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We like: Milse's sweet treats at Auckland's Britomart

July 29, 2013, 7:06 pm
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We like the sublime, sweet offerings of dessert restaurant and patisserie Milse (pronounced 'Mil-say', and is Gaelic for 'sweet') as much as we like its dramatic interior. 


The cocoon-like space in Auckland's Britomart opened recently and supplies desserts to neighbouring Ortolana restaurant as well as hosting diners at tables of its own, and offering takeout. 

The space was designed by Cheshire Architects. HOME editor Jeremy Hansen spoke to Nat Cheshire about the design, and to Milse's executive pastry chef Brian Campbell about the amazing food. These photographs are by David Straight.








HOME What was your brief for the space, and how did you go about filling it?
NAT CHESHIRE, CHESHIRE ARCHITECTS Within this left-over back-alley space we needed to offer an immersive and transformative experience, shaping spaces around some of the most ambitious dessert cooking in the country. We were inspired by the Arabian history of dessert-making to create an interior that folds together the crystalline structure of sugars and the delicate tracery of carved wooden moucharaby panels.


HOME How does it feel to be in the space?
NAT CHESHIRE The goal is a world of quiet delight within a chaotic left-over geometry surrounded by service lanes and delivery trucks outside. Milse has a cave-like intensity within the quiet complexity of its filigree surface. We hope this means it feels like another world entirely.


HOME I remember people eating their feelings at Death by Chocolate in the 80s. How is Milse different from the dessert restaurants of that era?
BRIAN CAMPBELL, EXECUTIVE PASTRY CHEF I think people are now eating a lot more casually – it’s the norm to restaurant-hop. Our approach is to focus on the best of seasonal products as well as showcasing premium ingredients such as chocolate and spices to give people an amazing dessert experience, whether they’re eating in or taking away.

HOME What’s your favourite thing on the menu at the moment?
BRIAN CAMPBELL I like the passionfruit and apple salted caramels.
NAT CHESHIRE I am trying to eat my way through everything, one hemispherical salted caramel gelato cake at a time.

Milse is at 27 Tyler Street, Britomart, Auckland, ph 09 368 9487 (no reservations accepted).

 
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Our new cover: Fashion Houses

August 1, 2013, 4:49 pm
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Behold! Our new cover, which New Zealand subscribers should receive today and which will hit newsstands on Monday. We hope you like it. It's a photograph by Sharrin Rees of a beautiful Sydney home designed by expat New Zealand architects Chris Adams and Bianco Pohio (who are also, as you'll see, experts at creating beautiful, calm interiors).


In the photo, the blue 'Clip' chairs are by Lorenz Kaz for Bedont, and the '91' table is by Alvar Aalto (who also designed the teaware on the shelf behind). The blue vase is by Bitossi. 

This issue is our annual focus on the connections between fashion, architecture and interior design. Some of the homes we've selected for it are owned by people in the fashion biz, and others were chosen because we think they say interesting things about the directions architecture and interior design are heading today. 

We're really pleased with the issue and hope you like it too. Thanks to photographer Sharrin and to Chris and Bianca for helping us create such an arresting cover. 

We'll preview more of the issue's content for you in our posts next week. Have a great weekend. 
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Meet the Architects on September 11 at Auckland Art Gallery

August 29, 2013, 4:20 pm
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We're delighted to invite you to Meet the Architects, our free evening where you can hear some of the country's best architects in conversation with HOME editor Jeremy Hansen and see slides of their recent and upcoming projects. We're hosting the event with our Home of the Year partner, Altherm Window Systems.

 
The event is being held at the Auckland Art Gallery Auditorium at 6pm on Wednesday September 11. Entry is free, but please RSVP to Ashleigh Webb, awebb@bauermedia.co.nz, if you're keen to come - it's important we manage numbers so we can fit everyone in. Architects who attend get 15 CPD points.

Here's who'll appearing on stage:

Nicholas Stevens and Gary Lawson, designers of the Home of the Year 2013, will talk about the winning house and their exciting upcoming projects, which include a medium-density residential development in Auckland, and a theatre in Hawke's Bay. 

The Headland House by Stevens Lawson Architects. Photograph by Mark Smith.
Aaron Paterson and Dominic Glamuzina of Glamuzina Paterson Architects (recent winners of two NZ Institute of Architects' New Zealand Architecture Awards) will talk about their Lake Hawea House, a finalist in the Home of the Year 2013, as well as other upcoming projects. 

The Lake Hawea House by Glamuzina Paterson Architects. Photograph by Patrick Reynolds.
Sally Ogle and Ben Mitchell-Anyon are the designers of The Dogbox, the Whanganui house that was a finalist in the Home of the Year 2013. They'll be talking about designing and building that remarkable house, as well as the other projects they've got coming up. 

The Dogbox by Patchwork Architecture. Photograph by Paul McCredie.
The talk will run from 6pm and finish about 7.15pm. Please come along - it's not only a talk for architects, but for anyone who's interested in design. We look forward to seeing you there.


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Book now: our latest Style Safari

September 3, 2013, 9:06 pm
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Good news: we're holding another of our popular Style Safaris - a day of design-store tours and expert briefings guided by HOME editor Jeremy Hansen - on October 18.

The all-day Style Safari experience includes visits to five Auckland design stores, briefings on the latest international design trends at each destination, and lunch at Cibo. 


The October 18 Style Safari includes briefings on new furniture arrivals from the teams at Studio Italia, Simon James Design, Matisse, Backhouse Interiors and Corporate Culture. 

You'll be transported between each destination in luxurious vehicles provided by our event partner Mercedes-Benz. It's a hassle-free way for you to get ahead on all the latest design developments and to see what's in stock and on order in Auckland's best design showrooms.

Numbers on the Style Safari are limited to 50, and our last event sold out quickly, so purchase your tickets now. They're available for $95 from Eventopia - click here to reserve your place! 
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Our new cover: An Auckland home by Athfield Architects

October 6, 2013, 2:59 pm
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Our new issue is out, and should be on newsstands around the country today. It features a photograph by Simon Wilson of an Auckland home by Athfield Architects. The shot was styled by Amelia Holmes (and includes a 'Husk' chair by Patricia Urquiola for B&B Italia from Matisse, rugs from Studio Italia, a cushion and cloche from Everyday Needs and bookshelves from Studio Italia). 

Pop out and pick up your copy today - we hope you enjoy it. 

 
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Canterbury Architecture Awards 2013

October 9, 2013, 4:36 pm
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The New Zealand Institute of Architects has just announced the winners of the 2013 Canterbury Architecture Awards, and we're delighted to present them for you here.

First up, the homes: the two images below show the Annandale Shepherds Cottage and Annandale Homestead on Banks Peninsula, both sensitively restored by Pattersons, which won awards in the Heritage and Sustainable Architecture categories.


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Next, a home many of you will recognise from our Home of the Year issue last April: the Clifton Hill House (below), originally designed by Ernest A. Kalnins in 1965 and sensitively renovated by Duval O'Neill of Herriot + Melhuish.



Another award-winner in the Housing category was this home (below) by Sumich Chaplin Architects. 


Also in the Housing category, this house in Ilam (below) by C. Nott Architects.


Matz Architects designed this home in Merivale (below), also a winner in the Housing category. 




This house in Fernside (below) by Wilkie + Bruce Architects also picked up awards in the Housing and Sustainable Architecture categories.


This holiday home (below) at picturesque Ngaio Point, Akaroa, is by Wilson & Hill Architects and also won a Housing category award.


This home (below) at Pentre Terrace won a Housing award for Cymon Allfrey Architects.


C. Nott Architects' second award in the Housing category is for the 'Tekapo Tractor Shed' (below), which is actually a shed-like holiday home.


Two projects at Christchurch Airport also received Canterbury Architecture Awards. The Air New Zealand Regional Lounge (below), designed by BVN Donovan Hill and Jasmax, won awards for Commercial and Interior Architecture. 


