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Torin Building
Torin Building is a heritage-listed former factory, now converted to factory and office space. It is located at 26 Coombes Drive in the western Sydney suburb of Penrith in the City of Penrith local government area of New South Wales, Australia. It was designed by Marcel Breuer (with Harry Seidler as onsite supervisor) and built from 1975 to 1976. It is also known as the Former Torin Corporation Building and Breuer Building. It was added to the New South Wales State Heritage Register on 15 May 2009.
Marcel Breuer was born in Hungary in 1902. He studied under Walter Gropius at the Bauhaus in Weimar where he also came into contact with a number of other significant figures in design and architecture such as Le Corbusier. These associations influenced Breuer in his professional life for many years. In 1924 Breuer became Director of the Bauhaus furniture workshop and also took on a teaching role there. It was while he was working at the Bauhaus that Breuer developed his ground breaking Wassily and Cesca tubular steel chair designs. In 1928 Breuer set up an architecture and interior design practise in Berlin. When Hitler became Chancellor of Germany in 1933, Breuer moved to London where he continued to practise as an internationally noted architect and designer.
In 1937 on the invitation of Walter Gropius, then Chairman of the Faculty of Architecture at Harvard, Breuer took up an Associate Professorship at that university. He also went into partnership with Gropius and began a distinguished career in America. During the 1940s Breuer's American work was primarily the design of domestic residences and he was thought to have revolutionised the design of American houses. Geller House was designed in 1945 and was the first of Breuer's binuclear houses where living and sleeping accommodation was separated in two wings roofed with one of his distinctive butterfly roofs that quickly became an icon of modernist design all over the world.
In 1952 the design of the UNESCO building in Paris marked Breuer's first significant foray into the design of international public buildings. In this building Breuer began his use of concrete as a favoured construction material. It was also a turning point in his adoption of a distinctively sculptural approach to architectural form which was developed over the years to his retirement in 1976 and expressed in buildings such as the Whitney Museum of American Art, New York and St Francis de Sales Church, Muskegon, Michigan. Through works such as these Breuer built his reputation as the most significant "form giver" of the 20th century. As Seidler noted in an obituary published in the Architecture Bulletin in 1981 "There can be no doubt that Marcel Breuer was a great man, the last and one of the greatest of those few men who shaped modern architecture and modern design after World War I."
Breuer's long-term association with the Torrington Corporation (later renamed Torin Corporation) began in 1952 when he designed the Technical Centre at the corporation's factory in Canada. Between 1952 and 1976, Breuer designed nine factory and office buildings for the Torin Corporation. The last was constructed in 1976 in Penrith, NSW. This building's design was a result of the evolution and refinement of technical and visual experience of the Torin buildings preceding it. A tenth Torin building was designed and constructed by Breuer's practise after he retired in 1976.
The Torin building in Penrith was designed by Breuer and his partner, Herbert Beckhard from their offices in New York. The administration of the project during construction was taken on by the office of Harry Seidler and Associates in Sydney. Seidler had worked for Breuer in 1946–1948. In 1973 there had been an agreement signed between Harry Seidler and Associates and the Commonwealth of Australia for an Australian Embassy in Paris, Seidler said that 'it was natural for me to ask Breuer's Paris office to be our 'architecte d'operation'. It meant re-establishing a working relationship with him after many years. The ground breaking ceremony took place on 6 January 1975.
The Torin Corporation factory at Penrith was built within an industrial estate to the north of the town centre. It is located on the corner of Coombes Drive and Coombes Drive South. Car access was from Coombes Drive and trucking access to the large storage area behind the factory building was from Coombes Drive South.
Buildings in the area are widely spaced and there are no special elements that would affect the outlook or disposition of the building on the site. The main elevation is bold in its architectural composition consisting of almost windowless cuboid forms of rough-textured concrete block and precast concrete. It is an exemplary late Twentieth Century International Modern Style industrial building, is a powerful work, a fully resolved in three dimensional architectural expression which is monumental in its bold geometry. The plan and mass of the building was the outcome of its integrated handling system consisting of storage, retrieval and reassembling.
