In Sydney’s rapidly growing north-west, a new sporting landmark has been created to support both elite performance and grassroots participation.
The Parramatta Eels Centre of Excellence and Community Facilities at Kellyville Park brings together professional athletes, junior pathways and the wider community within a single integrated precinct.
Developed by Melbourne based architects HB Arch in collaboration with the club and The Hills Shire Council, the project delivers world-class training facilities alongside community sporting infrastructure designed to nurture the next generation of players.
At the heart of the architectural response is the careful use of PGH Bricks, chosen to connect the building with its suburban context while expressing a contemporary identity.
A facility designed for performance and participation
The development includes two primary buildings set within a broader sporting campus featuring five international-standard playing fields. One building houses the elite Centre of Excellence, providing training, recovery and administration spaces for the club’s NRL and NRLW teams. The second supports community sport, incorporating change rooms, spectator facilities and match-day amenities.
The project design had a clear objective; to create a strong and meaningful connection between club and community while delivering the best functional and technical outcomes for both the Parramatta Eels Centre of Excellence and the supporting community facilities. This approach reflects a development model intended to benefit not only the professional teams but the broader rugby league ecosystem.
“The project always had this idea of club and community,” explains director Gray Barton. “You have the high-performance environment for the professional teams, while the site also supports the broader rugby league community and junior pathways that feed into that.”
This connection is reinforced through the architecture and planning of the precinct, including ongoing dialogue with connection to Country, clear wayfinding principles and careful consideration of the surrounding neighbourhood.
Centre of Excellence Gallery
Responding to site and context
Situated within a new residential estate, the facility occupies a sloping site that allowed the design team to organise the building across multiple levels. Visitors arrive from the upper level, while the players’ level below opens directly to the playing fields and houses the club’s high-performance training and recovery facilities. Because the approach is from the residential side of the site, the architects carefully considered how the building would present to the surrounding neighbourhood.
“We’re approaching the building from what is effectively the back-of-house side,” explains director Allison Hooper. “So the materials needed to work hard to present a strong civic presence while still fitting within the suburban context.”
Choosing brick to connect with the neighbourhood
Brick became a key material in establishing that connection. Used across the main approach façades of both buildings, the brickwork provides a familiar and durable material that reflects the surrounding residential architecture.
“The brick was really about tying the building into the residential context,” Hooper says. The facility sits right within a new suburban estate, so the vision was to ensure the building fit into that context without looking out of place. White and light grey bricks were selected to align with the club’s branding while maintaining a clean and contemporary aesthetic. Subtle accents of blue and yellow reference the Parramatta Eels’ colours, reinforcing the identity of the club without overwhelming the architecture.
Bricks with texture and natural detail
The design team selected PGH Morada Blanco bricks for their natural texture and material warmth. “We went through a pretty extensive process looking at different bricks,” Hooper explains. “What stood out for us was the warmth and texture. White bricks can look shiny or glossy, but these looked had a more natural look and feel that worked well with the light.”
The façade design incorporates crafted brickwork techniques to add depth and visual rhythm. In selected areas, a hit-and-miss brick pattern creates a semi-permeable screen, filtering daylight while allowing views out from interior spaces. Elsewhere, individual bricks are slightly projected to produce subtle patterning across the façade.
These details help articulate the long elevation and maintain visual interest along the main approach to the facility. “The brickwork allowed us to introduce pattern and screening while still using a traditional material,” Hooper says. “It creates movement across the facade and brings a human scale to what is quite a large building.”
Supporting the future of Rugby League
Beyond its architectural expression, the Parramatta Eels Centre of Excellence represents a major investment in the future of rugby
league in Western Sydney. By bringing professional training facilities together with grassroots sporting infrastructure, the project creates a pathway for players of all ages and abilities.
Projects like this demonstrate how thoughtful architecture and carefully selected materials can support both performance and place. Through the use of PGH bricks, the facility balances civic presence with suburban familiarity, creating a landmark that celebrates sport while remaining firmly grounded in its local context.
About Morada
The Morada range, imported from Europe, boasts the highest end of luxury with the smoothest finishes in solid, colour-through brick products.
Ideally placed to complement contemporary designs and slimline profiles, the bricks are available in Standard size and in a slender Linear. Often specified by architects, this collection epitomises a stunning architectural selection for achieving European style and elegance.
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