Ancient Times House, located in Little Bourke Street in the heart of Chinatown was a 3 storey former warehouse which operated as a museum of antiquities.  Owned by the Collins Street Baptist Church, WBa was engaged as architect by the City of Melbourne and Ecumenical Community Housing for the project responsible for the conversion of the building into a Christian Training Centre at ground floor level to be operated by ‘Urban seed’ and low cost student accommodation over four levels managed by Ecumenical Housing Inc above.

With preference toward self-contained student units in the city, the brief was to provide a housing model specifically designed for tertiary students within low rental constraints. WBa proposed a model comprising individual living/bedroom, kitchen and bathroom facilities of appropriate size and orientation. Common facilities are distributed over the proposed four levels to promote integration of occupants throughout the whole building