Canterbury's NZ Institute of Architects' awards

The winners have been announced at the NZ Institute of Architects Awards for the Canterbury region, and one building in particular has won big: Athfield Architects' conversion and redesign of the Christchurch Civic Council Offices and Chambers (both images below) won awards in the categories of Public Architecture, Sustainable Architecture, Interior Architecture, Planning and Urban Design (for its connections with surrounding buildings and the streetscape). Incidentally, New Zealand Green Building Council chief executive Alex Cutler chose it as her favourite building in our current issue. 

RTA Studio's Black Estate winery at Waipara (below) won a Commercial Architecture award. Photo by Stephen Goodenough. 

This one's in our current issue: Chris Wilson of Wilson & Hill's own family home, winner of a residential award. Photo by Stephen Goodenough. 

This house in Fendalton (below) by Sheppard + Rout Architects also picked up a residential award. Photo by Diederik van Heyningen.

The Buchan Group's Re:START container shopping precinct (below) won an award in the Planning & Urban Design category. It also won a Resene Colour Award. Photo by Murray Hedwig. 

Modern Architecture Partners won a residential award for this house in the Redcliffs area (below). Photo by Lisa Gane.

Christchurch's Court Theatre by Fulton Ross Team Architects (below) won a Public Architecture award. 

Finally, another residential award for Wilson & Hill Architects for the prefabricated Smart House (below). Photo by Stephen Goodenough.

NZ Institute of Architects Nelson/Marlborough awards

The New Zealand Institute of Architects' awards season is now in full swing, with another fine batch of buildings being recognised in the institute's Nelson/Marlborough Architecture Awards. First up, something you will have seen in our December/January 2012 issue: the Brancott Estate Heritage Centre (below) by Fearon Hay Architects, a winner in the commercial architecture category. Photo by Patrick Reynolds.

 

 
Cloudy Bay's The Shack (below), by Tim Greer and Paul Rolfe, also picked up an award in the commercial architecture category, and was featured in our August/September issue. Photo by Mike Rolfe.
 

This holiday home (below) by Min Hall and Arthouse Architects won an award in the residential category, and will be featured in our next issue. 

A home by Redbox Architects (below) also won a residential award. Photo by Elspeth Collier.

Wellington's Tennent + Brown Architects picked up two residential awards for homes in the Nelson/Marlborough region, the first for this house in Okiwa Bay (below, photo by Marina Mathews) and the second for the Waiwhero farmhouse (two below, photo by Jason Rothenberg), which is featured in our current issue.

There were two winners in the Enduring Architecture category. The first is a 1961 house by Ernst Plischke, photographed by Patrick Reynolds. 

The second Enduring Architecture winner in the region is photographer and publisher Craig Potton's house (below), designed by Hal Wagstaff and photographed by Paul McCredie for our February/March 2011 issue.

 Another winner in the residential category: this house (below) by Guy Herschell Architects.

Wellington's Parsonson Architects picked up a residential award for this house in the Wairau Valley (below). Look out for it in one of our upcoming issues. Photo by Paul McCredie. 

This house (below) by Palmer & Palmer Architects picked up a residential award. 

The Saxton Pavilion (below) by Arthouse Architects picked up a Public Architecture award. Photo by Oliver Weber.

And finally, Arthouse Architecture picked up a third award (this time for sustainability) for their Victory Primary School redevelopment (below). 

The Adirondacks - a small-world story

How's this for a charming small-world story? This week we received an email from Christina Kaiser, an expat American who has been living in New Zealand for the last 13 years. Christina wrote to us because she remembers hiking, and skiing and camping beside Raquette Lake in New York State's Adirondacks Mountains, the same location as the beautiful cabin photographed by Emily Andrews in our current issue. 

(To jog your memories, here's one of Emily's photographs featuring expat New Zealander Adrian van Schie, who designed and built the cabin, and his sons Huck and Tana. Alexandra Perce, Adrian's wife and the boys' mother, is just out of frame). 

