Innholdsfortegnelse for July-August 2021 i Architecture NZ

IF EVER THERE WERE ANY DOUBT THAT climate change is an ethical issue then the landmark judgement by the Australian Federal Court in late May should settle the matter. The class action case brought, on behalf of all Australian children and teenagers, against Environment Minister Sussan Ley sought to prevent approving the Whitehaven coalmine extension project in New South Wales. The court didn’t order the project should be stopped. Instead, it put the onus on the environment minister, finding she owes a duty of care to Australia’s young people not to cause them physical harm in the form of personal injury from climate change. Aspects of the profound duty of care finding, which provides the first step in a claim of negligence, are worth repeating: “It is difficult to characterise…

DISCLAIMER Felicity Wallace, BArch (Hons), is the Western Director of the Te Kāhui Whaihanga NZIA Board and a registered architect practising in New Zealand: she is based in Marton, a small town in the Rangitīkei district, not far from Bulls. She has more than 30 years’ experience in private practice and teaching design. In 2014, Felicity Wallace Architects was invited to submit a proposal for the preparation of a concept design and feasibility study for the proposed Bulls Community Centre but chose not to submit. Her partner, who is a business owner in Bulls, has been a vocal critic of the cost overruns on this project. The views in this review are personal and do not represent the views of the NZIA. IT’S PRETTY HARD TO MAKE A BUILDING LOOK…

PARNELL, AUCKLAND — Winner — Supreme Winner — Civic Design — Jasmax with FJMT and designTRIBE Jury comment — This significant landmark project is the result of a thoughtful unlayering of past interventions and an addition of interstitial elements, underpinned with a strong bicultural narrative. Following an eight-year-long collaborative and consultative process, the design team has succeeded in balancing the mana of the north and south atriums: bringing back volume to the space, releasing the tanoa, and creating prominent east and west boulevards to bring together a series of complex geometries. The entry waharoa provides a powerful welcome gesture to mark the transformation of this ritualised museum procession. Commissioned artworks activate the practice of tikanga, layered tawa fins define and provide access to spaces, and detailing of the light trench…

Lo & Co Showroom design — Material Creative materialcreative.co.nz project — Lo & Co Showroom Auckland client — Lo & Co loandcointeriors.com.au design team — Toni Brandso, Liv Patience, Jaime Aspinall, Julia Brown photography — Melanie Jenkins Good Books design — Bonnifait+Giesen Atelierworkshop Architects atelierworkshop.com project — Good Books Te Aro, Wellington client — Jane Arthur and Catherine Robertson goodbookshop.nz design team — Cecile Bonnifait, William Giesen, Olivia Ong photography — Russell Kleyn Auckland War Memorial Museum Store design — Ignite ignitearchitects.com project — Auckland War Memorial Museum Store Parnell, Auckland client — Auckland War Memorial Museum aucklandmuseum.com design team — Richard Voss, Nathan Carey, Phaedra Applin, Sam Castle, Vicky Lam photography — Sam Hartnett…

Auckland Spine Surgery Centre design — Unispace unispace.com project — Auckland Spine Surgery Centre Auckland client — Auckland Spine Surgery Centre design team — Harry Rowntree, Alice Dalton, Angie Wang, Chris Kim, Vinisha Topiwala photography — David Straight MacMurray Centre design — Warren and Mahoney warrenandmahoney.com project — MacMurray Centre Remuera, Auckland client — MacMurray Centre Digestive Diseases & Endoscopy macmurray.co.nz design team — Patrick Sloan, Phil Grey, Matthew Roberts, Matthew McFetridge, Scott Compton photography — Jono Parker…

OBJECTSPACE 9 MARCH ´ 30 MAY 2021 With the world drowning under an avalanche of disposable images, it is increasingly difficult to conceive of a space where photographs might speak to us and slowly reveal their stories. A remarkable collaboration between photographer John Miller and architectural designer Elisapeta Heta offers a solution and presents a cogent challenge to the ephemeral status photographs have acquired in the age of social media. Originally commissioned for the 2020 Sydney Biennale, the show is brought to home soil as part of Auckland Arts Festival Te Ahurei Toi o Tamaki. Drawing on her deep understanding of te ao Maori, Elisapeta Heta has reconfigured the main gallery at Objectspace, making it resonate with the essence of a wharenui. The transformation makes particular reference to Te Tai…