Also at Christchurch Airport, the Integrated Terminal Project (below) by Warren & Mahoney and Hassell won an award for Commercial Architecture. 


There were three winners in the Public Architecture category. First, the Selwyn Aquatic Centre (below), designed by Warren & Mahoney, which also won a Sustainable Architecture award in recognition of its passive energy utilisation.


Another award-winning pool complex: Timaru's Caroline Bay Aquatic Centre (below), designed by Boon Goldsmith Bhaskar Brebner Team Architecture. 


Christchurch City Council's own architecture office designed the Aranui Library (below), which picked up a Sustainable Architecture award in addition to being recognised in the Public Architecture category. 


The St Margaret College's Gymnasium and Chapel project (below), designed by Athfield Architects, received an award in the Education category. 


The repair of Harper and Julius Houses at Christ's College (below) by Wilkie + Bruce Architects won a Sustainable Architecture Award for the sensitive restoration of this Category 2 Heritage building originally designed by Benjamin Mountfort. 


The University of Canterbury's James Hight Undercroft (below) won an interior architecture award in recognition of Warren & Mahoney's transformation of a space bicycle storage area into a student hub. 


Athfield Architects picked up an award in the Commercial Architecture category for their work on the Fendalton Road shops (below). 


And Fulton Ross Team Architects won an award in the Sustainable Architecture category for their work on the New Regent Street shops (below). 


Last but not least, Herriot + Melhuish Architects won an Interior Architecture award for their work on Sala Sala Restaurant (below), which also features in our current issue. 


All the winners of the Canterbury Architecture Awards are now eligible for consideration in the New Zealand Architecture Awards, which will be announced in May next year. We'll keep you posted on those, of course - as well as the other regional awards as they're announced over the coming months.
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Our new book: great New Zealand modernist homes

October 14, 2013, 8:29 pm
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We're so pleased with our new book, Modern: New Zealand Homes from 1938 to 1977, which we've created in conjunction with the kind folks at Random House publishers. It'll be in bookstores from November 1, but we wanted to tell you a bit about it here before it comes out. 

The book's jacket features a photograph by Patrick Reynolds of a home designed by Reginald Uren in Raumati in the mid-1960s. When you get your copy, you'll see the jacket (like the rest of the book, designed by our friends at Inhouse) folds out to reveal a bigger view of the house.



Under the jacket lies this foxy linen cover with embossed lettering. Yum. 



The book, which has 350 pages between its gorgeous covers, is a compliation of features of our favourite mid-century homes from the magazine in the last decade or so, with the addition of some that have been newly photographed for the book. The shot below is of a spread from the book featuring the Donner House, designed by Auckland's City Architect, Tibor Donner. It was photographed by Mark Smith and styled by Katie Lockhart.

There are 24 homes in the book, modernist gems from Auckland, Hamilton, Thames, Whanganui, Hawke's Bay, Raumati, Wellington, Christchurch, Hokitika, Dunedin and Alexandra. All of them show mid-century New Zealand as a place of great sophistication and inventiveness. Most of the homes are still in marvellously good condition, as liveable today as they were when they were first completed - including Wellington's Halberstam House (below), designed by Henry Kulka and still occupied by Lucie Halberstam, the daughter of the original owners. This photo is by Paul McCredie. 



The book also features homes designed by, among others, Ernst Plischke, Bill Alington, Robin Simpson, Vladimir Cacala, John Scott, Ivan Juriss, Ted McCoy, Jon Craig, and Sir Miles Warren, whose magnificent Selby (below, photographed by Paul McCredie) near Havelock North features along with a home Sir Miles designed in Dunedin that has been shot especially for the book.



We're including the shot below just to make it clear that this isn't just a picture book. In fact, it includes the work of some of the country's best architectural writers from HOME's family of contributors, including Douglas Lloyd Jenkins, Julia Gatley, Linda Tyler, Adrienne Rewi, Lara Strongman, Andrew Barrie, Bill McKay, Michael Findlay, Alistair Luke and Claire McCall. 



There are also plans of almost every house, and helpful biographies of the architects involved. 



One of the many nice things about the book is the way it traces modernism's development in New Zealand from textbook flat-roofed homes to later experiments in combining European modernism with this country's cottage vernacular, where homes such as Jon Craig's near Wellington (below, photographed by Paul McCredie) combined pitched roofs with open-plan living rooms. 


We're pleased to be able to offer the book for the special price of $70 (RRP is $75) including postage, from www.magshop.co.nz/modern. You can pre-order your copy there now. We really hope you enjoy it. 


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Auckland Architecture Awards 2013

October 16, 2013, 10:52 pm
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The winners of the NZ Institute of Architects' Auckland Architecture Awards were announced last night. There's a whole host of great buildings here. We'll start with the houses. 

The Newcombe House in Parnell, Auckland (below) was designed by Peter Bartlett and won an Enduring Architecture award. You can see this terrific house published in full in our new book, Modern: New Zealand Homes from 1938 to 1977, which is in bookstores on November 1. The photograph is by Samuel Hartnett. 


The other winner in the Enduring Architecture category was the Yock House (below), designed by architect Lillian Chrystall. 


In the Housing category, RTA Studio won an award for the Stable Lane apartments (below), which featured in our June/July issue. The photograph is by Patrick Reynolds. 


New York-based, New Zealand-born architect David Howell won a Housing Award for this home on Auckland's Upper Queen Street (below), photographed by Patrick Reynolds.


Glamuzina Paterson Architects picked up a Housing award for this holiday home on Waiheke Island (below), photographed by Samuel Hartnett. 


Strachan Group Architects designed the Nikau House in Parnell, which also won an award in the Housing category (below). It also won a Sustainable Architecture award. Photograph by Jackie Meiring. 


You might remember this from our February/March issue last year: the Ngunguru House (below) by Tennent + Brown Architects, another winner in the Housing and Sustainability categories. Photograph by Paul McCredie. 


Strachan Group Architects also picked up Housing and Sustainability awards for their work for VisionWest Community Housing, two low-budget homes in West Auckland (below). Photograph by Jackie Meiring. 


The Takapuna House by Athfield Architects (below) is on the cover of our current issue, and also won a Housing award. Photograph by Simon Devitt. 


On Waiheke Island, the Macalister House (below) by architect Wendy Shacklock picked up a Housing award. Photograph by Patrick Reynolds. Watch out for this in one of our upcoming issues. 


This home (below) by Dorrington Architects also won a Housing award. Photograph by Emma-Jane Hetherington. 


Another Housing award winner to watch out for in an upcoming issue: the Tarrant/Millar house in Point Chevalier (below), designed by architect Guy Tarrant (who also happens to have a home in our current issue). Photograph by Patrick Reynolds. 

 
The Cliff Top House (below) by Xsite Architects featured in our August/September issue last year, and also won a Housing Award. Photograph by Simon Devitt. 


Patterson Associates won a Housing award for this home (below) in St Mary's Bay, which you can also look forward to seeing more of in one of our upcoming issues. Photograph by Simon Devitt. 


And the final award in the Housing category went to the Dune House (below) by Fearon Hay Architects, photographed by Patrick Reynolds. 


Onwards! Now to the Interior Architecture category, in which there were five winners. The first, the St Heliers Bay Bistro (below), by McKinney Windeatt Architects. Photograph by David Straight. 


Jasmax won an Interior Architecture award for their work on AUT's Sir Paul Reeves Building (below), which also won an award in the Education category. Photograph by Simon Devitt. 


Cheshire Architects garnered an Interior Architecture award for their work on Milse (below) in Auckland's Britomart precinct. Photograph by Jeremy Toth. 


The York Street Mechanics cafe (below) in Parnell, with an interior by Bureaux Architects, was another winner in the Interior Architecture category. Photograph by Samuel Hartnett. 