Christina Kaiser's connection to the Adirondacks and Raquette Lake runs deeper than the aforementioned childhood memories: her father, architecture professor Harvey Kaiser, wrote The Great Camps of the Adirondacks, probably the definitive tome on this important aspect of the area's history. In the mid-1800s, wealthy families from New York would come upstate for the summer and stay in tents or compounds made up of structures that, even when they became elaborate, still aspired to a type of rusticity. (Adrian and Alexandra's cabin shown above was built recently, but it emulates the rusticity of the buildings in the Great Camps nearby.) 

Christina writes:

[Dad's] book helped popularise the term 'great camp' and drew an incredible amount of attention to these historic places and their need for preservation. Without planning it, he became an expert on the great camps and local celebrity in the largest state park in the country. Thirty years later, he is still regularly asked to give talks about the great camps. 

Sam Eichblatt's story for us touches on the way preservation efforts of the camps were galvanised in the mid-1970s. Harvey Kaiser's important role in these efforts came about almost accidentally, Christina writes:

  

When Syracuse University announced plans to sell Camp Sagamore, my dad was an architecture professor and a Senior Vice President at the university. According to him, he "turned up at the auction in September 1976 and while standing there, as an Adirondack novice from Brooklyn, wondered who built the place, why did they build it out of logs down this 5-mile road from the nearest highway, and so on. When I couldn't find any answers in print - virtually zero was ever published about the camps - I decided there should be some advocacy voice to bring to the public's attention these rustic architecture masterpieces. So I researched, wrote, took pictures, and found a good publisher."

The rest is history, as 40,000 copies of the book are in print, and the preservation efforts it helped inspire have ensured many of the camps have survived. We're delighted Christina got in touch, and that our story prompted this connection with Harvey. We're looking forward to the new edition of his book (due in late 2014 or early 2015), and we applaud the way his work turned out to be instrumental in preserving the unique buildings of this area. We'll end this post with a photo Christina sent us of her and Harvey at a signing of the book at Lake Placid 1982 or 1983. 

Meet the Architects: Auckland, October 31

We'd like to invite you to our special 'Meet the Architects' evening we're holding in conjunction with our Home of the Year partners Altherm Window Systems in Auckland on Wednesday October 31st (yes, we know it's Halloween; no, the architects won't be spooky).

The details:

MEET THE ARCHITECTS
6PM-7.30PM, WEDNESDAY OCTOBER 31
GEYSER, 105 PARNELL ROAD, AUCKLAND

Entry is free, but please register to attend by emailing Gabrielle Lourens at glourens@acpmedia.co.nz 

We'll serve drinks at 6pm, then you'll be able to hear HOME editor Jeremy Hansen in conversation with the following excellent architects, who will talk about recent and future projects. The whole event will be a little over an hour long, is open to everyone. It promises to be a fascinating evening.

1. ANDREW PATTERSON, PATTERSON ASSOCIATES 
Andrew has won more architectural awards than we can count, including one for the amazing Mai Mai house (on p.84 of our current issue) and another for Geyser, the Parnell building where we're holding our event (below, photographed by Simon Devitt).

2. DAVE STRACHAN, STRACHAN GROUP ARCHITECTS
Dave is an accomplished architect, former builder, and teacher at Auckland's Unitec, where the bach he created in collaboration with last year's architecture students was a finalist in our 2012 Home of the Year award (below, photographed by Simon Devitt). He'll talk about this year's student project (a social housing initiative) plus a number of the other fascinating projects and beautiful homes his firm has under development.  

 

3. LANCE AND NICOLA HERBST, HERBST ARCHITECTS

The husband-and-wife architecture team will talk about the development of 'Under Pohutukawa', the unforgettable 2012 Home of the Year (below, photographed by Patrick Reynolds), as well as their approach to light, space and craft. 

Please join us for what we know is going to be a fantastic event. We look forward to seeing you there.

NZ Institute of Architects awards - Auckland winners

The awards season for the NZ Institute of Architects' regional awards is beginning, with the announcement of the Auckland winners on Wednesday night. Winners from these regional awards will go forward for contention in the NZ Architecture Awards, which will be announced next year. Here, we've included a photograph of each of the Auckland winners. Our congratulations to all of them.

