Shellharbour Workers’ Club

Shellharbour Workers’ Club:

Cnr Wattle & Shellharbour Rds,
Shellharbour NSW
(02) 42967 155 or www.shellys.com.au

Shellharbour Workers’ Club, a prominent NSW South Coast institution, is based in a 20-year-old building that dominates its region both physically — sitting on a hilltop above Shellharbour village; and economically — as the club is one of the largest employers in the district.With 20,000 members, Shellharbour Workers Club was keen to address upcoming environmental tobacco smoke issues early in the game and have thus become one of the prime examples of the ‘I told you so’ clubs.In 2003 the club targeted future smoking issues by providing their patrons with an outdoor verandah which has direct access from almost anywhere in the club. The verandah doesn’t just let people smoke outside, it has been designed specifically to draw smoke up through the roof.The brief for the design was to transform the building’s façade from its original foreboding castle-like appearance into an appealing, contemporary look — and do so with a strong environmental element. Caroline Pidcock and Richard Goodwin, under the management of Big Switch Projects, collaborated to produce a roof and balcony extension which completely transformed the existing Shellharbour Workers Club so that it could confidently anticipate the growing space needs of the club and future smoking laws.