And the final Interior Architecture award went to CPRW Fisher for the Lincoln Road fitout (below). Photograph by Simon Devitt. 


Onto the Heritage category, where there were two winners. The Fox Street Office (below) was designed by Fearon Hay Architects and photographed by Jackie Meiring. 


The other winner in the Heritage category was Salmond Reed Architects for the Allendale House and Annex on Ponsonby Road (below). Photograph by Simon Devitt. 


Now Commercial Architecture, in which there were four winners. McKinney Windeatt Architects won an award in this category for their design of the Special Building, just behind Victoria Park Market (below). Photograph by Simon Devitt. 


Also in the Commercial Architecture category, Warren & Mahoney won an award for their work on the renovation of the ANZ Centre in Albert Street (below). Photograph by Simon Devitt. 


RTA Studio won a Commercial Architecture award for the McKelvie Street shopping Precinct (below), which you might remember from our February/March issue. Photograph by Patrick Reynolds.

 
And the final Commercial Architecture award went to Jasmax for the Quad 5 office building at Auckland Airport (below), which also won a Sustainable Architecture Award. Photograph by Simon Devitt. 


To the Education category, in which RTA Studio won an award for the St Kentigern College MacFarlan Centre (below). Photograph by Patrick Reynolds. 


Warren & Mahoney won an Education award for the Massey University Albany Student Amenities Centre (below). Photograph by Simon Devitt. 


Kay and Keys Architects won an Education category award for the Unitec Marae Stage 2 Wharekai (Manaaki) (below), photographed by Greg Kempthorne. 


Warren & Mahoney won another award in the Education category for the University of Auckland University Hall. Photograph by Simon Devitt. 


In the Public Architecture category, Archoffice won an award for the refurbishment of the ASB Theatre at the Aotea Centre (below). Photograph by Simon Devitt. 


Warren & Mahoney won a Public Architecture Award for the Point Resolution Footbridge (below), just beside Auckland's Parnell Baths. Photograph by Patrick Reynolds. 


Jasmax won a Public Architecture award for the Muriwai Surf Lifesaving Club (below). Photograph by Kenneth Li. 

  

Also in Public Architecture, Glamuzina Paterson Architects and Hamish Monk Architect won an award for the Giraffe House (below) at the Auckland Zoo. Photograph by Mark Smith. 


In the Small Project Architecture category, Archoffice won an award for this Auckland Council Amenities building (below). Photograph by Simon Devitt. 


Also winning a Small Project Award is the Arruba Bach by Bossley Architects (below), which you should look out for in an upcoming issue of HOME. Photograph by Simon Devitt. 


The House of Steel and Light (below) by Robin O'Donnell Architects also won a Small Project award. Photograph by Fraser Newman.

 
BVN Donovan Hill and Jasmax won an award in the Sustainable Architecture category for ASB North Wharf (below). Photograph by Simon Devitt. 

 
Finally, the Planning and Urban Design category, in which Sills Van Bohemen won an award for Takapuna's Hurstmere Green (below). Photograph by Simon Devitt.  


Construkt Architects and Isthmus Group won a Planning and Urban Design Award for the Sunderland Precinct comprehensive development plan in Auckland's Hobsonville Point (it's not developed yet, so there's no photo). 

And the final winner in this epic post is Matter and Auckland Transport, who designed this temporary installation on a disused part of Spaghetti Junction motorway to raise awareness of cycling. It won a Planning and Urban Design award. Photograph by Alex Wallace and Laura Forest. 


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Milan Mrkusich, modernist master

November 13, 2013, 5:44 pm
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This week we had the pleasure of attending the opening of an exhibition accompanying an auction of works (by online art dealers Ocula Black) from the collection of the great New Zealand modernist artist, Milan Mrkusich. 

This isn't an auction of works from the secondary market, but paintings from Milan Mrkusich's own collection that have been selected for auction by his son, Lewis Mrkusich. Lewis has chosen five pairs of works, each pair combining a painting from early in his father's career with a more recent work. 

The image below shows, at left on the end wall, 'Chromatic Primary Suite', completed in 1992, paired with (at right on end wall) 'Triptych: Homage to Rodchenko), painted in 1966. The pairings of all the works show the remarkable consistency of Mrkusich's exploration of geometry and colour throughout his career.


This image (below) shows 'Meta Grey Light Series No. 1' (1970) at left, and 'Meta Grey, Yellow' (1998) at right. 


Here (below), Milan Mrkusich's 'Progression II' (1985-92) is shown at left alongside 'Untitled I' (2002).



At the opening, a couple of people wondered if Milan Mrkusich was still alive, as they hadn't seen any new works from him in some time. We can happily report that he is in his 80s and, although he now needs to use a walker to help him move around, he is very much alive, although he stopped painting some years ago. He didn't attend the opening but visited the gallery earlier in the day to see the works. Lewis said his father was delighted to see the paintings, and intrigued by the way they were grouped. 

In the image below, Milan Mrkusich's 'Dark Painting II' (1971) hangs at left beside 'Achromatic with Cobalt Blue' (1991).


Not everyone knows that Mrkusich, who was born in Dargaville in 1925, began his career as a designer at the Auckland firm of Brenner Associates. He worked on a number of architectural projects and also designed the Auckland home that he still lives in, a modernist marvel that is still in terrific condition (but he is reticent about having it photographed).

Wellingtonians will also know his work from the mural of colour blocks on the Cable Street facade of Te Papa, commissioned as the museum was undergoing construction. And, of course, his paintings are in major public and private collections all over the country.

Ocula Black's online auction of these wonderful works continues until next Tuesday, November 26. Even if you aren't going to bid on them, we recommend you take the opportunity to visit Ocula Black's Auckland gallery space (at 25 Sale Street) to see the paintings - or see more of them at the Ocula Black link at the top of this page.
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More Mrkusich: this time, the master's marvellous house

November 14, 2013, 8:26 pm
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Yesterday we blogged about Milan Mrkusich's great paintings (10 works from his collection are currently being auctioned by Ocula Black) but we didn't want to leave out the fact that the artist was also a great designer, as these photos of his own Auckland home show. 

Mrkusich started his career as a graphic designer, and later worked on architectural projects in his role at Auckland's Brenner Associates. He designed his own home (where he still lives today) in the early 1950s. 

Our thanks to Auckland War Memorial Museum - Tamaki Paenga Hira for allowing us to reproduce these images of the home from their archives. The shots were taken by a photographer from Sparrow Industrial Pictures soon after the home was completed. 

This shot (below) shows the home's north-facing elevation and the way its striking wedge shape follows the contour of the site. 


Here's the southern elevation, with a timber wall sheltering the home from cooler southerly winds, while a clerestory window lets in light.


The home's interior (below) is lovely, with an open-plan, split level living space holding the kitchen, dining, living and studio areas. Some time after this photo was taken, Mrkusich added a larger studio to the southern wing of the home, enabling his wife Florence to use this space on the lowest level of the living area.

 
Another view of the living room (below) shows the southern clerestory window and the chairs from Brenner Associates. A work by Mrkusich is on the pillar in the foreground. Please excuse the blemishes on the photo, which are a result of damage to the transparencies before they entered the care of Auckland Museum.

 
 This view (below) looks from the living room back to the dining area, taking in the beautiful fireplace with its stone surround and the marvellously cantilevered steps.


And finally, this view (below) of the compact dining area also shows the kitchen at right and the home's main entrance. 

 
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Our new cover: The Summer Issue

November 27, 2013, 7:07 pm
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Our latest cover (which will reach subscribers tomorrow, and be on newsstands from Monday December 2) features a photograph by Emily Andrews of the home and studio of artist Jennifer Bartlett (whose work hangs at right), designed by David Berridge. 

Given all the Christmas madness that's about to engulf us, we wanted to create a cover that embodied our simple aims in the upcoming holidays: to rest, relax and reconnect. We hope you get this feeling of calm when you look at this lovely shot. 