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Torin Building
Torin Building is a heritage-listed former factory, now converted to factory and office space. It is located at 26 Coombes Drive in the western Sydney suburb of Penrith in the City of Penrith local government area of New South Wales, Australia. It was designed by Marcel Breuer (with Harry Seidler as onsite supervisor) and built from 1975 to 1976. It is also known as the Former Torin Corporation Building and Breuer Building. It was added to the New South Wales State Heritage Register on 15 May 2009.
Marcel Breuer was born in Hungary in 1902. He studied under Walter Gropius at the Bauhaus in Weimar where he also came into contact with a number of other significant figures in design and architecture such as Le Corbusier. These associations influenced Breuer in his professional life for many years. In 1924 Breuer became Director of the Bauhaus furniture workshop and also took on a teaching role there. It was while he was working at the Bauhaus that Breuer developed his ground breaking Wassily and Cesca tubular steel chair designs. In 1928 Breuer set up an architecture and interior design practise in Berlin. When Hitler became Chancellor of Germany in 1933, Breuer moved to London where he continued to practise as an internationally noted architect and designer.
In 1937 on the invitation of Walter Gropius, then Chairman of the Faculty of Architecture at Harvard, Breuer took up an Associate Professorship at that university. He also went into partnership with Gropius and began a distinguished career in America. During the 1940s Breuer's American work was primarily the design of domestic residences and he was thought to have revolutionised the design of American houses. Geller House was designed in 1945 and was the first of Breuer's binuclear houses where living and sleeping accommodation was separated in two wings roofed with one of his distinctive butterfly roofs that quickly became an icon of modernist design all over the world.
In 1952 the design of the UNESCO building in Paris marked Breuer's first significant foray into the design of international public buildings. In this building Breuer began his use of concrete as a favoured construction material. It was also a turning point in his adoption of a distinctively sculptural approach to architectural form which was developed over the years to his retirement in 1976 and expressed in buildings such as the Whitney Museum of American Art, New York and St Francis de Sales Church, Muskegon, Michigan. Through works such as these Breuer built his reputation as the most significant "form giver" of the 20th century. As Seidler noted in an obituary published in the Architecture Bulletin in 1981 "There can be no doubt that Marcel Breuer was a great man, the last and one of the greatest of those few men who shaped modern architecture and modern design after World War I."
Breuer's long-term association with the Torrington Corporation (later renamed Torin Corporation) began in 1952 when he designed the Technical Centre at the corporation's factory in Canada. Between 1952 and 1976, Breuer designed nine factory and office buildings for the Torin Corporation. The last was constructed in 1976 in Penrith, NSW. This building's design was a result of the evolution and refinement of technical and visual experience of the Torin buildings preceding it. A tenth Torin building was designed and constructed by Breuer's practise after he retired in 1976.
The Torin building in Penrith was designed by Breuer and his partner, Herbert Beckhard from their offices in New York. The administration of the project during construction was taken on by the office of Harry Seidler and Associates in Sydney. Seidler had worked for Breuer in 1946–1948. In 1973 there had been an agreement signed between Harry Seidler and Associates and the Commonwealth of Australia for an Australian Embassy in Paris, Seidler said that 'it was natural for me to ask Breuer's Paris office to be our 'architecte d'operation'. It meant re-establishing a working relationship with him after many years. The ground breaking ceremony took place on 6 January 1975.
The Torin Corporation factory at Penrith was built within an industrial estate to the north of the town centre. It is located on the corner of Coombes Drive and Coombes Drive South. Car access was from Coombes Drive and trucking access to the large storage area behind the factory building was from Coombes Drive South.
Buildings in the area are widely spaced and there are no special elements that would affect the outlook or disposition of the building on the site. The main elevation is bold in its architectural composition consisting of almost windowless cuboid forms of rough-textured concrete block and precast concrete. It is an exemplary late Twentieth Century International Modern Style industrial building, is a powerful work, a fully resolved in three dimensional architectural expression which is monumental in its bold geometry. The plan and mass of the building was the outcome of its integrated handling system consisting of storage, retrieval and reassembling.