Construcciones Yamaro: Modular engineering preserves Bondi heritage façade

Coates’ modular propping and bracing system was designed to support the heritage façade during redevelopment. (Image: Coates)

Coates has delivered a bespoke temporary works solution to preserve the heritage-listed façade of a four-storey apartment building in Bondi, New South Wales, which is being redeveloped by Lasic Property. The modular propping and bracing system was designed to overcome tight site access, structural complexity and heritage constraints, enabling the new structure to be built.

Dhanushka Athapaththu, temporary works engineer at Coates, describes removing the interior of a multi-storey building, without compromising the façade, as no small feat.

“Coates is helping to overcome a significant structural challenge in retaining the façade and maintaining structural integrity throughout construction,” says Athapaththu. “Although Coates has considerable experience delivering complex solutions, I haven’t worked on anything quite like this before.”

Located one block back from Bondi Beach in a mixed residential and school zone, the redevelopment will transform the existing 12-unit complex into two luxury residences. Local traffic conditions made it difficult to transport large equipment such as cranes and prop segments to and from site, while the propping and bracing system had to be designed with minimal anchor points to protect the 85-year-old Art Deco exterior.

“The need to transport smaller components and allow for manual installation shaped the temporary works,” says Athapaththu. “Coates specified lower capacity struts and modified the configuration of joints and bracing to accommodate the high structural loads.”

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Coates’ engineers designed and certified a bespoke system featuring its proprietary Universal System Props, waler beams for lateral stability and a matrix of propping towers and needle beams for additional capacity and load transfer during construction. The strong but lightweight modular design and simple connections made Coates’ system easy to transport and quicker to install.

“This approach allowed us to move the equipment to site in small sections before walking each prop up the stairs,” says John Lasic, director of Lasic Property. “This is not something we could have done with a prefabricated system that would have taken five times longer to install, using a crane that we could not get to site.”

Technology played a key role in the temporary works design, with Lasic Property and Coates using building information modelling (BIM) to plan, visualise and communicate the design across the wider project team.

“Coates has excelled at delivering the more technically challenging aspects of this solution and we value the expertise they bring to the project,” says Lasic. “This includes recent needling work to provide temporary support and load redistribution, allowing the team to safely underpin and strengthen the foundation before building back up again.”

Lasic Property is delivering the project in collaboration with Platinum Constructions and architects ANA + Associates and Richards Stanisich. Completion is expected in 2026.

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