Inside, there's a range of inspiring summer escapes, from a beautiful pool pavilion on the Kaipara Harbour by Herbst Architects to a humble Wanaka holiday home by Anna-Marie Chin that was inspired by the region's vernacular sheds. 

You should also look out for the Noble family's fabulous off-grid Northland encampment - made up of a converted shipping container and a clutch of Indian tents - and a magnificent Waiheke Island holiday home by Andre Hodgskin.

We hope you enjoy the issue, and that the promise of post-Christmas calm carries you through the craziness of the festive season. 
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Design Case Studies with Altherm Window Systems: Drift Bay house by Kerr Ritchie Architects

January 30, 2014, 12:00 pm
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Happy New Year everyone, and welcome to the first in our new series of Design Case Studies, which will run weekly here on our blog. 

The Design Case Studies are created to give you insight into the building process of some of the amazing homes in the magazine, so the owners can share some of the lessons they learned with you. The series is brought to you in association with Atherm Window Systems. 

The first Design Case Study visits Pete Ritchie and Bronwen Kerr of Queenstown's Kerr Ritchie Architects and talks to them about how they allowed themselves maximum flexibility and minimum fuss with the construction of their home at Drift Bay on Lake Wakatipu. The photographs are by Paul McCredie.

Pete Ritchie and Bronwen Kerr's home in Drift Bay, near Queenstown.
Architects often say that when they get to design their own homes they have a duty to experiment, and Pete Ritchie and Bronwen Kerr’s home on the shores of Lake Wakatipu is no exception. When architects are their own clients, they also tend to leave their documentation until the last minute. For both of these reasons, Pete and Bronwen decided to hire a builder on a labour and materials arrangement, instead of a fixed-price contract (in which the builder agrees to complete the work on a house for a previously agreed price). “It seemed like a fair way to build and there was flexibility along the way,” Pete says. “Plans don’t have to be quite as tied down, so there’s more scope to move throughout the project. There was a certain amount of experimentation going on, and the builder enjoyed that – although it's not always what we would recommend to our clients, as many want more price certainty.”

Pete Ritchie and Bronwen Kerr of Kerr Ritchie Architects.
This arrangement allowed for small but important changes along the way, changes that would have involved potentially time-consuming renegotiation of a fixed-price building contract. For example, what was intended to be a large storage cupboard in an area at the centre of the house was changed into a room containing a pellet boiler to heat water for the underfloor heating system after Pete and Bronwen investigated heating options and decided a boiler was essential. In another case, they decided not to clad an external wall in cedar, but were able to arrange with the builder to use the leftover timber indoors instead. This flexibility minimised the potential stress of making big decisions a long way in advance. Instead, Pete and Bronwen had the luxury of refining details as the building evolved.

A view of the home with The Remarkables rising behind.
The couple started out with the intention of designing a “lean” house containing enough room for them and their three children, as well as a studio to allow them to run their architecture practise from home. Initially, they hoped to complete the house for somewhere around $2000 a square metre, a target they’d achieved on a home they had previously designed for themselves in Wellington.


The home's studio (where Pete and Bronwen work) and guest bedroom is in the volume at left, with the living areas and three additional bedrooms at right. The eastern courtyard, shown here, connects with the kitchen and catches the morning sun.
By the time building started on their Queenstown house in 2006, prices for building and materials had increased, meaning the cost of the new house came in closer to $2500 a square metre. Fortunately, the increase in the value of their lakeside land in the years between their purchase of it and the erection of their home gave them the ability to borrow more money to cover the extra cost.

The home's main living area looks north across Lake Wakatipu towards Queenstown.
Some decisions they made along the way helped keep costs down, but these choices were always made with the overall aesthetic of the building in mind. Inside, they made the economical choice of strandboard panels for doors, joinery and some walls, instead of the more expensive hoop pine they were initially considering. Now that the strandboard is installed, it feels perfectly in keeping with the home’s casual aesthetic.


The kitchen looks out to the courtyard. The staircase at left is clad in Strandboard panels, which helped keep costs down and fit the home's casual aesthetic.
The home's living area features cedar detailing that is also used on the exterior.
The other decision they made in order to save money was for Pete to become the builder’s labourer. The couple had just relocated from Wellington to Queenstown and didn’t have a great deal of local work on at that time, so the arrangement made financial sense and also gave Pete valuable insight into the building process (as well as making it clear that working outside in the middle of a Queenstown winter can sometimes be a bit grim).
 
One of the home's bathrooms features a sauna and a sliding door that opens to the garden. The walls feature 'Vixel' glass mosaic tiles.
Now, with their own home and a number of other commissions completed, the couple say they have a good handle on budgetary matters, but they also emphasise the role the client must play (along with a quantity surveyor or builder) in managing their expenditure. “We’ve found that a lot of clients want to manage projects themselves, and they call on us as required,” Pete says. “Some clients are very hands-on and have the time and capability to get involved in aspects of the building process, while others would rather keep more of a distance.”


A view through the house from the entry to the studio.
Q+A
Bronwen Kerr & Pete Ritchie

HOME Why did you decide on a labour and materials arrangement (in which a builder is effectively paid by the hour and for the materials used) with your builder instead of a fixed-price contract? 

Pete Ritchie: We had a good friend who was the builder, and because we know the industry we could source some materials ourselves. We were our own project managers, and to work like that you need a builder who you trust. A labour and materials arrangement is a pretty open and honest kind of system. We didn’t want to pay a huge premium for a fixed price, and nor did we want the builder to make a loss on the job. So it seemed like an appropriate way for us to work. Architects do have experience and expertise that not everyone else has. This gives them more confidence to work this way. 


HOME You worked as the builder’s labourer. Is that an experience you’d like to repeat? 

Pete Ritchie: On the whole I enjoyed it – I also painted the house myself and stained all the weatherboards. That saved quite a bit of money. But in the middle of winter weeks can go by without you seeming to make much progress, and it’s a bit grim and very cold and you have smoko around a campfire. 

HOME Was the process of building your own place helpful in knowing about budgets? 

Pete Ritchie: It gives you a good idea of where clients are coming from. We naturally tend to be conservative with budgets, and we don’t try to extend clients. The process gave us a really good foundation of understanding where costs lie and how to work within a budget. 

HOME When you learned the house would cost more than you originally intended, did you think about revising the plan, and reducing the home's size? 
Pete Ritchie: We didn't really feel we had any option but to carry on as we had originally planned. We had certain needs and requirements which included the studio we work from. It's not a particularly fat house, so there wasn't much to trim off. We weren't in the mindset of creating a house that was oversized anyway.

The home is clad in dark Colorsteel.
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Preview: The Art Issue 2014

January 30, 2014, 6:56 pm
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Our annual Art Issue is always one of our favourites, and we're especially delighted with the way this year's extravaganza has worked out. There are plenty of highlights, including New Zealand jewellery designer Jessica McCormack's remarkable London townhouse, which features in the the beautiful shot by James MacDonald that stars on our cover.

There's much more to see inside. HOME editor Jeremy Hansen visited Jessica in London last June, and details her stellar career - her jewellery designs have been worn by Rihanna and Madonna, and she has a list of well-heeled clients from all over the world. She's also a dab hand at creating an art-filled interior, as you'll see in our pages.

Another rising star in this issue is New Zealand artist Simon Denny, who won the prestigious Baloise Art Prize at Art Basel in 2012, and has been selected as New Zealand's representative at the Venice Art Biennale in 2015. Photographer Steffen Jagenburg visited Simon (below) at his home and studio in Berlin, and took some marvellous shots. 


And there's more New Zealand artistic talent that we've tracked down offshore: our Art Issue features Fiona Connor at home in Los Angeles, a former shop in the Echo Park neighbourhood that she also uses as a studio for her sculptures (one of which is the outdoor lounge chair in this photo by Emily Andrews below). Fiona has a fascinating art practice that we're really delighted to tell you more about in this issue. 


