Fortitude Valley, Brisbane, 2018

100 Brookes Street is an office building in the renowned Emporium precinct in Fortitude Valley. It was designed by Michael Rayner and Casey Vallance at their previous practice Cox Rayner over a decade ago. Dramatically increased public activity around the building prompted the building owners to revitalise the public interface with a new foyer and café.

The design pulls back the original street-aligned edge to open up a forecourt to the historic Holy Trinity Church opposite the building. A new café stretches along and completely opens up to the forecourt, forming an expansive meeting place, connected into the refurbished foyer.

Materials are primarily natural, relating the spaces to the raw coloured-concrete building above with former suspended ceilings stripped off to allow the concrete to wrap under and form the canopy to the spaces. Subtle material and colour transitions along a profilit glass wall reinforce spatial continuity, with bespoke detailing removing the previously corporatised identity, encouraging people to regard the space as openly public.