A team of specialist consultants including Artedomus and our Italian porcelain partner, Fiandre, recently delivered the magnificent eastern facade of Arden Station. The project called for custom printed porcelain that would deliver innovation, high performance, and environmental benefits at a very large scale.
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Artedomus recently delivered our largest-scale custom-printed porcelain façade in Australia, for Arden Station in Melbourne. Arden Station is a new transport hub, delivered as part of the Victorian State Government’s Metro Tunnel Project. The hub is already attracting widespread attention for its impressive brick arches which pay homage to North Melbourne’s industrial history, and the magnificent 522-square-metre east exterior façade which features a major artwork by Australian artist Abdul Abdullah.
Abdul’s piece, ‘Come Together’, was originally imagined as a mosaic but ultimately realised in large-scale through Fiandre’s Design Your Slabs (DYS) porcelain. This custom hot stamping technology allowed for seamless, high-resolution reproduction of the artwork while maintaining the performance requirements essential for a major transport infrastructure project.
The east facade features Maximum Uni-Ice matt slabs, each 300×150cm in size and customised using the DYS system. The surface depicts Abdul’s artwork – a large-scale mosaic reproduction of the West Melbourne Swamp which existed on the site prior to colonisation and architectural intervention. Overlayed onto this swampland scenery are two large aluminium hands reaching out towards one another. “I wanted to make a waypoint where people could meet, I wanted them to meet under the hands of Arden Station,” says Abdul.
In addition to the east façade, Artedomus also delivered 590 square metres of Fiandre’s Maximum White Iron slabs for Arden Station’s west façade, too. Both façades – 1,112 square metres in all – deliver numerous maintenance and environmental benefits thanks to Fiandre’s patented Active Surfaces treatment, which enhances the porcelain panels with photocatalytic properties.
“The photocatalytic properties prevent environmental dirt from sticking to the surface of the panel, and generally rain will be all that’s needed to keep the surface clean. The panels also deliver anti-pollution properties, effectively reducing nitrogen oxides, [which is a key contributor to urban air pollution], to physically clean the air around it,” says William Pearse, Business Development Manager at Artedomus.
Laboratory tests, simulating an area of 1,112 square metres and 12 hours of sunlight per day, have demonstrated that the Active materials used in Arden Station’s east and west exterior facades can degrade approximately 6.5 kilograms of nitrogen oxide per year. The tests found the scale of pollution reduction comparable to that of 9,600 square metres of green space, validating Active Surfaces as a powerful ally in urban sustainability and public health. Read more on Active Surfaces.
“This is the first large-scale project in the world using Fiandre DYS with Active Surfaces; it is quite unique and exciting to see what is possible at this scale. There is no limitation to the type of artwork or shape, scale or colours that can be achieved with Fiandre – there is nothing else like it,” says William.
Browse Active Surfaces porcelain products.
Project team credits:
Artist – Abdul Abdullah
Project Manager – Charmaine Kasselman, CYP Design & Construction Joint Venture
Art Development – UAP
Porcelain Manufacturer – Fiandre, Iris Ceramica Group, represented in Australia by Artedomus
Porcelain Installation – Bartucca Tiling and Construction
Article credits:
Words by Alice Blackwood
Videography by Tommy Devy
Photography by Joanne Ly