Many of you will know 'Wind Tree', the fantastic sculpture in Auckland's Silo Park (if you don't, here it is, photographed by Simon Devitt).


'Wind Tree' was not created specifically for Silo Park, but for another Auckland site in the 1970s. It spent about a decade in storage after being removed from QEII Square to make way for the Britomart redevelopment. We tracked down Michio Ihara, the remarkable artist who created it, at his home near Boston. Gemma Gracewood has written a touching story for this issue about Ihara-san's illustrious artistic career, and Emily Andrews took beautiful photographs like this one below of his home and studio. 


Another highlight from this issue is the New York home of Bill Shumaker (below), a one-time New Zealander whose Brooklyn brownstone is bursting at the seams with his idiosyncratic art collection. Emily Andrews also took the photos, and writer Sam Eichblatt's story in our Art Issue details Bill's fascinating life story. 


There's much more in the issue of course. It's on newsstands from Monday February 3.
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Design Case Studies with Altherm Window Systems: Newmarket Townhouses by Scarlet Architects

February 6, 2014, 12:30 pm
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It was a tale of two townhouses when architects Jane Aimer and Lindley Naismith decided to design their own homes in the Auckland suburb of Newmarket. 

In this, the second of our series of Design Case Studies with Altherm Window Systems, Aimer and Naismith talk about how the design of their homes was also a masterclass in project and budget management. The photographs are by Patrick Reynolds.


Jane Aimer, her husband Paul Kelly, and their children Gina
and Tom are in the left-hand townhouse, while Lindley
Naismith and her partner John Balasoglou
occupy the right-hand home.

Naismith and Aimer live next door to each other in in twin houses they designed themselves (with the assistance of their partner at Scarlet Architects, Mike Dowsett). Being so deeply involved in their own building process gave them even greater insight into their clients’ experiences, and the challenges of managing budgets. “Nothing hones the mind more than doing it for yourself,” Naismith says. “It gives you an insight into the stress of the project and what happens to people psychologically as they go through it. It’s a heady mix of financial pressure, emotional pressure, time pressure and relationship pressure.” 

The homes have shutters that filter late-afternoon westerly light and are a nod to the heritage homes in the neighbourhood.
From left: Mike Dowsett, Lindley Naismith and
Jane Aimer of Scarlet Architects.
Much of that pressure stems from the common misperception that equates a builder’s tender with the overall budget for a house, when in the final reckoning, the overall cost of a home can be far, far higher than that. That’s because a builder’s tender doesn’t include the costs of all the extras needed to complete a home: lighting, interior cabinetry, landscaping, drapes, bathroom and kitchen fittings and fixtures … the list is long and the size of the final bill can vary enormously. 

The rear view of the homes (which are on separate titles)
shows Aimer's home on the right, and Naismith's on the left.
The gardens are connected by two sliding doors - if either
couple has theirs shut, it's a signal they don't want to
be interrupted (although this is rarely the case). 
The view to the garden from the living room in Aimer's house. The artwork is by Tracey Tawhiao.
In Aimer and Naismith's own project, they attempted to assess the cost of all these extras early on in the design process, just after the builder’s quote had arrived. They estimated a budget for each of the items over and above the builder’s estimate, and as the building process continued they endeavoured to make each of these items adhere as closely as possible to their original estimates to keep the budget on track. “It’s the little increments that can get you,” Lindley says. 

Rooms in each home are arranged vertically around light-filled stairwells - green in Aimer's home, and red in Naismith's.

The staircase in Naismith's home features red plexiglass.
This kind of budget creep – a few extra thousand here, and a few more there – may be the source of the old (and unfair) adage that if you’re using an architect, you should set a budget and then expect to double it. In the relatively recent past, it was indeed considered an architect’s job to estimate a client’s budget. These days, the process of building has become much more complicated, and the possible range of variations much greater. That’s why Aimer, Naismith and Dowsett prefer to get a quantity surveyor involved in the early stages of every project. “We always do a reality check early on,” Aimer says. “We haven’t got a project until the client is happy with the cost of it.” 

A view of the kitchen and dining area in Naismith's home.
Looking into the living room of Aimer's home from the stairwell.
Even then, it remains the clients’ responsibility to control the budget and keep track of expenditure (unless they have employed a project manager or paid the architects to manage the building process). After all, architects have no control over whether their clients choose top-of-the-range kitchen appliances, or lavish bathroom tiles, or other budget-blowing interior finishes that may not have been originally specified. Says Naismith: “There’s a huge responsibility there for clients, and some of them ignore it. Often if things are over budget, it’s not the responsibility of the architect, because of the fittings the client has chosen. You can have fancy tiles and wonderful lighting, but the budget might not be estimated for that level of finish.” 

This sectional drawing shows the way both homes are organised around their central stairwells.
Ironically, when it came to their own project Jane and Lindley ignored their own good advice of getting a quantity surveyor’s estimate, and instead relied on their own best estimates of the non-build costs. These estimates weren’t as accurate as a quantity surveyor would have been. Jane and Lindley’s houses were budgeted to cost about $750,000 each. Because Jane and her partner Paul had a little more flexibility with their budget, they specified high-quality lighting and other fittings, and ended up spending about $250,000 more. Lindley, however, wanted to stick more closely to her budget, which often resulted in her and her partner John choosing cheaper options, and spending about $120,000 more than they anticipated, all the while resisting the pressure all renovators or new-home builders come under to finish a job “properly”. 

Another view of the exterior of the homes. The cottage on the
right was an earlier project renovated by Naismith.
A little extra here and there may not seem like a big deal in comparison to the overall amount of money being spent, but each of these items adds up. But now their homes are complete and happily occupied, neither Jane nor Lindley thinks they have over-capitalised, and both say they are now better informed about managing budgets than ever. 

Naismith's living room features a Skagen couch from
Bromhead Design and a Lammhults-designed chair from
Katalog. The bench is by George Nelson for Herman
Miller from Matisse, and the 'Tolomeo' floor lamps and
Arteluce table lamp are from ECC.
The mezzanine study in Naismith's home overlooks the dining area.
Q+A
Mike Dowsett, Lindley Naismith and Jane Aimer of Scarlet Architects

HOME How did you estimate your budget? 
Mike Dowsett After the builder’s estimated price came in, we set a budget based on previous jobs and guestimated figures for additional items. 
Jane Aimer We took a stab at trying to identify things that weren’t part of the builder’s price. The builder’s cost is nowhere near the full cost, so setting that budget early on was really good for us, as we’d compare it to every sub-contractors’ quote that came in, and if their quote was higher, then we’d discuss what we needed to do to get it down.
Lindley Naismith The best way to avoid budget blowouts is to rigorously estimate the budget at an early stage.

HOME When things looked too expensive, how easy was it to bring costs down? 
Lindley Naismith One example is how we put a lot of effort into the stairwells that form the core of our homes. We found the original quote was for them to be built in a highly finished architectural way. In the end we chose a more commercial-style installation and decided to live with the imperfections. It’s less refined, with bolts visible, but that’s not necessarily a bad thing.
Mike Dowsett Originally we had specified commercial-grade windows, but they turned out too expensive so we used standard residential windows that we bulked up a bit so they read as heavier sections.

HOME Why do you use a quantity surveyor on jobs you are designing for clients?  
Lindley Naismith We really push for it even if our clients want to rush ahead. Because we are optimistic folk we want to please our clients, so the temptation to underestimate is huge. So getting a quantity surveyor in involves a third party and takes the project away from us being optimistic.
Jane Aimer If you want a job to meet a budget you have to look at all the line items and make sure they meet budgets. Clients have to be rigorous about that, with our help.

