In collaboration with Renewal SA, Arup, Breathe Architects and Aboriginal Urban Design, we shaped a green framework that reclaims this industrial site for community life — reconnecting people to the Karrawirra Parri (River Torrens), restoring ecology, and weaving Kaurna knowledges into the daily rhythms of the precinct.

At the heart of the masterplan lies Brewery Green, a civic park that gathers people and stories. From this anchor, a lattice of plazas, linear parks and biodiverse laneways extend through the neighbourhood, ensuring every home is within reach of greenery. These landscapes do more than soften the city — they create a living system of shade, cooling and connection.

Landscape here is not a supplement, but the backbone of urban life. A revitalised riparian edge along Karrawirra Parri nurtures biodiversity and resilience. A target of 30 percent tree canopy coverage turns streets into shaded corridors, while water-sensitive design ensures that rain, stormwater and river are reimagined as visible, regenerative elements in the public realm.

Heritage anchors the new with the old: the iconic Walkerville Brew Tower stands as a civic marker, while the foundations of Colonel Light’s ‘Theberton’ Cottage are interlaced into plazas and parkland.These artefacts are not preserved as static relics but reactivated as places of gathering, storytelling and reflection — a continuity of memory within a new landscape.

Through close collaboration with urban designers, transport planners and sustainability specialists, TCL helped shape a people-first, climate-responsive framework.Streets are conceived for walking and cycling, public spaces for inclusion, and ecology for endurance. Water, shade and planting are not afterthoughts but structural elements of design, ensuring the neighbourhood can adapt, thrive and belong.

Southwark Grounds aims to set a new benchmark for renewal led by landscape — a vision of how nature, culture and community can come together to create a truly liveable piece of city.