Innholdsfortegnelse for August - September 2021 i Home New Zealand

When we started putting this issue together, the obvious first question was: what does ‘green’ mean when it comes to our built environment? The answer? Well, it was vast and varied, as seems to be the case when considering sustainability in any context. Of note was discussion around sustainability certifications. In some instances, for example, achieving passive house certification is a clear answer, while in others avoiding certain certifications and simply using locally sourced materials, clever design methodologies, and a reduced footprint makes more sense. It’s those considerations that we traverse in this issue. On page 82, we explore a certified passive house on the hills of the Kapiti Coast that cleverly mimics the unmistakable low-lying form of Kapiti Island in the distance. On page 60, we look at a different…

Gardens of Babylon DESIGN:03 Living art is the hallmark of a new Auckland destination for design and plant enthusiasts: Babylon Store in Saint Heliers. The lofty space is the brainchild of the talented team of landscape designers behind some of Auckland’s best residential landscapes: Babylon Gardens. Here, a tapestry of green covers this former industrial space with a voracious collection of indoor and outdoor plants, kokedama, and other botanical sculptures, as well as an enviable collection of handmade ceramics and luxe planters from artisans around the globe.babylonstore.co.nz The artist behind the lens DESIGN:04 Taking inspiration from the work of South African artist William Kentridge, where the studio is the artist’s castle — a place where they can play king or buffoon — a new exhibition entitled A Safe Place for…

You shot your new collection in the Fisher House — tell us about this space. It is located in Warrandyte, Victoria and owned by Australian photographer Sean Fennessy and his partner, art director / stylist Jess Lillico. It was designed in 1969 by Alistair Knox, who specialised in recycled materials and mud brick, and has recently undergone a sensitive update, led by the very talented Melbourne interior designer Adriana Hanna of Kennedy Nolan Architects. What attracted you to this house to shoot your new collection? We had actually contacted Sean and Jess to do an interior shoot for us, and, when workshopping potential locations, we suggested an image we’d seen on Instagram of the Fisher House bathroom. Sean responded, “That’s our house”, so we didn’t look any further. Our initial attraction was the mid-century design,…

Tree Sense: Ways of Thinking About Trees Ed. Susette Goldsmith Massey University Press From the scientific through to the navel-gazey, from the conceptual through to the mythological, and from the observational through to the activist, Tree Sense gathers a dozen essays about the many ways of looking at New Zealand’s trees. The book raises interesting questions about how we perceive, interact with, and use local flora both from Pākehā and Māori perspectives. The Stubborn Light of Things: A Nature Diary By Melissa Harrison Allen & Unwin Back in 2016, Melissa Harrison published Rain, a compact but powerful tome about just what the title says. Since then, she has moved to the British countryside and begun writing this diary and producing a podcast in the vein of traditional country almanacs — think Aldo Leopold…

“Back in the day, you had segregated dining, kitchen, and living rooms,” says Designer Rugs managing director Laura Furey. “Now, architecture has [turned those] into open-plan areas, but you still need to define these spaces within the open plan, so rugs are technically replacing walls.” Laura goes on to explain how doing away with wall space has also meant a reduction in wall surfaces from which to hang artwork, and how Designer Rugs has engaged artists, fashion designers, and the like whose work is translated into the textile form to bring back colour and flair into those open-plan spaces. “We carry a huge array of designs from many creative fields; Max Gimblett, Boh Runga, Zambesi, Kate Sylvester, and many others have had a hand at creating a Designer Rugs collection,” she…

A series of distorted spherical lights, ‘Melt’ lamps are half metallised to create an extraordinary optic effect and cast an ethereal luminosity on their surroundings. Obsessed with the idea of creating an imperfect, organic, and naturalistic lighting object, Melt was created in collaboration with Front, a Swedish design collective. Melt lights are created through a process of blow moulding and vacuum metallisation to achieve melted orbs with abundant and unusual luminosity. Available in Smoke, Gold, or Copper, the light bouncing and reflecting around the uneven surfaces of the Melt series creates a dramatic, melting, hot-blown-glass effect. Translucent when on and mirror finished when off, Melt lamps are available as pendant or wall lamps in two sizes. ecc.co.nz…

Sarah Lods and Belinda Merrie Our guest stylist and photographer duo were responsible for the styled photo shoot (page 38) in Judy Darragh’s recent exhibition, Competitive Plastics, at Objectspace. What attracted you to Judy Darragh’s exhibition as a location for this photo shoot? Sarah: Our brief was sustainability, or green for colour, and new, emerging design talent, and I’d just gone to the opening, at Objectspace, of Judy’s exhibition. It instantly resonated with the topic, predominantly in the sustainability area. Judy reuses plastic — the ultimate bad guy in the recycling story — and utilises it in a visually strong message. [The exhibition] is bright and engaging, with materials used in surprising ways, bringing several points of view to the narrative. Judy’s show is a must-see, and is expected to…

There has always been a certain stillness to the work of Douglas and Bec (D&B); a quiet depth that sometimes bubbles up and surfaces, making itself visible through small gestures in materiality, colour, form, or otherwise. Throughout the years, there have been hints at river stones — pounamu-like colourations on lamp bases and glass shades. There have been art-deco allusions. There’s been an unabashed femininity and a serious penchant for balance and proportion. The work has often hinted at Bec Snelling’s original profession as a visual artist. Take, for instance, D&B’s 2016 collection, its colour palette inspired by the regionalist art movement and, in turn, reflecting a little of what it is like to spend any time in the isolation of rural New Zealand — as if viewed through the eyes of…