The homes' shared rooftop features a hot tub underneath an array of solar panels.
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Architect Amanda Levete is coming to New Zealand

February 6, 2014, 3:07 pm
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We're delighted to announce that the Stirling Prize-winning London architect Amanda Levete will travel to New Zealand be the international member of our Home of the Year 2014 jury. She will give lectures in Auckland (on Monday March 10) and Christchurch (on Wednesday March 12) about her remarkable work. Tickets to the lectures can be purchased here. We're grateful for the support of Altherm Window Systems, our Home of the Year sponsor, whose generosity has made Amanda's visit possible.  

Amanda Levete in her London office. Photograph by Peter Guenzel.
HOME editor Jeremy Hansen met Levete at her office in London last June. Here's his profile of her from the current issue of the magazine:

Amanda Levete almost didn’t become an architect. Expelled from school for sunbathing naked on the roof when she should have been at biology class, she had no idea what she was going to do next. “I got so embarrassed that all my friends were going to university that I did an A-level in art and art history and a foundation year at art school,” she told Stuart Jeffries of The Guardian. “That’s when architecture came across my radar, and when it did, I realised that I work best when I’m doing something creatively, but have a boundary to push.”

Levete (pronounced Lev-eet) has been pushing boundaries to create remarkable buildings ever since. For 20 years she was one-half of the innovative firm Future Systems with her then-husband, the late Jan Kaplický. Together they designed the Media Centre at Lord’s Cricket Ground, a curvaceous pod of white aluminium that almost bankrupted them but then won the 1999 Stirling Prize, Britain’s most prestigious architecture award. Their subsequent design for Birmingham’s Selfridges store, a swoop of a building covered in circular aluminium discs, was hailed as a symbol of the city’s regeneration. Kaplicky stormed out of the Selfridges opening because the finished structure wasn’t as pure as their original design. Levete was more pragmatic. “I don’t devalue the power of conceptual thinking, but for me the thrill of architecture is to see your ideas realised – to struggle against the problems out there and overcome them,” she told Jeffries.  
 
A rendering of the EDP Foundation Cultural Centre in Lisbon, Portugal, designed by Amanda Levete Architects and currently under construction.
An aerial view of the EDP Foundation Cultural Centre.
The EDP Cultural Centre is a dramatic swoop on the Tagus River with a rooftop walkway.
A rendering of the cultural centre's exterior and its
specially designed tiles.
Levete and Kaplicky had a son, Josef, but divorced in 2006 – “a very public falling out,” according to  Levete. Kaplicky, who was Czech, died in Prague in 2009 at the age of 71, just after visiting his second wife, Eliska, and their newborn daughter in hospital. He and Levete had continued working together after their divorce, but had agreed to separate their architectural practice four months before his death, which is when Levete established Amanda Levete Architects.

Anyone who wondered if she had been riding on the coattails of Kaplický’s genius (a word Levete uses to describe him) has since been thoroughly silenced. In 2011, Levete won an international competition to build an extension to London’s Victoria & Albert Museum. The 1,500-square-metre gallery for temporary exhibitions will be the biggest new art space in London since the Tate Modern; the project also involves the design of a new entry to the building from Exhibition Road. An earlier scheme by Daniel Libeskind was abandoned seven years earlier after encountering a storm of public option. “It was an iconic building, but the time for iconic buildings has passed,” Levete told The Guardian. Her design is currently under construction.

A rendering of Amanda Levete Architects' competition-winning scheme for a new entry and gallery space for London's Victoria and Albert Museum.
Another rendering of the V&A project, which features a courtyard connected to Exhibition Road.
 

Two views of the new subterranean gallery spaces that are
currently under construction at the V&A.
Other major projects are nearing completion: a waterfront cultural centre in Lisbon that reads as a dramatic bulge in the landscape; a shimmering high-rise hotel and shopping centre in Bangkok which Levete will attend the opening of on her way home from helping to choose our 2014 Home of the Year. She has also designed furniture for London’s Established & Sons and writes regularly about architecture, design and urbanism for The New Statesman (you can read her articles here). Her office, a non-descript semi-industrial building in London’s northeast, now employs more than 50 staff, who pad around on the immaculate space’s bright carpet in socks (the office’s no-shoe office rule means you are greeted by an archipelago of footwear when you arrive at reception).  

Two views of Amanda Levete's London home, photographed by Gidon Fuehrer.
This will be Levete’s first visit to New Zealand. Her husband Ben Evans, director of the London Design Festival, will accompany her. She has already reviewed the entries in the 2014 Home of the Year with us, and will help choose a winner when we visit the shortlisted homes in person. 

First impressions? This year’s entrants are notable for their “modesty in scale and materials and technology, and within that they’re searching for something quite profound and poetic,” she says. That seems promising.
We’re looking forward to showing her the best New Zealand homes of the past year. Please come along to Levete's Auckland and Christchurch lectures: it’s a rare chance to hear a remarkable talent reveal more about her remarkable work.
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Design Case Studies with Altherm Window Systems: the Signal Box by Melling Morse Architects

February 13, 2014, 12:30 pm
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Welcome to the third in our series of Design Case Studies with Altherm Window Systems, which we've created to help give insight into the process of designing and building a home - and staying within budget as you do so. 

This week, we visit the Signal Box in Masterton by Melling Morse Architects. The home won our 2008 Home of the Year award. Since then, we're sad to report that Gerald Melling, who ran Melling Morse Architects with Allan Morse, has passed away. We hope this post serves as a reminder of Gerald's cleverness and the original, thoughtful homes he and Allan created together. The photographs are by Paul McCredie.

The Signal Box by Melling Morse Architects, our Home of the Year in 2008, is whimsically inspired by the signal arms of the nearby railway station.
Make no mistake: Stephanie Chilcott loves her house. “It’s really lovely – in winter, I walk in when I get home from work, and it’s usually about five degrees warmer than it is outside, all thanks to the sun,” she says. “I wanted a house designed for me, and that’s what I’ve got. I found it really rewarding”. 

Once she had purchased her site near the Masterton railway station, Stephanie’s next challenge was to find an architect. With an estimated budget of just over $200,000, she found many architectural practices wouldn’t even allow her to make an appointment to see them, as they considered her budget unrealistic. Eventually she called architects Gerald Melling and Allan Morse, creators of a number of successful low-budget homes. She found them happy to take on the project.

In the kitchen, the 'PH5' lights are by Poul Henningsen. The artwork above the sink is by Bill Hammond.
In order to save money, Stephanie decided to manage the project herself, hiring the builder on a labour-only basis and ordering many of the materials and joinery. She estimates that doing this probably saved her $50,000. Despite this, her budget blew out, requiring her to eventually spend a total of about $350,000.

There are two options Stephanie believes she should have considered at the beginning of the process. One would have been to employ a quantity surveyor at the outset of the project to provide a more rigorous estimate of how much it would cost to build Melling Morse’s design. Stephanie says had she known how much the house would end up costing, she would probably still have gone ahead with the build, but saved herself the stress of needing to refinance part-way through the process. 

The home's entry hall is a cool respite in the heat of summer. The artworks are by Gavin Chilcott.
The other option she could have considered to keep costs from blowing out would have been to employ a builder on a fixed-price contract (a fixed-price contract means the builder agrees to complete the job for a mutually agreed sum). Some architects believe fixed-price contracts are inflexible and can create tension on a building site if unforeseen complications arise that require the builder to spend extra time on the job – something that is especially common in renovations, where the condition of the original building isn’t always clear. In Stephanie’s case, she did ask two builders to quote for fixed-price contracts, and both of them estimated a price of about $350,000. Those estimates turned out to be accurate, but at the time, Stephanie was convinced she could do it cheaper, so she employed a builder on a labour-only arrangement, which means the builder charged an hourly rate for his services. 
 