Jasmax won an award for its work at the University of Auckland's Grafton Campus (above), including the design of the new Boyle building and the refurbishment of three other existing buildings.Photo by Tod Wilson.

Also in the education category, ASC Architects were recognised for the BLENZZ campus redevelopment (above) in Manurewa.Photo by Michael Ng.

 

Williams Architects were given a regional award for their expansion and renovation of the Blum showroom in Avondale.

Cheshire Architects in association with Assembly Architects received an award for the design of the Britomart Showcases, the stores in the Britomart precinct (above). Photo by Jeremy Toth.

The Broadcast Tower at North Harbour Stadium by Copeland Associates received an award in the small project category.

A clever reworking of a former State House in the suburb of Westmere by CCM Architects (above) received an award in the 'Housing' category. Watch out for this house in one of our upcoming issues. Photo by Simon Devitt.

Also in the housing category is this house (above) in the suburb of Cox's Bay by McKinney + Windeatt Architects (you may remember us featuring architect Jack McKinney's own house, a winner in last year's awards, in our June/July issue). Photo by Patrick Reynolds.

One of our favourite Auckland eateries, Depot (above, featured in our October/November 2011 issue), received an interior architecture award for its designers, C Nott Architects. Photo by Florence Noble. 

Geyser (above), the new commercial building in the Auckland suburb of Parnell by Patterson Associates, received a commercial architecture award. Come and join us there for our Meet the Architects event on October 31 - information in you current issue, and will also be posted here very soon! Photo by Simon Devitt.

This renovation (above) by Strachan Group Architects received a residential award. It was published in our October/November 2009 issue. Photo by Patrick Reynolds.

  

Three-time Home of the Year award winners Stevens Lawson Architects also won a residential award for this house on Waiheke Island (above). Photo by Mark Smith.

Another residential award-winner (above): this is house by Sumich Chaplin Architects. 

Jack Tar (above), a pub on Auckland's North Wharf by Architecture HDT, won a heritage award (the photo is by Jenny Trevelyan), while Architectus won a planning and urban design award for their work on North Wharf's Karanga Plaza and Kiosk (below). Photo by Jeff Brass and Andy Chong.

Cheshire Architects won an award in the education category for their work on the Leigh Marine Centre (above). Photo by Jeremy Toth. Also in the education category, Jasmax picked up an award for the Performing Arts Centre at Massey High School (below). Photo by Kenneth Li.

More from Cheshire Architects, this time an interior award for their design of Britomart's Mexico Restaurant & Tequila Bar (above). Photo by Jeremy Toth.

Scarlet Architects won a residential award for this bach (above) on the Kaipara Harbour (to be seen in one of our upcoming issues). Photo by Simon Devitt. 

More Cheshire Architects! This time, a public architecture award for Q Theatre (above). Photo by Jeremy Toth. 

Many of you will recognise this house (above) by Glamuzina Paterson Architects, which featured in our June/July issue and picked up an NZIA residential award. Photo by Emily Andrews.

The lovely School of Music at the University of Auckland by Hill Manning Mitchell Architects (above) received an enduring architecture award.

Architectus received an award in the education category for this building (above), a performing arts centre at St Cuthbert's College. Photo by Patrick Reynolds.

Fearon Hay Architects won a residential award for this cottage on Great Barrier Island, which was featured in our December/January 2012 issue. Photo by Patrick Reynolds. 

The Cloud (above), on Auckland's Queen's Wharf, designed by Jasmax, won a public architecture award. Photo by Kenneth Li, Jonny David & Euan Cafe.

Andrew Lister won an interior architecture award for his work at The Grill restaurant (above), which featured in our December/January 2012 issue. Photo by Simon Devitt.

Fearon Hay Architects picked up a heritage award for their work at Auckland's Imperial Buildings (above). Photo by Patrick Reynolds. 

Last but not least, a house on the North Shore by Stevens Lawson Architects (above) won a residential award. Photo by Mark Smith.