Victoria Gardens

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Arcadia’s concept for the Victoria Gardens Shopping Centre expansion will capture Richmond’s inner-city vitality and heritage while creating a dynamic, new generation mixed-use precinct. Arcadia has designed the landscape to build a connected community, enhance individual wellbeing and play a key role in the transformation of an evolving urban environment.

With a significant Indigenous underlay, Arcadia’s narrative for the site will use a layered approach which references the water and vegetation of the Birrarung River (the Indigenous name for the Yarra), the texture and materiality of the character of the suburb of Richmond, and a range of interpretive elements which will celebrate the rich Indigenous and European site history.

Victoria Gardens’ appeal will be heightened by the diversity of amenity and the mix of social and retail options available to residents, shoppers and visitors alike. A highlight of the project will be the creation of an engaging and inviting ‘public realm’ throughout the centre, including the creation of a ‘river line’ referencing the flow of the Birrarung through the site, with river bends creating spaces for people to slow down and occupy, while river straights encourage pedestrian movement and flow, and fern tree gardens using the plant character of the Birrarung that is suitable for the site micro climate. Paving along the River Line will incorporate brick and bluestone to create a place