18 Honeysuckle Drive — Edition Apartments

The Project

18 Honeysuckle Drive is a mixed-use development on the corner of Worth Place and Honeysuckle Drive in Newcastle's waterfront precinct, the harbourside urban renewal corridor that has reshaped the city's former industrial waterfront. Developed by Doma Group and constructed by BLOC, the project comprises two interconnected buildings: a commercial office building fronting Honeysuckle Drive and a residential tower on the corner, marketed as Edition Apartments, containing 72 one- and two-bedroom apartments with harbour and district views. The two buildings share integrated basement parking and services infrastructure.

The Challenge

The site occupied a prominent corner position at the eastern end of the Honeysuckle regeneration corridor, adjacent to the Newcastle Heavy Rail Line that was still in operation during the design phase. We worked with the understanding that the rail line would eventually be truncated, as it was in December 2014, and that a new road would fundamentally change the building's street frontage and urban context. The dual-use programme added another layer of complexity: combining commercial office and residential apartment typologies on a single site, with shared parking and servicing at podium level but distinct functional requirements above, demanded careful resolution of access, acoustic separation and servicing interfaces.

My Approach

I worked on this project as a part-time Graduate Architect at DWP Suters while completing my Master of Architecture at the University of Newcastle. My involvement spanned the development application and early design phases, where I supported the team with documentation and design resolution. I spent considerable time working on the street frontage levels, resolving the accessible entry sequence to the commercial building and managing the grade changes inherent in the sloping site. The corner condition was a particular focus: because we knew the adjacent rail corridor would eventually become a road, the design had to address both the existing condition and the future urban context that would emerge once the rail line was removed.

Learning how two distinct building typologies, commercial and residential, share loading docks, fire egress, mechanical plant and car parking while operating on fundamentally different patterns was valuable early exposure to the coordination challenges that define mixed-use design.

The Outcome

The completed Edition Apartments and commercial building now form part of the evolving waterfront streetscape that has given Newcastle a new harbourside identity. I departed DWP Suters before the project commenced on site, with BLOC completing construction in 2017.

Alongside the concurrent Arena Apartments project, 18 Honeysuckle Drive gave me the practical grounding in documentation, mixed-use coordination and the relationship between planning and building design that underpinned my transition from university into full-time practice. That understanding of how different uses coexist within a single building is something I bring to every project at Yaxley Studio.