LONG AGO, WHEN WE WERE still allowed to have open fires in the city, I decided I would work only with a bricky with a good track record in fireplaces: structures that drew well, gave out good heat and didn’t smoke. I lucked upon Willie Colvin who, as a child, had worked with his father on the fireplaces in Mackintosh’s Windy Ridge house. I was a bit too dim to understand the implication of the house’s name, that a windy ridge was likely to damn-near guarantee a successful draught up the chimney and a smoke-free fire, but I soaked up Willie’s advice, particularly his tip for dealing with dodgy customers. He would lay a sheet of glass halfway up the flue and, if a recalcitrant customer was tardy in paying…

I’ve always dreamed of having a key to enter any building I desire. While I remain keyless, my aspirations were lived out through the festival of exceptional architecture – Open Christchurch. In any other city, this would seem to be an event of architectural provocation but not for Ōtautahi, a city shaken by 13,000-plus earthquakes. Open Christchurch provided visual evidence of progression and response to 10 years of post-disaster construction. Numerous site visits of multi-residential and revived commercial buildings unveiled a lens: witnessing the urban densification of a city once deemed desolate. On 15 and 16 May, Christchurch opened more than 40 of its doors to its public. The event was organised by Te Pūtahi, an independent, not-for-profit body, whose aim was to encourage people to engage with, and become…

WELLINGTON’S CUBA STREET IS A DIVERSE place, with its own cookbook and street festival, CubaDupa. Hip and fine dining restaurants mix with noodle houses and grungy cafes, second-hand clothing and records, night music venues and a range of boutique shops and services, including several architects’ offices. It has a low-rise character and scale, graduated from tall buildings at the north end transitioning to a residential scale at the south. The small site and building sizes and the advanced age of many of Cuba Street’s buildings have created a natural enterprise incubator of cheap tenancies in poor condition near the ends of their economic lives. Almost every period of our history is represented in an eclectic mix that includes many Edwardian mixed-use commercial buildings with heritage designations. The street is relatively…

How did you make the move from architecture to landscape design? I studied architecture in Milan and Barcelona and then, towards the end of my university career, I worked for an architecture practice specialising in landscape architecture and urban design. That’s where I learned firsthand how the design of the surrounding spaces, the ‘interstitial’, the ‘empty’, is important to the creation of good architecture. Technology nowadays could allow buildings to become site agnostic. Landscape design, to me, has the role of grounding the building to the specifics of the site and being true to the land, the orientation, the microclimate. In your line of work, you must draw great inspiration from the colours of nature. When using colour in my work, the main intent is often to complement and enhance…

Winner — Workplace (up to 1000m2) Design — Warren and Mahoney Jury comment — In what was perhaps one of the most difficult categories to judge, as it challenged the jury’s preconceptions of what constitutes a workplace, it was a foyer and lobby experience on a scale not typically seen in New Zealand which rose above the rest. Elevated from the busy street, with the integration of a café and bar opening onto a landscaped outdoor terrace, this next-generation commercial lobby offers employees in the PwC Tower an extension of the workplace itself: a place for connection and exchange with colleagues and clients. High-quality natural materials and furniture raise the six-metre-high, glass-walled interior to a level of unexpected luxury and local artists are celebrated throughout. With a lobby such as…

Te Hohepa Kōhanga Reo design — Bull O’Sullivan Architecture bosarchitecture.co.nz project — Te Hohepa Kōhanga Reo Phillipstown, Christchurch client — Te Hohepa Kōhanga Reo Te Kōhanga Reo National Trust kohanga.ac.nz design team — Michael O’Sullivan (project principal) Paul Anselmi (architect) E James Builders (builders) Engco Consulting Engineers (structural, geotechnical, civil) photography — Sam Hartnett Christchurch Town Hall design — Warren and Mahoney warrenandmahoney.com project — Christchurch Town Hall Christchurch client — Christchurch City Council ccc.govt.nz design team — Peter Marshall, Richard McGowan, Simon Laurie, Angela Pelham, Shane Horgan, Eoin Hudson photography — Stephen Goodenough, Olivia Spencer-Bower…

