The 2020 Learning Environments Australasia (LEA) Awards for Excellence in Educational Facilities saw two overall winners declared in the 13th annual awards.
Carlton Primary School’s Carlton Learning Precinct by Law Architects and John Paul College’s Kindergarten by Deicke Richards Architects with Aspect Studios in collaboration with John Paul College Kindergarten both won the top honours from a field of 122 entries across Australia, New Zealand and Singapore. There were eight categories for projects to be entered into this year.
LEA says these two winners were very different projects in scale, but both worthy of the overall winner prize.
Carlton Learning Precinct also won the Category 4: Renovation / Modernisation Valued Over AU $5 Million. The judges described the project as “a truly transformative project that improves the lives of the children and families who engaged directly with its services and is a focal point for community events including weekend markets and local sport”.
John Paul College Kindergarten won the Category 6: Small Projects Under AU $2 million. The judges noted it as “designed to provoke wonder and curiosity, this child-centred environment is indeed the third teacher in a local context”.
The awards’ ceremony was to be held as part of the annual LEA conference in Christchurch, New Zealand. However, the COVID19 pandemic and resulting restrictions resulted in the conference being sadly cancelled. This provided an opportunity for the awards to be presented via an online “webinar” which 264 participants attended on 11 June, 2020.
The video of the awards presentation can be viewed here.
To see the entire list of winners and commendations and to read the jury citations go to 2020 Awards.
