Design Tasmania Camp

Design Tasmania has announced their 2016 camp, which will run from Friday Oct 28th – Monday 31st 2016. This year’s camp has partnered with Spring Bay Mill at Triabunna. Tickets are now available to participate in this year’s event on the East Coast of Tasmania.

Over three days the camp will immerse practitioners in the heart of this historical and industrial complex situated on the east coast of Tasmania.

Spring Bay Mill is situated on the headland of Freestone Point, overlooking Maria Island and is being revivified into a tourism hub and multipurpose site, designed with an air of ‘contemplation’ as the driving forces for visitors in the future.

The Mill partners with local education and cultural groups, and has hosted festival partnerships with MOFO, Festival of Voices: Unplugged, Ten Days on the Island, exhibitions and workshops.

There is a plethora of undulating landscapes that tell the story of the sites history, from the last forty years as the Southern Hemispheres largest woodchip mill and before that a site for whaling and sandstone mining. The land ownership dates back millennia to the lands of the Laremairremener, Tyreddeme and Portmairremener people.

The existing industrial infrastructure pays homage to the once functioning timber mill, a walk through the large voids beckons a feeling of magnificence and a thought towards what possibilities lie ahead for the future.

These adaptive settings evoke dynamic interactive environments that allow for a range of opportunities to explore new ideas, develop conceptual approaches and discuss ideas with other professionals.

Working in teams of 3-5, participants are asked to explore the site, uncover the history and design an orienteering route to their final destination. The checkpoints can incorporate any way of finding the site, such as historical facts of Spring Bay Mill, obvious land marks, or a navigational treasure map.

The final destination will be the place in which participants uncover an experience for the visitor. The site has had many uses and layers of history, participants may choose one of these to focus on or indeed choose to travel over time.

The end destination needs to be a culmination of the journey taken and become an immersive experience for the visitor. Participants designs will utilise existing equipment and materials found on the site and their design must be contained to the boundaries of Spring Bay Mill.

Over three days participants will be guided by mentors, have critique sessions and discussions with the final concepts to be pitched to a selection panel for Ten Days on The Island.

The panel will consist of Pippa Dickson, Chair of Design Tasmania, Stuart Loone, General Manager Spring Bay Mill and Jane Deeth, Visual Arts Coordinator Ten Days on the Island.

The successful design outcomes will be funded by Spring Bay Mill to be constructed and implemented on site up to a value of $2000.00 per work.

The camp booklet can be viewed here and an application accessed here.