Dubai-Based Designer Judith Hobby’s Opens Her Home
New Zealander Judith Hobby, who has lived in the Middle East for 22 years and in Dubai for almost 17, is the founder of the Judith Hobby Clothing fashion line. Her modernist…
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Hotelier Simon Baeyertz Engineering Stays for the Intrepid
No building in Vieques, Puerto Rico is “more striking” than new 22-room eco-hotel El Blok, according to the New York Times. Co-owner, Simon Baeyertz, “a dashing New Zealander and longtime record industry executive, explained…
New Zealand Baches Get a Luxury Makeover
A bach on the beach has long been the embodiment of the New Zealand dream, with the traditional version often a modest structure haphazardly pieced together with corrugated iron and reused timber. Lance and Nicola…
Get Interior Design Tips from Expert Sandra Nunnerley
Later this month, New York-based New Zealand interior designer Sandra Nunnerley will answer readers’ questions on the Washington Post’s online feature Home Front about living and decorating with art. Nunnerley runs a design studio in…
Hotelier Sean Macpherson Clearly Has the Midas Touch
New Zealand-born hotelier Sean MacPherson’s Bowery, Jane, Maritime, Lafayette House and Marlton Hotels will always be some of lower Manhattan’s coolest places to stay, according to Forbes Life contributor Anne Abel. “Now he’s back, in…
Herbst Architects’ Sensitive Retreat Invites the Outside in
A new beach house – “overlooking New Zealand’s breathtaking Whangarei Heads” – designed by Auckland husband-and-wife team Lance and Nicola Herbst is featured on design magazine Wallpaper’s website. “Situated on a cranked ridge line ……
Mark Wigley Judging Hot Helsinki Guggenheim Competition
New Zealand born architect and author Mark Wigley is the jury chair for the Guggenheim Helsinki Design Competition, which has now announced finalists for the as-yet-unapproved Guggenheim art museum in Finland’s capital. The jury has…
Art of Living with Significant Spatial Drama
New Zealand-born painter Stefan Dunlop’s treetop Noosa home is one of a number of artists’ houses throughout the world with “significant spatial drama”, according to a Telegraph article. Dunlop is an individual “with an…
Mark Burry Maintains Epic Work on the Sagrada Família
Executive architect of the Sagrada Família New Zealander Mark Burry has been able to complete Gaudí’s designs by devising parametric computer modelling techniques, adapted from the aerospace industry. Burry has even sped up the…
Michael Volkerling, Cultural Visionary (1948-2014)
One of the principal architects of New Zealand’s cultural and creative sectors, Dr Michael Volkerling, died suddenly on 13 June, 2014 in Sydney, aged 66. At the time of his death he was Principal…
Caribbean Island Getaway Opens Doors
Former music industry executive New Zealand-born Simon Baeyertz is co-owner of El Blok, a 22-room inn which has just opened on a small island off the eastern coast of Puerto Rico, and…
Architecture Full of Romantics – Mark Wigley, Retiring Columbia Dean
New Zealand-born Mark Wigley has stepped down after 10 years as dean of the Graduate School of Architecture, Planning, and Preservation (GSAPP) at Columbia University. Under his leadership, the school has built on its…
Auckland’s Greatest Ruin Comes to Life
“Creative enterprises and unique collaborations are flourishing in Auckland thanks to the dramatic renovation of a collection of 1960s city council workshops,” Monocle reports. “Until two years ago, the City Works Depot was a near-derelict…
Bright Chelsea Square Home NZ-Inspired
Free, easy, glamorous and family-orientated is how interior designer and architect Alison Henry sums up her style, and because she is originally from New Zealand, she says she always opts for “open,…
Kiwi Bach Takes Top Architecture Award
A small Kiwi-designed bach has won a prestigious award at a ceremony dubbed the “Oscars of architecture” in New York. The “sled hut”, which measures a mere 40sq m over two storeys, sits on a…
Vision West a Pioneering New Housing Project
Strachan Group Architects in Auckland is one of four innovative companies “from London to Tokyo” to feature in a Monocle special on social housing projects, with developments “showing how good design and…
Cardboard Cathedral Architect Wins Pritzker Prize
The designer of Christchurch’s Cardboard Cathedral, Japanese architect Shigeru Ban, has been named the winner of this year’s Pritzker Architecture Prize, largely because of his work designing shelters after natural disasters in…
Guided Tours Showcase Napier’s Fascinating Architecture