Green – as in the colour, sustainable intent, or designed by young makers – furniture and homewares are paired here to Judy Darragh’s artworks: ready-made, plastics made into installations that question the way we consume the unpopular material Shot in the exhibition: Competitive Plastics by Judy Darragh, at Objectspace, Auckland. This show is scheduled to open in December at Christchurch’s CoCA — Centre of Contemporary Art Toi Moroki, coca.org.nz. All chairs pictured in the back are sustainably designed or have a low carbon footprint.…

Colours of the earth Choose well with Resene Environmental Choice–approved paints. Colours from the Resene Multifinish collection…

Can you describe who lives here? The house is situated in one of the upmarket neighbourhoods near Auckland’s city centre next to a green park, in a perfect place for a busy family with four kids. For a family of six, you need large areas for food storage; we have integrated the large French-door fridge-freezer and a large bifold-door space tower as a main place to store food. The scullery also has lots of shelving for additional storage. The kitchen is designed with the option of having multiple persons working at the same time. With the fridge and main food storage right at the entrance to the scullery, someone could be cooking dinner in the main kitchen while someone else bakes a cake in the scullery without a lot of…

Evergreen Architecture: Overgrown Buildings and Greener Living Gestalten Biophilic design, green architecture — call it what you will, there is a growing number of building professionals hoping to help revert the effects of construction and rapid urbanisation on global warming. The good thing is that this environmentalist sentiment has now started to match artistic intent and green architecture no longer looks like awkward science experiments. As eye candy, this book is a delightful amalgamation of global architecture and landscaping. Think Singapore-like mega structures with gardens protruding from various floors, expansive green walls, tree trunks rupturing through bedroom floors and ceilings, rooftop gardens that froth and spill onto surrounding nature. These projects are a mixture of completed and idealised ‘artist’s impressions’ — such as the jaw-dropping Koichi Takada Urban Forest building…

It’s safe to say that the 19th-century miners who excavated this goldfield in Central Otago would never have imagined that the remnants of their work would one day play host to Pinot Noir, truffles, and olives. However, that’s precisely what Rod and Mirani Keillor have curated on their magnificent Black Quail Estate in Bannockburn, Central Otago. There’s no mistaking the care and attention they’ve put into this land either. Today, the Keillors’ 25ha of fertile land is home to a thriving vineyard, an olive grove, extensive vegetable gardens, and the southernmost truffière producing black Périgord truffles — a significant change from its former use as a sheep farm and its origin as a rich alluvial goldfield. Black Quail Estate sits above the Keillors’ recently built, spectacular Black Quail House, which was…

Material Space INAX MOSAICS These tiles embody the beauty and wabi-sabi nature of traditional Japanese aesthetics based upon the premise that they are not mass produced but have variations between each tile that serve to enhance their collective beauty. Inax offers hundreds of innovative three-dimensional formats and glaze permutations, and provides an unrivalled quality of product with a backstory detailing the history and origins of these materials, properly befitting the resurgence of interest in products of this nature. Ceramics have been celebrated in Japan for hundreds of years. The origins of the Inax brand lie in the collaboration with Frank Lloyd Wright in the supply of product for the 1923 redevelopment of the Imperial Hotel Tokyo. Inax production facilities are typically family businesses located in small towns, each having its…

Head south-west out of Christchurch and the city quickly gives way to countryside that offers a quintessential English charm. The roads are narrow, meandering, and surrounded by trees, through which dappled light casts a familiar, unpredictable pattern. This one, in particular, winds around a stream whose banks are dotted with weeping willows. As you make your way further towards the house, an old vineyard introduces the viticultural history of the area now bounded by extensive pastures. This is farmland with an ethereal beauty delivered by the seasons, moving through the lush greens of winter to the scorched brown tapestries of summer fields. This is farmland with an ethereal beauty delivered by the seasons, moving through the lush greens of winter to the scorched brown tapestries of summer fields For former…

This courtyard was placed smack in the centre of the site, with the kitchen and dining areas bordering it on two sides Among the hordes of documents that needed to be created, triple checked, and duly filed during the design and build of this house, there were two little wish lists written on school stationery. The first — perfectly double-spaced, big letters conscientiously written with a blue highlighter — begins: “Dear architect, I would like this in my new house”, followed by an impeccable show of good manners: “please if you can”. The second one: blue-lined paper in an A6, staple-bound notebook, has been annotated with a well-sharpened pencil. Some corrections are still visible: “I win like” has been changed to “I would like”, and numbers 11 and 12 on the…

Kiri and Richard Last, directors of Middle Earth Tiles, discuss the process, benefits, and sustainable characteristics of terracotta, a highly tactile, ancient material. “The process begins with searching the local area to find clay with the correct characteristics to make the best terracotta,” says Kiri of their process of scouting an 11km radius of Warkworth farmland. “The two best characteristics we are looking for [are] a land formation that had an ancient river running through it or [one that] was at the bottom of an ancient lake,” explains Richard. “Once we find a likely area, we test the elasticity of the clay — how much it will shrink in the kiln and the colour of the tile after firing. If all looks good then it’s on.” Finding a good source…

“I often went out in the evening to spend time watching the bees flying home. As the sun went down, the low-angled light would catch the bees’ wings; flashes of light coming and going. Over time, out of a kind of reverie, I began to see the world differently — as a complex interconnected network of relationships that a colony of bees make palpably visible.” — Anne Noble, from her book Conversātiō: In the Company of Bees (Massey University Press). Photo: Eidolon # 3, by Anne Noble.…