of the vast knowledge and innovation held within First Nations cultures.

“I still hear from my team about that experience, so I think it was pivotal for them,” said Chalmers.

“It also confirmed how important it is to get designers to think about what it means to design with Country and to understand and work with local communities at that early stage of a project.

“We do a lot of projects on Gunditjmara Country and the Budj Bim area in southwestern Victoria, so to get more of our team there to understand the opportunities for designing with Country was beneficial.

“These collaborations have started opening further networks, opportunities and possibilities.

“And we’re continuing to build on some of those community relationships, which are fundamental.”

Opportunities and hope for the future

Gilliland said he’d like to focus on addressing some of the social problems for Indigenous communities that he’d seen working together with Aboriginal Housing Victoria.

“Having stability in housing is fundamental for everything else being successful in your life, so I would like to see more work on that issue and more equality,” he said.

It’s good that things are changing and people are feeling more comfortable to talk about these issues, and acknowledging Indigenous Knowledge and culture in architectural designs.

“Within our practice, we’re now addressing it in every design pack that goes out, so it’s becoming more integrated into ‘business as usual’.”

Outcomes and impact of the Yulendj Weelam Design Research Lab and collaborations

A few key examples of the extensive outcomes and impacts include:

ClarkeHopkinsClarke Architects

  • Demonstrates leadership - in reconciliation and design practice for reconciliation through more extensive representation of Indigenous Knowledge in design projects and place development.
  • Reciprocity - Reciprocal benefits and opportunities through stronger relationships with Indigenous communities
  • Obligation - Ability to meet moral and ethical obligations inherent in practicing on unceded lands.
  • Competitive advantage - through unique capability in Indigenous engagement and co-design.

Indigenous community partners

  • Trusting relationships established - that ensure Indigenous community partners feel respected and valued.
  • Emplaced - Indigenous Knowledge and culture is more extensively and respectfully embedded in place, recognising Indigenous sovereignty.
  • Empowered - Indigenous communities are empowered to tell their story of Indigenous Knowledge and culture through and in place.
  • Self-determination - Economic benefits through procurement of Indigenous services and enterprise development.

Wider community

  • Visibility - Increased cultural awareness and support for reconciliation through stronger representation of IK in design projects and places.
  • Celebration and acknowledgement - Built environment projects that acknowledge and celebrate 60,000 years of Indigenous culture.

Gilbert said it was good to see the resulting knowledge and tools developed by CHC that aim to help their ongoing efforts to embed Indigenous Knowledge into everyday practice.

“ClarkeHopkinsClarke has made some pretty significant shifts to the way the organisation runs, and they have developed an internal document to guide staff with principles and practical examples of how they might go about embedding Indigenous Knowledge into their practice,” said Gilbert.

“Individual architects within the organisation are building these amazing relationships through the projects that they're doing with Aboriginal community organisations,” he said.

“Now my focus is really to help them as an organisation to foreground those relationships and those beautiful stories.

The reciprocal benefits and opportunities through the relationships that are being developed for the architects, researchers and communities are vital. This includes bringing our First Nations communities into contact with design practitioners, so each is starting to learn the others’ language.

Key contacts

Dr Jock Gilbert
Program Manager and Lecturer
School of Architecture and Urban Design

Dr Christine Phillips
Senior Lecturer
School of Architecture and Urban Design

SDGs

Indigenous knowledgearchitectsdesign practitionersAustralia’s built environmentsreconciliation
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Acknowledgement of Country

RMIT University acknowledges the people of the Woi wurrung and Boon wurrung language groups of the eastern Kulin Nation on whose unceded lands we conduct the business of the University. RMIT University respectfully acknowledges their Ancestors and Elders, past and present. RMIT also acknowledges the Traditional Custodians and their Ancestors of the lands and waters across Australia where we conduct our business - Artwork 'Sentient' by Hollie Johnson, Gunaikurnai and Monero Ngarigo.

Learn more about our commitment to Indigenous cultures