In the dining area, the concrete floor and insulated block walls retain solar heat.
Is the cost blowout an architects’ problem? Not necessarily. Architecture schools don’t teach students how to estimate costs, so most architects are judging a building’s budget from their own experience, or from an estimated average square-metre cost, which can prove to be inaccurate depending on the time required to realise an unusual design. It’s worth having a frank discussion about your financial situation with your architect, but to take the pressure off, a quantity surveyor or a project manager can work on your behalf to ensure your initial estimates are accurate, and that a building project comes in as close as possible to its original estimate. Architects will also manage the building process for you, for a higher percentage of the costs.

The living room features a vintage settee by Peter Hvidt. The artwork above it is by Gavin Chilcott.
The other thing Stephanie says first-timers should be aware of is that they need to budget for costs such as GST, council fees, architects’ fees, engineer’s fees, securing a building permit, drainage fees, and so on. Architects and tradespeople generally assume a budget figure to be net costs (this is so their fee, a percentage of the build costs, is based only on the net figure) – so if you tell an architect you have a budget of $200,000, he or she will create a design up to that amount without including potential ancillary costs unless specifically directed to do so.

The bedroom in the home's "Signal Arm" is a series of stepped platforms.
Q+A with Stephanie Chilcott

HOME What would you do differently if you were to build another house? 
Stephanie Chilcott The key thing is that I would probably pay money for a quantity surveyor or go for a fixed-price build. My advice would also be to be quite direct with your architect. [A budget blowout] is a gradual process that creeps up on you. Some building costs had escalated by the time we started. I could have finished the house more cheaply on the inside, but that would have cheapened it. You’ve got to finish a house the way it was intended, but that must be a serious dilemma for lots of people. 

HOME You managed the project yourself in order to save money. Was that challenging? 
Stephanie Chilcott You don’t need special skills to manage a process like this, but you do need to be able to interpret a plan to understand a little bit about the construction process. You need a really good relationship with the builder. I offered my builder a little bit more to manage the site – he had sub-contractors he liked to use so he used them. It’s important to have a clear discussion with your builder about who’s responsible for what. You don’t want to be involved in site management, deciding when the subbies should come. You shouldn’t spend any more time on the building site than you have to, but go down there only when required. If you go there too much, you start making changes and you’ll find yourself spending more money. You have the plans, you’ve got a builder – you let them get on with it. 

A small study is located on a landing on the way up to the bedroom.
 HOME Did you enjoy the process? 
Stephanie Chilcott I found it really rewarding to watch things come into three dimensions, to watch the house grow and change. The driver for the house was I wanted something designed for myself, and that’s what I’ve got – it’s been designed for me, for how I live. The proportions of all the rooms are perfect, and that’s what you’re paying for – design skills. The house has a valuation for more than it cost to build, and it has a value above the dollar stuff because of its inherent qualities.

"It was either going to be a complete embarrassing disaster or something a bit special," said architect Gerald Melling of the home's signal arm inspiration.
Before his death, Gerald Melling formed a Wellington-based architectural partnership, Melling Architects, with his son, David Melling. David still runs the practice today. Allan Morse has his own firm, Allan Morse Architect, also based in Wellington.
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Design Case Studies with Altherm Window Systems: the O'Sullivan Family Home

February 20, 2014, 12:30 pm
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The fourth in our series of Design Case Studies visits the super low-budget Auckland home of architect Michael O'Sullivan (of Bull O'Sullivan Architects) and Melissa Schollum, which Michael mostly built himself. It's an inspiring tale of creating architectural magic on a low budget. This series is brought to you by Altherm Window Systems. The photographs are by Florence Noble.

Michael O'Sullivan (centre) with Melissa Schollum and some of the neighbours who
helped them build their house. From left: Seti Faaofo, Rhys Hanna, Ikimau Ikimau
(holding Michael and Melissa's daughter Mary), Michael, Melissa
(holding son Seamus), Fred Taupa and Mary Taupa.
Michael and Melissa’s 115-square-metre home in the Auckland suburb of Mangere Bridge (which was a finalist in our Home of the Year award in 2009), cost just $152,000, but that doesn’t mean you should presume you can get a house that cheap for yourself. The house cost so little because the couple didn’t pay a builder – Michael did all of that himself, with the regular help of some of the couple’s neighbours. “It’s the labour that kills projects,” Michael says, estimating that, if they had paid for a builder and for architects’ fees, their house would have cost over $300,000 – which is still a pretty good deal. 

Melissa in the kitchen, with its brass-clad island.
The plates on the mullions behind her are by Rachel Carley.
On this project, Michael was determined to do things differently from the start. “We didn’t have a budget,” he says. “We had $70,000 to start with, and we had decided to work with that in the first instance and see how we went.” That amount of money, along with many hours of Michael’s labour, got them as far as the basic timber structure being erected, and with the roof on. 

The kitchen and living areas have a cedar ceiling
with lights residing behind the triangular cutouts.
With their funds depleted, it was time to visit the bank, but not to request a conventional mortgage. “We went to the bank and said this is how far we’ve got, but we didn’t know how much it was going to cost to finish off,” Michael says. They did, however, know how much they could afford to pay off a mortgage each week, a figure the bank used to estimate the maximum the couple could borrow and set up what was essentially a floating overdraft. “They were initially a bit sceptical,” Michael says, “but they’re pleased now they’ve seen what we’ve done.”

This view of the dining area (with a dining table by IMO) shows
the home's main entrance. A small deck outside is shaded by an oak tree.
Michael and Melissa needed to remain extremely mindful of how much money was required to finish the building within their budget, but in a sense, the most pivotal budgetary decision – to keep the house relatively small – had been made early on. There is only one bathroom, but a more difficult choice was to design the house with just two bedrooms, as by the time it was nearing completion, the couple’s third child was about to be born. So far, however, children Seamus (4), Finbar (3) and Mary (2), as well as Michael’s son Rem (11), who stays occasionally, like their relatively large room with its bunk beds, and the house has been designed so the later addition of another bedroom is possible. Michael thinks the decision not to have a third bedroom saved between $15,000 and $20,000 in materials alone, as well as making the building process about two months quicker because of the home’s smaller footprint. (Since these photographs were taken, Michael has added an upstairs area with more children's bedrooms).

Seamus in the hallway leading to the bedrooms,
which feature heavy velvet curtains instead of doors.
Savings like this meant that there was enough money for strategic splurges in other parts of the house. The kitchen has marble-topped benches – a luxurious addition in a low-budget house – and the bathroom is lined entirely in vivid green marble. Admittedly, Michael managed to secure most of these materials at bargain prices, but although they still cost more than more basic materials would have, these additions add a textural richness that makes the compact house feel warmer and more generous that it might have otherwise. 

Finbar and Seamus in the tub. The bathroom is entirely
lined in green marble, a splash of luxury in a low-budget home.
There are other areas where Michael wished the budget had stretched. The bedroom ceilings are lined in basic pine ply, which Michael feels lacks the elegance (and is a little less forgiving of his limitations as a builder) of the cedar that the couple purchased to line the ceilings of the living area. But these are small quibbles compared to the overall satisfaction their completed home now offers – not only the space and shelter it provides for the family, but the lasting relationships this collaborative project established with the neighbours who helped Michael and Melissa out so much.  

A view of the home's second deck that connects to the living area and hallway.
Q+A with Michael O’Sullivan
 
HOME Your house cost $152,000. What would it have cost if a client had to pay for a builder and your services as an architect?
Michael O'Sullivan It would easily be double that if you included builders’ and architects’ fees. It’s the labour costs that kill a project.

HOME If you were a client hiring an architect, what lessons would you take from your own project?
Michael O'Sullivan Engage a quantity surveyor at the outset. As architects, we are very respectful of our clients’ budgets, but quantity surveyors have skills that we weren’t taught at architecture school.