“Nobody was building town centres during the Depression, so Napier is rare,” says Robert McGregor, Independent journalist John Lee’s guide and the author of several books on the city. “South Beach and Napier are…
Shaping New Zealand’s landscape
Notable landscape architect Thomas Woltz has an innovative and ecologically minded approach to shaping the world around us. The US-based Woltz is currently working on projects in New Zealand, which he spoke about in…
Mark Wigley’s Experimental Genius
Mark Wigley, dean of Columbia University’s Graduate School of Architecture, Planning and Preservation (GSAPP), has announced that he would step down from his position at the end of the academic year, in June 2014. Wigley,…
Christchurch Cardboard Cathedral Opens
Christchurch’s ‘cardboard’ cathedral has opened, a move that is seen as a significant step in the regeneration of the city following the February 2011 earthquake that killed 185 people. Dubbed the ‘Transitional Cathedral’, the…
Parisian Architectural Exhilaration
New Zealand-born architect Brendan MacFarlane, one half of Paris-based firm Jakob + MacFarlane, has had his hand in redesigning the French capital’s docks. The New York Times includes the Docks of Paris…
New Look Cathedral Unveiled
Christchurch’s new cathedral, which will be made of cardboard and will house 700 people, is due for completion in April next year. The city’s magnificent Gothic revival cathedral hewn from local basalt was irreparably…
Home On The Range
A Queenstown detached home with “views of the mountains, deer roaming nearby, and hills that change colour with the seasons,” is the Wall Street Journal’s ‘House of the Day’. On the market for NZ$4.35…
Portable Home on Sleds
Auckland’s Crosson Clarke Carnachan Architects have designed a macrocarpa-clad hut made with a requirement that all structures be removable. The hut measures 40 square metres and rests on two thick wooden sleds…
On The Cheap In Auckland
Auckland Art Gallery is one of a “trifecta of frugal activities” recommended by The New York Times’ Seth Kugel on “a day and a half” visit to the City of Sails. “After…
Distinctively World Famous
“Today, of 164 buildings constructed between 1920 and 1940, 140 remain, forming a time capsule of design elements — zigzags, sunbursts, Egyptian motifs and geometric patterns — that characterize the style and garner…
Woodland Harmony
A 1960s Boston house designed by Hamilton-born Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) professor and architect Maurice Smith is advertised as for sale in the Boston Herald. “This Weston contemporary is built to harmonize with its…
Reflective Energy Efficiency
Auckland’s “sleek” New Zealand Insurance Centre is “one of the city’s most eye-catching and sustainable buildings utilizing energy efficient technology” according to CNN. “Situated on a busy junction, the diagonal glazing that wraps the…
Great Things Take Seasons
New Zealander Mark Burry is executive architect of the Basilica and Expiatory Church of the Holy Family in Barcelona and part of a project that needs no completion date according to the Guardian’s Jonathan…
Christchurch’s Cardboard Cathedral
The quake-ravaged Christ Church Cathedral is set to be rebuilt – using cardboard. Since the destruction of the iconic building in February’s deadly earthquake, rebuilding the Cathedral has been deemed a priority for the…
Xena’s Mt Albert Eco-Home
Lucy Lawless, star of television series Xena and Spartacus, is returning to her roots in Mt Albert, Auckland where she is converting a large part of her estate into what has been described as…
Paraparaumu Paradise
“For a small country, New Zealand has surfeit of coastline: over 9,400 miles of it, more than the contiguous United States (which has roughly 5,000), and enough to allow — in theory at least…
Inspired By Nature
The stunning landscape of Waiheke Island (off Auckland’s east coast) is home to over 7,5 residents. Regenerating bush, an indented coastline, vineyards and olive groves are some of its defining characteristics. When…
With Light in Mind
A design by a group of Victoria University students, inspired by the New Zealand bach, is the first southern hemisphere entry in the international US Department of Energy Solar Decathlon competition held…
Leading Lights of Architecture
Auckland architecture firm Patterson Associates has been named as one of the five practices set to shape the future of architecture. World Architecture News, the top international architecture journal, announced the win…
Distinctly New Zealand Feel
