Thoughtful About Action: Other Architects' Grace Mortlock on Expanding the Scope of Architecture and Caring for What Already Exists

By Julia Gamolina

Grace Mortlock is a director of Other Architects, a young Australian office that finds architectural interest in everyday, overlooked and unlikely places. She runs the office with co-director David Neustein and associate Lindsay Mulligan. Grace is also a Senior Design Advisor working on state-significant development projects for the Government Architect of New South Wales, and in 2018 was Architect in Residence at the University of Wellington, New Zealand.

JG: Tell me about your foundational years — where did you grow up and what did you like to do as a kid?

GM: I grew up around boats, trees, and swimming pools in Sydney’s North Shore. My grandfather, Bryce Mortlock, was a key figure in my early life. He was a very keen hiker and my sister and I would accompany him on expeditions to tidy up bushland sites. Today there is a coastal reserve named after him. He designed and built boats and made architectural models in his home workshop, and we would spend hours in there with him, learning how to cut, join, and plane timber.

Of course, while I knew him as my grandfather, he was known very widely as one of Australia’s most important Modern architects. His office, Anchor Mortlock and Woolley, was essential to the establishment of the Sydney School, and a young Glenn Murcutt apprenticed under him.

How did you choose where you started architecture?

Unlike many young people in Europe, Asia, and North America, Australians tend to study where they live. My grandfather had studied architecture at the University of Sydney, so that’s where I went too. The best thing about the architecture school is that it has a huge timber workshop in the basement, so I spent a lot of my time down there. I also met David at the school.

Tell me about Other Architects — why you started, how it has evolved over the years. What are you focused on these days?

After graduating, I worked for a lovely Sydney practice called Dunn and Hillam Architects, and would occasionally moonlight with David on competitions. The moonlighting ramped up when David and I became the lone Australians selected for the inaugural Chicago Architecture Biennial, which was the moment that we realized there was no going back! David and I were very much amateurs when we began working together. Learning to run a business and find consistent sources of income have been equally important as learning to design buildings. We’ve now been working together in an official capacity for eight years, which feels like quite an achievement.

The other biggest contributor to our evolution has been Lindsay Mulligan, who joined us while still a student and is now an associate, a registered architect, and an essential part of everything we do. Together, we are focused on being relevant, on aligning our built output with our ethics, on trying to make our work as direct and purposeful as possible, and continuing to adapt to the world around us.

“Together, we are focused on being relevant, on aligning our built output with our ethics, on trying to make our work as direct and purposeful as possible, and continuing to adapt to the world around us.”

— Grace Mortlock

How would you summarize the experience of practicing in Australia? What is unique about the way architecture is designed and made here?

Despite the influence of global tourism, the internet, and Instagram, distance is still very much part of the Australian experience. Australia is not only the most isolated inhabited continent, but our cities are also the most spread apart. Things — both objects and ideas — take time to reach us.

On one hand, this remove from the rest of the world is very productive. It’s very easy to generate your own outlook and identity here, and we’ve found that there’s endless interest from abroad in our landscapes, people, and stories. On the other hand, the Australian architectural community tends to be very conservative, insular, and self-referential. Our architects are generally unaware of the inherent interest in their work, and more focused on trying to continually one-up each other by making the most elaborate and ostentatious buildings.

Australian architects are best known for their houses. For a variety of reasons, including our colonial heritage and low-rise cities, it is much easier to obtain commissions for freestanding dwellings here than in most other parts of the world. Our climate is also relatively benign, creating lots of opportunities for outdoor living, permeability, and openness.

Many of the projects that I studied at university were experimental second houses, often built on a shoestring budget and self-commissioned by their architects. Today, the residential property market is so pervasive that such houses are rarely possible.

Highlands House. Photography by Clinton Weaver.

Looking back at it all, what have been the biggest challenges? How did you both manage through perceived disappointments or setbacks?

