Australia’s Best Timber Building Is a Lesson for Every School
Judges called Wollongong’s Hoskins Building the first cross-laminated timber Passive House building in Australia, with 850 cubic metres of the engineered wood forming its walls, floors, and roof.
Inside the Hoskins Building at The Illawarra Grammar School in Wollongong, which judges called the first CLT Passive House building in Australia. (Photo Credit: Early release supplied by Australian Timber Design Awards for one time use / Leo Mamede)
The Illawarra Grammar School’s Hoskins Building has topped a field including Sydney Fish Market and the Adelaide Aquatic Centre to take the country’s top timber design prize. That is according to the judges of the 27th Australian Timber Design Awards, who named the cross-laminated timber school building by betti und knut architecture the overall winner on Wednesday night.
“I think we’re quite overwhelmed by getting this award,” betti und knut architecture said as it accepted the Grand Prix on stage at Sydney’s Museum of Contemporary Art. The practice also said many more schools should be built like the Hoskins Building, to get students thinking about sustainability.
Its architects said it had been “quite surprising” to be engaged at all, given the small studio was tendering against much larger practices for the job. They credited a client and project team “aligned with everything that you’re doing” and thanked “a great builder” in Rohrig.
betti und knut architecture with the Grand Prix for the Hoskins Building, announced by Kevin Peachey, Head of Built Environment Programs, FWPA/WoodSolutions, at Sydney’s Museum of Contemporary Art. (Photo Credit: Leo Mamede / Australian Timber Design Awards)
Hilti quick connectors join the building’s cross-laminated timber columns and beams, which the architects said will let the whole frame come apart in future without screw fixings. They also said the building tested four times tighter than the Passivhaus standard requires, and that its design cuts heating and cooling demand by 80 per cent.
In comments played over the project’s images, the judges called the Hoskins Building “something to be very proud of”, with one judge saying all schools should be like it. They praised the technical innovation in its connections, which allow for “longer term circularity”, saying there was “a lot of stuff packed into a small package”.
Before taking the Grand Prix, the Hoskins Building won the Public Building award ahead of Woods Bagot’s The Forest, which reworked the University of Tasmania’s historic Forestry building in Hobart. MC James Fitzpatrick, whose Seed House took the top prize in 2019, called the overall award “the high point of our awards presentations this evening”.
Meanwhile, Sydney Fish Market won the Savcon-sponsored Commercial Building category for 3XN with BVN and ASPECT Studios, ahead of finalists including Lyons and EJE’s Gosford Central. Its harbourside roof, the largest built for a fish market in the Southern Hemisphere, uses 1,800 cubic metres of spruce glulam shipped from Italy.
Members of the public chose fjcstudio’s fit-out of The Cutaway at Barangaroo for the People’s Choice Award, with the judges also handing it the Intergrain-sponsored award for commercial and public fit-outs. The practice said its 13 free-form timber trees rise up to 17 metres around the existing concrete columns beneath Barangaroo Reserve.
fjcstudio with the People’s Choice Award, sponsored by Wood Central, and the commercial and public fit-out award, presented by Intergrain general manager Evan Sprong, for The Cutaway at Barangaroo. (Photo Credit: Leo Mamede / Australian Timber Design Awards)
Archier’s Ora House, a Victorian family home whose timber window systems and ceiling panels were prefabricated by its sister company Candour, won the Responsible Wood-supported Australian Certified Timber Award. Fitzpatrick told guests the category is judged not on design but on “how certified timber is an integral part of the use of timber in the design”.
Matt de Jongh, Responsible Wood’s acting chief executive, presented the award, with Gray Puksand’s CIT Woden, LIAN Architects and Hayball’s Swift Walk Arcade, and Charles Sandford’s The Foundation Tree the other finalists. It comes as betti und knut said all of the Hoskins Building’s cross-laminated timber is PEFC and FSC certified, with fjcstudio citing PEFC-certified timber from its manufacturer.
Matt de Jongh, Responsible Wood’s acting chief executive, presents Archier with the Australian Certified Timber Award for Ora House, on a plaque made from timber salvaged at Rollands Plains on the NSW mid north coast, in country hit by the Black Summer bushfires. (Photo Credit: Early release supplied by Australian Timber Design Awards for one time use / Leo Mamede)
Elsewhere on the list, Bohane Campo’s Enclave House took the ASH-sponsored award for new homes, whilst Casey Brown Architecture’s Wilson’s Cottage won the Pentarch-sponsored alterations and additions award. Prior Barraclough’s Bank Street House won the Timber NSW-sponsored residential fit-out award, with Richards Stanisich’s Lamella Chair taking furniture and joinery, sponsored by iTi Australia.
Warren and Mahoney’s Adelaide Aquatic Centre, designed with JPE Design Studio and Karl Winda Telfer, won Sports and Recreation, and Das Studio’s Tonsley Technical College took the Planet Ark-sponsored Sustainability award. The Aesop Design Team won Recycled Timber, sponsored by Kennedy’s Timbers, for the skincare brand’s Canberra store, with Helen Murray of the Gottstein Trust accepting on its behalf.
Tomek Archer, whose Archer Office won last year’s Grand Prix for the Boot Factory in Bondi Junction, was one of five judges who chose the winners across 11 categories. He sat on the panel with Yann Frampton of Hassell, Nick Hewson of Arboralis, Victoria Judge of SJB, and Amy Smith of Arup.
Kylan Low, who organises the Australian Timber Design Awards, says the goal is for timber in Australian buildings to become unremarkable. (Photo Credit: Leo Mamede / Australian Timber Design Awards)
“We’re at the point now where people who are not familiar with the timber industry might scratch their heads and think, what, this is unusual?” said Kylan Low, who organises the awards. Low also said furniture and joinery drew real fervour from entrants this year, and that the goal is for timber to become “not so special anymore”.
For the full list of 2026 winners and finalists, subscribe to the Australian Timber Design Awards.
Editor’s note: Wood Central sponsored the People’s Choice Award, which publisher Jason Ross presented on the night.
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