New Zealand landscaper Sam Martin has landed a multi-million dollar contract to redevelop London’s iconic Battlesea Power Station. After sitting derelict for nearly 3 years, Europe’s largest brick building is now being revamped to…
Structural Snapshots
New Zealand’s best new buildings range from a bus shelter in Queenstown and an office tower in Auckland, to an opera house in Oamaru, houses on Waiheke Island, and an apartment in…
Focus on Food
The Gascoigne Associates-designed Japanese restaurant Cocoro in Auckland features on the World Interior Design Network site. “The interior décor features large squares of woven charcoal and chocolate carpet that resemble subtle tatami-style matting. All…
Finn Plays SXSW
Musician and songwriter Liam Finn launches his first-ever full band tour beginning with two gigs in Austin at this year’s South by Southwest (SXSW) music festival. Finn’s next album is set for a spring…
Drawn into the fold
Christchurch City Art Gallery is a “place that works” according to design and architecture publication Metropolis Magazine, connecting to the natural environment “through modern architectural form that resonates with the self-image of people…
Humbug Like the Lolly
New Zealand abstract painter Peter Adsett and architect Sam Kebbell’s collaboration on Adsett’s Mornington Peninsula, Melbourne property, ‘Humbug’ features in the summer 21/11 issue of Architectural Review Australia. The building had to serve two…
Customise Your Cool
Auckland-based One Cool Habitat designs small portable container habitats for use as home offices, studys or sleep outs and ships them around the world. The company’s site says: “Our design is your…
Structural winnings
The Supreme Court of New Zealand in Wellington, designed by New Zealand-based Warren & Mahoney and completed in 29, has won the Institution of Structural Engineers Structural Award in the heritage category, for its…
Simply affordable
Earlier this year, director of Auckland-based S3 Architects Limited Stephen Smith won a Department of Building and Housing competition challenging entrants to come up with a design for a cheap, easy-to-build house which complied…
Hospitable angles
“Inspired by the nearby Remarkables and Bob’s Peak, architects incorporated intriguing roof angles into a low-line structure housing just 19 rooms, including a fabulous two-level tower suite complete with fireplace,”…
Intimate Sophistication
Wanaka’s Whare Kea is included in a Forbes’ list of the ‘World’s Top Microboutique Hotels’. “Whare Kea means ‘house of the kea’ in Maori — the kea being the world’s only alpine parrot. This…
Wilderness gold
“Just like the safari camp and the ski chalet, the New Zealand lodge is a triumph of reinvention, the transformation of a utilitarian wilderness refuge into tourism gold,” writes The Sydney Morning Herald’s Max…
Designer royalty
Prestigious industry magazine Architectural Digest has named New Zealander Sandra Nunnerley in its annual AD 100 directory which represents a “selection of the top architects and interior designers whose work has featured in Architectural…
Stepping off the deck
For the past 20 years, Sir Peter Blake’s widow Pippa Blake has lived on the Chichester harbour sea front in a 1940s bungalow where just recently “a forward-thinking architect tore down walls, built a…
Parliamentary eyesore
The Beehive has been rated among the world’s ten ugliest buildings, coming in at number three on a list decided by editors and members of the popular online Virtual Tourist travel network. Virtual Tourist’s…
To a job well done
The life and work of distinguished New Zealand architect, Marshall Cook— whose career spans over 40 years and across six countries — is paid homage in Issue 03 of design magazine Habitus. “Inspired by…
Perfect for picking
Andrew McKenzie’s mid-orchard home is featured in this month’s Dwell magazine as the perfect example of a marriage between economy, sustainability and design. The house earned Architects Cecile Bonnifait and William Giesen a regional…
iDYLLIC
The New Zealand designed iPAD is an eco-friendly prefabricated building and one of “six of the best in the world” according to the Independent on Sunday. After producing the pioneering Bachkit in 2000, the…
Sixties renewal
Auckland-based fashion designer Kate Sylvester and her partner Wayne Conway chose New Zealand architect Belinda George to design the renovations to their 1960s Westmere home, remaining true to that decade’s form, combining new with…
Home sweet home
“The time has come to learn from Down Under,” where homes have sustainable features “light years ahead of the curve,” are “modestly scaled and unpretentious, employ an original aesthetic language, and without fail, offer…