As previously mentioned, architecture school doesn’t prepare you for running a business. Nor does an education in a generally affluent, colonialist, and late-capitalist society adequately prepare you for issues of social responsibility and sustainability. Ours has been a process of extended education as we grapple with the conflicting priorities of commercial development and climate collapse. On a related note, our own energy and ideas have always exceeded the small number of projects we’ve been able to undertake through conventional client commissions, and we also found ourselves landing as runners-up in competition after competition. For all of those reasons, we have invested quite a lot of our effort in self-initiated projects, allocating the time we would have spent on bids and competitions to creating our own work, in order to generate unusual commissions such as cemeteries, car parks, and emergency housing. These unconventional jobs are typically more in tune with our ideals and aspirations.

What have you also learned in the last six months?

Prior to having a child, I was the youngest person appointed to the Government Architect of New South Wales’ (GANSW) Design Review Panel overseeing state-significant developments, but becoming a mother meant that I didn’t have a chance to exercise that role. Then 18 months ago I was offered a part-time position at GANSW as a Senior Design Advisor, which involves coordinating the Design Review process. This new position didn’t just reframe my sense of agency as a woman and caregiver, it also reframed how I thought about my practice. Prior to parenthood, David and I operated as if we were a single entity, working, teaching, and living together. Now we have much more defined roles and responsibilities. Rather than just seeing the projects and clients that come directly to our practice, I advise on seniors housing, schools, infrastructure projects, cultural projects, and industrial projects with budgets over $100 million. So I now have a new title, new colleagues, new abilities and knowledge, and a much greater understanding of how the built environment is changing in Sydney and Australia.

“I am most passionate about caring for what already exists, regardless of whether it fits within the narrow frame of what is considered ‘architectural’ . . . I would like to create new work that embodies this sensibility, while also providing ideal conditions for the incoming designer who inherits our spaces next.”

— Grace Mortlock

What are you most excited about right now?

I’m always excited about taking overlooked or undervalued spaces and transforming them using a minimum of means. I am currently working in that respect on projects for existing, moribund urban cemeteries, on a small-town aged care facility, on low-cost, prefabricated modular dwellings, and on retrofitting a very average commercial building in a bland business park setting into a highly desirable, eco-hedonistic housing complex.

In my personal life, I am super excited and very fortunate to have recently welcomed my second child, my daughter Bryce, who is named after my grandfather. Of course, I am also a bit worried about how the new baby will once again upend my life and work.

Who are you admiring now and why?

At GANSW I work under the leadership of Government Architect Abbie Galvin and within a majority woman-led team. I think it is really important for women in any line of work to have female role models, mentors, and allies. I really admire the amazing women that I get to collaborate with as we try to influence how our city is planned and constructed.

The Eternal Forest at the Versaille Biennale. Photography by Hamish McIntosh.

What is the impact you’d like to have on the world? What is your core mission? And what does success in that look like to you?

Our core mission at Other Architects is to be thoughtful about how and where we act. In pursuing that mission, success represents the opportunity and authority to exercise that judgment rather than blindly following the instructions and agendas of others.

I am most passionate about caring for what already exists, regardless of whether it fits within the narrow frame of what is considered “architectural.” Because of that, I have come to the realization that I prefer working with as-found objects and conditions. I would like to create new work that embodies this sensibility, while also providing ideal conditions for the incoming designer who inherits our spaces next.

Finally, what advice do you have for those starting their career? Would your advice be any different for women?

My advice would absolutely be different for women. I was brought up to believe that women and men should be treated fairly and equally. In my first architecture job, as a student in a large corporate workplace, I was amazed to discover that the female employees were expected to answer the telephone, but the men — regardless of their seniority — were not. Over the years I have experienced occasional issues with male students, colleagues, and builders who were conditioned to expect that women should not be as ambitious, creative, or authoritative as men. These “blokes” thought of women as gap-fillers in a male world. I have always resisted this characterization, and I think you should too!

Thank you so much Grace — powerful words!