New Zealand Architecture Awards shortlist announced

FRIDAY, JULY 19, 2019

Forty-five buildings, from the Bay of Islands in the north to Dunedin in the south, have been announced as finalists in the 2019 New Zealand Architecture Awards, which are organised by the New Zealand Institute of Architects, New Zealand’s leading architecture awards programme.

Auckland has 15 of the finalists New Zealand’s leading architecture awards programme, and Wellington and Christchurch each have seven.

Not all finalists, however, are to be found in main centres. The awards jury will also visit Lindis Lodge, a retreat in the South Island’s remote Ahuriri Valley; Lakeside Memorial Hall in the Canterbury town of Leeston; a house on Great Barrier Island; and an office building in Te Awamutu in the Waikato.

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Larger-scale projects on the awards shortlist include XXCQ in Wellington, New Zealand’s largest base-isolated building; Tūranga, the new Christchurch library; B:Hive, a contemporary workspace building in Takapuna; and Waterfront House, a new building at Lyttelton.

The awards jury led by Auckland architect Malcolm Walker compiled the shortlist from the 187 projects that earlier this year received Local Architecture Awards in the eight constituent branches of the New Zealand Institute of Architects.

Walker described the awards’ heritage and public architecture categories as being particularly strong.

“The painstakingly restored and reinvented historic buildings we shortlisted illustrate a variety of ways architects have responded to complex heritage challenges,” Walker said. “We’re looking forward to visiting these projects.”

The seven heritage projects shortlisted include St Mary of the Angels church in Wellington, Rose Historic Chapel in Christchurch and the Jetty Street Development in Dunedin.

New Zealand’s Modernist heritage has not been ignored, with reworked buildings originally designed by Tibor Donner in Auckland and Ernst Plischke in Nelson having made the cut for the awards shortlist.

The awards jury,will also visit three standout educational buildings: AUT’s Nga Wai Hono Building and Freeman’s Bay Primary School, both in Auckland, and the new Memorial Hall at Wellington College.

This year’s housing finalists include eight-standalone houses, two alterations and five multi-unit projects.

Walker said one project he is particularly looking forward to seeing is Housing New Zealand’s Te Maru o Tawatawa in Wellington, which looks to embody a new approach to the provision of medium-density social housing.

“New Zealand really needs high-quality, affordable multi-unit housing,” Walker said. “We hope to see good examples of this housing type as we travel through the country.”

The New Zealand Architecture Awards jury will undertake its tour of all shortlisted projects in August.

The 2019 New Zealand Architecture Awards will be announced at Queenstown Events Centre on Saturday 9 November.

ENDS

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