Seymour Street Alterations design — Salmond Reed Architects salmondreed.co.nz project — Seymour Street Alterations Ponsonby, Auckland client — Karen and Stephen Pearson lionsshare.co.nz designer — Philip Graham photography — Patrick Reynolds Bendemeer Estate design — Seagar Design seagardesign.com project — Bendemeer Estate Lake Hayes, Central Otago design team — Adrienne Seagar in conjunction with Ponting Fitzgerald Architects, David Ponting photography — Simon Wilson House on a Rock design — South by Southeast Architects southbysoutheast.co.nz project — House on a Rock Sumner, Christchurch client — Sarina and Ken Powrie designer — Ken Powrie photography — Sarah Rowlands…

My inspiration is drawn from sense of place: the people, purpose and values that reflect my background and connection to Aotearoa – honest, pure and grounded. I chose Laminam Ossido Verderame to form the backdrop to a boutique office lobby concept. Its green, earthy tones have a beautiful, rich, bronze undertone and the overall effect feels very connected to nature. This product is best applied vertically so I imagine it lining the, say, five-metre-high lobby walls as a subtle detail. It is accented by a palette that elevates and enrichens this: introducing organic wood, lighting and furniture from local makers, and addressing the space with soft furnishings. I’m also interested in sculptural elements. Richard Serra’s Corten steel Te Tuhirangi Contour at Gibbs Farm expresses movement, tracing the contour line across the land.…

WE ALL NEED SOMEWHERE NICE TO LIVE: a house with a way in, some friends and a little respite. Yet, these days, private life seems to require more planning than ever: setbacks, height restrictions, living circles, fencing, acoustics, fire ratings. Throw in some curtains or blinds and our seclusion seems well guarded if not a little blinkered. Boundaries increasingly come with walls and, as housing efforts ramp upwards and outwards, communities are easily lost amongst all that privacy. Going to town with your housing development and pushing copy on that plan for the afternoon can quickly contribute many individual spaces but the divided uniformity of a spreadsheet. It’s all math and ever-decreasing squares. Ironically, in the search for neighbours, plans that follow the plan seem to do well keeping us…

Winner — Workplace (over 1000m2) Design — Jasmax project — MinterEllisonRuddWatts Auckland Office Fit-out CBD, Auckland client — MinterEllisonRuddWatts minterellison.co.nz design — Jasmax jasmax.com design team — Phil Judd, Nick Moyes, Chris Kim, Alasdair Hood photography — Sam Hartnett Jury comment — This sophisticated project represents a carefully crafted response to a brief that shifts the client group from its traditional individual offices into a transformational, ‘office-free’ working environment, while providing multifunctional spaces for quiet working, meetings and team sessions as well as staff facilities. A crisply detailed, inter-level stair connects the business over four levels and stained-timber joinery, brass detailing and marble flooring provide an elegant, timeless backdrop reflecting the culture of the client. A rigorous sustainability agenda called for life-cycle and energy efficiency, minimised energy consumption and robust…

Winner — Residential Design — Bull O’Sullivan Architecture Jury comment — A joyful addition to an existing house provides a range of interior spaces for both whānau and friends, in a relaxed manner that belies the careful control in the unfolding sequence of spaces. A strong sense of wairua (spirit) reflects both the whānau and the architects’ poetic nod to Ngā Rangi Tūhāhaā, the various heavens that lead up to Te Toi o Ngā Rangi. Reclaimed native timbers, cork and sumptuous carpet have been installed by the home-owners with much aroha and bespoke furniture, which is both functional and beautiful, has been designed specifically for each space. Rimu exterior weatherboards have been repurposed and now line the interior with warmth and history. Past, present and future generations and their interconnectedness…

Winner — Emerging Design Professional Current design practice — Jasmax Jury comment — Elisapeta is a natural leader in our industry, championing tikanga Māori and a collaborative design approach that is generous in spirit. Her work has enriched both the culture of the office at Jasmax and the cultural credibility of its projects. She has brought her skills, thoughts, philosophy and personality to Waka Māia (Jasmax’s bicultural design and advisory team), maintaining and developing her design thinking while enhancing the work of the practice. Elisapeta has co-chaired and acted as secretary for Architecture+Women.NZ and was co-opted as Ngā Aho representative to Te Kāhui Whaihanga NZIA. Her ambition is to continue to co-design authentic, identity-enhancing spaces that whakamana (uplift and empower) all who interact with them. designer — Elisapeta Heta project…