Mt Peter Outside School Hours Care
A luminous community space for learning, care and connection
Mt Peter OSHC in Cairns, Queensland, brings a spirited architectural identity to a purpose-built outside school hours care facility at MacKillop Catholic College. Designed by Fisher Buttrose Architects, the project uses Danpal’s NM Façade system in Ice, Purple, Orange, and Green to create a translucent building envelope that feels both playful and precise — an ideal expression for a community-focused education environment.
Set within a landscape of mountains, open skies and dramatic tropical weather, the building’s translucent walls mediate between interior activity and the surrounding environment. Natural light is softened, colour becomes atmosphere, and the façade takes on a dynamic presence throughout the day — calm and diffused from within, bold and memorable from the outside.
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Translucent walls that balance daylight, durability and design intent
For architects working in education, childcare and community architecture, Mt Peter OSHC demonstrates how a façade can do more than enclose. The Danpal NM Façade and Cladding systems transforms the building envelope into an active daylighting element, supporting a comfortable interior while giving the project a distinctive visual identity. The facades palette introduces color without heaviness, allowing the walls to appear light, layered and responsive to Cairns’ shifting daylight conditions.
Danpal translucent façade and cladding systems are engineered for architectural daylight applications, offering even light diffusion, thermal performance, weather protection, UV protection, high impact resistance and air and water tightness. These qualities are especially relevant in tropical public and educational settings, where visual comfort, resilience and long-term performance are central to the design brief. The façade’s seamless appearance also supports a clean architectural reading, giving the building a crisp contemporary expression while reducing visual clutter.
Inside, the translucent wall system helps create a bright, welcoming environment for children to socialise, learn, build, move and relax. The result is a building that aligns with the OSHC program’s emphasis on safe, supportive and engaging spaces, while offering architects a refined example of how polycarbonate façade systems can bring daylight, color and performance together in one integrated envelope.
Rather than treating daylight as a purely functional requirement, Fisher Buttrose Architects use it as a defining architectural material. The Danpal NM façade and cladding gives Mt Peter OSHC a sense of openness and energy while maintaining privacy and environmental control — a smart response to both the social purpose of the building and the climatic demands of Far North Queensland.