Winya Indigenous Furniture supplies certified, sustainable commercial furniture to schools, universities and training facilities across Australia. For more than ten years, we have furnished classrooms, libraries, study hubs, staff offices, student breakout areas and Indigenous student centres, working alongside facilities teams, faculty staff, architects, builders and state education departments.
As an Indigenous-owned business, we bring something more to education spaces. We understand the part culture plays in helping students feel they belong, and we know how much social procurement outcomes matter to the institutions we work with. Every space we deliver is built for heavy daily use, for layouts that change, and for the people who learn and work there.
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Our education work covers universities, schools and staff workplaces, with projects delivered in NSW, Victoria, the ACT and the Northern Territory and delivery available in every state and territory. We have supplied the University of Sydney, the University of Melbourne, RMIT, Swinburne University, the Australian National University, UNSW AFDA and Charles Darwin University. Projects range from a single meeting pod to furniture across several buildings on the one campus.
Most education fit-outs are timed around term breaks, semester starts and building handovers, which means tight install windows and staged deliveries. We plan for that from the first meeting. Our team manages the whole job, from space planning and product selection through to delivery and installation, so facilities staff can stay focused on keeping the campus running.
For many schools and universities, a Reconciliation Action Plan sets out real commitments for the campus. We help turn those commitments into places students and staff use every day. Our Indigenous-designed fabrics carry the stories of our House Artists, and we work with local artists so a space reflects the Country it sits on. At Charles Darwin University, we used artwork by local artist Susan Wanji Wanji on custom lounges for the Indigenous Engagement Hub, and arranged ottomans as a yarning circle.
Indigenous student centres and safe spaces are a large part of our education work. We furnished the Moondani Toombadool Centre at Swinburne University with Yanada modular lounges from our own Indigenous Collection, and created an Indigenous Safe Space in the University of Melbourne’s Law Building with a custom serpent lounge and moveable ottomans. RMIT’s FORWARD workspace was fitted out under the guidance of the university’s second Reconciliation Action Plan, with soft seating in printed and hand-stitched Indigenous fabrics.
Culture can also sit in a single piece. For the University of Melbourne’s Baldwin Spencer Building, we made a custom timber and glass boardroom table with three Indigenous creatives: Lowell Hunter (Salty One), a proud Nyul Nyul Saltwater man, on design; Lucinda Johnson-Cornes, a proud Pitjantjatjara woman, on digitisation and story preservation; and Marara Designs, a proud Wiradjuri woman, on wood engraving.
Education spaces have to handle many ways of learning in the same week, and often the same day. Our range covers student desks and chairs, collaborative tables, modular soft seating, quiet booths, acoustic pods, workstations and ergonomic task seating. Everything is chosen for high-traffic durability and easy cleaning, and so it can be moved or reconfigured as teaching needs change.
We work with faculty teams and learning environment designers on layouts that make better use of the floor. At the University of Sydney’s New Law Building, quiet booths, high tables and stools turned a common area into a student co-working hub with zones for focused work, group study and downtime.
When the College of Science at ANU needed a new meeting room, we supplied an Acoustix Pod instead of building walls. The pod came with sprinkler access, wheelchair access, circular airflow and integrated power, and cost less than a partitioned room.
Winya holds state government contracts for education furniture, so schools can buy from us without running a new tender. In NSW, we are on the Department of Education’s Office and Education Furniture State Contract (DoE2040350214). In Queensland, we hold Department of Education Standing Offer Arrangement QED SOA 104526. In Victoria, we hold a standing offer for office and education furniture to Victorian Government School Councils, and we have worked with Built Environs on a Victorian School Building Authority rollout across four schools. In Western Australia, we are on the Department of Finance Common Use Arrangement CUAFWE2024.
For higher education, we are an approved supplier to Federation University (RFT 2020-12) and are listed on the Advanced portal for Australian Catholic University, James Cook University, QUT, the University of Melbourne and the University of Queensland.
Schools and universities replace furniture on long cycles, so sustainability starts with furniture that lasts. We favour Australian-made products, GECA-certified fabrics and recycled materials. Our REDEFINE tables and WINGARA table and stool, made with Defy Design, use 100% recycled HDPE from Australian post-consumer and post-industrial plastic.
When furniture reaches the end of its life, our Take-Back Program collects it. Each piece is assessed for reuse or refurbishment, or broken down for recycling. On large projects, we report the diversion rates so you can show the results against your sustainability targets.
Our quality, environmental and workplace health and safety systems are certified to ISO 9001 and ISO 14001, so every order follows the same documented process from production to installation.
Certification varies from product to product, so we specify it item by item and prioritise certified options wherever we can. Many of our chairs, lounges and tables carry AFRDI Level 6 certification for heavy daily use, including load-rated and Green Tick variants. For commercial-grade foam, we prioritise GECA-certified materials. For timber and board, we use FSC-certified timber wherever possible and prioritise E0-rated substrates, low-toxicity adhesives and low-VOC finishes. GREENGUARD-certified products are available on request where indoor air quality is a priority, and our take-back and circular programs support projects working towards Green Star ratings.
We confirm the certifications for each item at quote stage, so you know exactly what you are getting before you order.
We hold public and product liability, professional indemnity and workers compensation insurance in every state we operate in. Our team understands the specification process for education tenders and supplies the compliance documentation each project needs.
We deliver and install across every state and territory, in capital city campuses as well as regional and remote communities. Our team already manages freight, site access and installation for remote Defence sites such as Woomera, Bradshaw and Tindal, and we bring the same planning to regional and remote schools and campuses. We are also affiliated with almost every Indigenous Chamber of Commerce in Australia, which connects us with local artists and Indigenous businesses wherever a project takes us.
Education centres working within a Reconciliation Action Plan, IPP, or state-based procurement target frameworks can rely on Winya for genuine, reportable outcomes.
