Blueprint for Success: How Design Guides Create Consistency, Identity, and Vision
Oak Tree Academy is dedicated to creating nurturing, community-focused Early Learning Centres, all unified by a holistic design approach.
Through a collaborative process, COX and Oak Tree Academy established a set of core values that serve as the foundation for a comprehensive design guide. The Design Guide ensures consistency across all centres by streamlining decision-making and providing a clear framework for future designers and stakeholders. It defines the material, spatial, and architectural strategies that are integral to Oak Tree Academy’s identity, fostering a cohesive and inspiring learning environment for children.
Design for Connection, Identity & Play
Tested across three sites—Rosewood, Stafford Heights, and Landsborough—the Oak Tree Academy Design Guide is built on three core principles:
- Creating a sense of home
- Fostering a holistic connection to nature
- Cultivating curiosity in young minds
These principles are brought to life through a cohesive kit-of-parts approach, incorporating warm, tactile finishes, scale-appropriate forms, child-centred design and wayfinding, and a seamless connection to the outdoors.
The design guide also ensures flexibility, allowing each centre’s architecture to respond to its surroundings. By prioritising site-specific materials, forms, and detailing, each space harmonises with its natural and built environment while maintaining the Academy’s core identity.
Oak Tree Rosewood: A model for future centres.
Soon to break ground, Oak Tree Academy at Rosewood exemplifies how the design guide can be adapted to strengthen the Oak Tree identity while responding to its historic town-centre location and strong community spirit.
While the interior design follows the guide’s replicable planning and material strategies, this site takes a unique approach by repurposing a 1956 brick store into a café and reception area. This thoughtful reuse not only preserves local history but also activates the street front as a welcoming social hub for parents and the wider community.
Drawing from the store’s original architectural elements—such as awning and parapet heights—the childcare centre is arranged around a central courtyard, fostering both security and connection.
The design guide model ensures that every new centre remains contextually responsive while staying true to Oak Tree Academy’s guiding values of home, nature, and curiosity.
