The RMIT Building 10 Super Wet Lab was a ground-breaking new teaching laboratory for RMIT’s STEM college. Representing a new paradigm for the University, its open-plan layout and bespoke design allowed for AV-enhanced teaching of up to 120 students concurrently.

Striking for the project was the ‘humanization of the laboratory’. Through careful consultation with senior STEM stakeholders it was determined to avoid the typically sterile and unwelcoming aesthetic of the conventional laboratory, and instead develop a space that was welcoming, warm and inviting, while also being practical, safe, durable and entirely fit for purpose.

The extensive use of timber-style finishes, and the ‘crystalline floor pattern’ which draws on Aboriginal colour groups associated with STEM teaching programs, were carefully intertwined with the exciting c1960s building form (characterised by its rhythmic column grid and brutalist material language). Light fills the laboratory through the retention of extensive glazing along the north and south facades.

Detailed studies including population-movement simulations were undertaken to ensure the function and arrangement of the laboratory was flexible and future-focussed. Teaching can be conducted in groups as small as 15, and up to 120. Bespoke and integrated AV required careful interfacing with RMIT IT. Every last inch of ceiling space was required to incorporate building services (in fact the timber ‘ceiling truss’ doesn’t just informalise the environment, it provides the space required for services to cross one another).