HOME You said that you’re not generally in favour of fixed-price building contracts. Care to tell us more about that? 
Michael O'Sullivan Fixed fees can be quite stifling. There’s no suspense or element of surprise, no room for excitement. The appropriateness of different materials becomes apparent as you build – quite often the built form gives clues as to what the interior finishes should be.

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Design Case Studies with Altherm Window Systems: Architect Dave Strachan's eco-friendly Auckland renovation

February 27, 2014, 12:30 pm
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The fifth in our series of Design Case Studies with Altherm Window Systems visits the Auckland family home of architect Dave Strachan (of Strachan Group Architects), a former bungalow that's had a significant renovation with increased energy efficiency one of the primary goals.  The photographs are by Patrick Reynolds.

You could say that architect Dave Strachan has a 360-degree view of the process of designing and building a home. He was a builder before he went to architecture school and, along with his wife Colleen, he was his own client when he designed an extensive renovation of the couple’s bungalow in the Auckland suburb of Mount Eden (he also had to supervise his sons, who worked as builders on the project). This led to a mild case of multiple personality disorder. “When you’re the client, the architect and the builder, you wonder who’s calling the shots,” Dave says. “The client wants to know how much it is, the builder wants to know if you can do it easier, and the architect is reaching for the sky.”

Dave Strachan's family home in Auckland is a bungalow that's had a significant, environmentally senstive renovation.
Of course, performing these roles simultaneously saved the couple a lot of money. Their original bungalow was 180 square metres, but now the extension is complete, Dave and Colleen (who at the time had all four of their children living at home) have a renovated home measuring about 300 square metres in size.
  
The home before renovations began.
A view of the home after renovations were complete.
They initially explored the option of demolishing the bungalow and starting anew. Dave estimates that if a client was to pay a builder and an architect for an all-new home of that size (which includes a swimming pool), they would be looking at a bill of about $900,000 (plus the pool). In this case, Dave and Colleen completed the job for about $500,000. “I reckon we’re about $400,000 better off because we decided to keep the old bungalow,” he says. “And I think there’s something really nice about the embodied memory that’s still in our building – the heart of it still beats.” Part of the savings came from doing so much of it himself, but Dave still estimates that if a client was to undertake a similar project, they would save about $250,000 by keeping an old house.


The home's two-stage entryway features a garden
inside the building envelope that leads to the front door.


Two of Dave Strachan's conceptual sketches for the renovation.


















A new indoor-outdoor living area at the rear of the house faces northwest and is usable year-round.













                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                   
Dave does a budget estimate for a client himself at the sketch design stage, but calls in an independent quantity surveyor to estimate the cost of a build once the design has been developed. The biggest challenge, Dave says, is marrying clients’ wish lists to their budgets – and if they don’t match, letting the clients know quite clearly at the outset of the process that what they’re asking for is not achievable. The clients then have the option of scaling down their desires, or finding the extra finance to meet the budget.

The cliché that anyone taking on a new building project should estimate their budget then double it is, Dave says, “a horrible thought”. He prides himself on making clients aware of the full scope of potential costs at the outset of a project, including council and resource consent fees, building in a contingency for landscaping, and so on. If a client asks for something outside that scope, Dave says they need to be informed that such a decision will have budgetary implications. It’s a process that has worked successfully for Strachan Group Architects – a house they recently designed in the Auckland suburb of Parnell, for example, has a developed design budget (by a registered quantity surveyor) that is consistent with the original project estimate. “We’ve lost jobs where people have come in with a budget and we’ve told them it’s unrealistic, and they’ll go to someone else who tells them what they want to hear,” he says, “but you have to be honest with people about the process.”

The home's main bedroom looks onto the back lawn. The lightshade is by David Trubridge.
Q+A with Dave Strachan

HOME What was the hardest part about the process of renovating your own home? 
Dave Strachan We decided, rightly or wrongly, to live in it while we did it, so we put up with all the dust, mess, noise, and camping and decamping as you move around the building as various phases get completed. I remember lying in bed during a terrible storm after we’d pulled off as much roof of the old bungalow as we could cover with a tarpaulin and listening to the tarpaulin flapping around in the wind and finding water coming down the Gib board inside. With the design, I relied on the team at the office – you can get too close to a project like this, so it’s good to have people to talk to. 

Architect Dave Strachan.
HOME Does your background as a builder help you gauge a budget more accurately? 
Dave Strachan In general, you know how much everything costs. But we don’t do budgets with guesswork – in the initial stages, we calculate them by using the price books in our office. And we have a good feel for it and a collaborative approach with the builders we use. 

A view of the home's new living area with pool outside.
HOME What do you think of the old cliché that if you have a budget for a project, you should double it to get a realistic figure?
Dave Strachan I reckon there’s no excuse for that. The budget needs to marry reasonably well with the clients’ wish-list at the outset. After that it’s about knowing the budgetary consequences of the decisions the clients make, and informing them of that. We get a quantity surveyor in at the developed design stage and we don’t proceed with a project unless the client sees those cost estimates and says that they’re OK. Sometimes clients’ budgets don’t really match their dreams, and they don’t often admit that. A lot of it is about having a reasonable budget to cope with the scope that you intend.
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Our new cover: Fashion Houses

August 1, 2013, 4:49 pm
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Behold! Our new cover, which New Zealand subscribers should receive today and which will hit newsstands on Monday. We hope you like it. It's a photograph by Sharrin Rees of a beautiful Sydney home designed by expat New Zealand architects Chris Adams and Bianco Pohio (who are also, as you'll see, experts at creating beautiful, calm interiors).


In the photo, the blue 'Clip' chairs are by Lorenz Kaz for Bedont, and the '91' table is by Alvar Aalto (who also designed the teaware on the shelf behind). The blue vase is by Bitossi. 

This issue is our annual focus on the connections between fashion, architecture and interior design. Some of the homes we've selected for it are owned by people in the fashion biz, and others were chosen because we think they say interesting things about the directions architecture and interior design are heading today. 

We're really pleased with the issue and hope you like it too. Thanks to photographer Sharrin and to Chris and Bianca for helping us create such an arresting cover. 

We'll preview more of the issue's content for you in our posts next week. Have a great weekend. 
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Home of the Year 2014 - the finalists

April 1, 2014, 7:03 pm
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Tonight's the night we announce our 19th annual Home of the Year award. We're delighted to present the six finalists for the award for you here. 

As always, the winning architects will received a $15,000 first prize, thanks to our award sponsors Altherm Window Systems. 

The award was judged by our Home of the Year jury - HOME editor Jeremy Hansen, Gary Lawson of Auckland's Stevens Lawson Architects, and Stirling Prize-winning London architect Amanda Levete - who visited all the shortlisted homes in early March to make their selection of the winner and finalists. 

The winner and all the finalists will be in our Home of the Year issue, on newsstands from Thursday April 3.  And you can check back here at 7.30pm this evening to see our short web film of the winning home.

Here are the finalists, from north to south:




















The Castle Rock House (above) is a holiday home at Whangarei Heads by Herbst Architects, who designed our Home of the Year 2012 winner. The photograph is by Patrick Reynolds. 




















Eyrie by Nat Cheshire of Cheshire Architects is a pair of almost-identical cabins (above) on an inlet of the Kaipara Harbour. The photograph is by Darryl Ward.













This Waiheke Island home (above) was designed by Wendy Shacklock Architects in association with Paul Clarke. The photograph is by Samuel Hartnett.




















This 50-square-metre home (above) in Wellington was designed by Andrew Simpson of Wiredog Architecture for himself and his partner, Krysty Peebles. The photograph is by Paul McCredie.




















This farmhouse (above) on an isolated bay on Banks Peninsula was designed by Pattersons, and photographed by Simon Devitt.




















And this home in Wanaka for a retired couple was designed by Tim Lovell and Ana O'Connell of Lovell O'Connell Architects.

We're delighted with the inventiveness and variety of this year's finalists. Remember to check out much more coverage of all these homes in our Home of the Year issue. 
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