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Book Review: 'City House Country House' by Walsh and Reynolds
The third book from this duo celebrates the best of NZ architecture, and reveals lessons from 40 great Kiwi houses
Catherine Smith
7 November 2016
Houzz New Zealand Contributor. A design addict from way back, I can't resist looking at other people's houses. And doing a tiny bit of styling and decluttering. Just a tiny bit.
Houzz New Zealand Contributor. A design addict from way back, I can't resist looking... More
In his role as communications manager of the New Zealand Institute of Architects (and former editor of their journal) John Walsh has seen pretty much every great new-build home or renovation from the country’s architects, and it’s a fair bet that Patrick Reynolds has photographed many of them. The pair looked at New New Zealand Houses in 2007, followed up by Big House, Small House in 2012, and four years on, went in search of any new zeitgeist in our islands.
“What was most important was that the projects say something about what good architecture is, and how it is achieved,” Walsh writes. “The projects in this book do what architect-designed buildings should do. That is, they are skilful and sympathetic responses to client stipulation.”
“What was most important was that the projects say something about what good architecture is, and how it is achieved,” Walsh writes. “The projects in this book do what architect-designed buildings should do. That is, they are skilful and sympathetic responses to client stipulation.”
Walsh is a firm believer in architecture’s job to delight its clients – or, in some projects, lucky passers-by. When asked for the common theme of the 40 projects selected for the book, Walsh says that each of the projects made a real difference to people’s lives. Here are some of the key ideas Walsh gathered on his exploration (and narrowing down) of recent projects.
Sophistication doesn’t mean bling
Project: Sod the Villa
Location: Grey Lynn, Auckland
Architect: Malcolm Walker
Friends for years, architect Malcolm Walker and artist John Reynolds had a true partnership in the makeover of the old villa that John and his family had lived in for 25 years. Walker kept the front of the house intact, only adding square bays to make the facade ‘more villa-like’, and retaining verandah lace and the central corridor typical of the period. To the back he added height and volume, skylights and cutout glimpses to open light into the old place’s gloom. The boldest step was using concrete walls, solid and textured beside what’s described as the ‘wooden tent’.
Project: Sod the Villa
Location: Grey Lynn, Auckland
Architect: Malcolm Walker
Friends for years, architect Malcolm Walker and artist John Reynolds had a true partnership in the makeover of the old villa that John and his family had lived in for 25 years. Walker kept the front of the house intact, only adding square bays to make the facade ‘more villa-like’, and retaining verandah lace and the central corridor typical of the period. To the back he added height and volume, skylights and cutout glimpses to open light into the old place’s gloom. The boldest step was using concrete walls, solid and textured beside what’s described as the ‘wooden tent’.
Neither client nor architect are fans of the villa (hence the name of the project), but Walker is happy to roll with the house. “You work with what you’ve got, and then do the unexpected,” he says.
Reynolds wanted better light and room above his head, necessary because there is barely any land outside (what there is, a magnificent pohutukawa tree, is deftly wrapped by the living rooms).
Architects’ own houses are research labs
Project: Narrowneck House
Location: Devonport, Auckland
Architect: Davor Popavich
Walsh and Reynolds were conscious of the need to find more innovative and sustainable projects, and in a range of sizes. They found that while there are still big houses being built at the top end of the market, there are others doing more with less.
“With the cost of building in New Zealand, architects’ own houses are an opportunity [to] experiment,” says Walsh. “A lot [of architects] starting out aren’t that well off, so they’re building relatively inexpensively. There’s a lack of indulgence.”
Project: Narrowneck House
Location: Devonport, Auckland
Architect: Davor Popavich
Walsh and Reynolds were conscious of the need to find more innovative and sustainable projects, and in a range of sizes. They found that while there are still big houses being built at the top end of the market, there are others doing more with less.
“With the cost of building in New Zealand, architects’ own houses are an opportunity [to] experiment,” says Walsh. “A lot [of architects] starting out aren’t that well off, so they’re building relatively inexpensively. There’s a lack of indulgence.”
He points to Davor Popavich’s Narrowneck House as a resolute attempt to eliminate anything excessive. Popavich used second-grade materials because they were cheaper, but used some ‘big gestures’ that made a material difference to the house: a concrete kitchen bench poured on site is one.
Walsh also applauds the architect’s refusal to build around a car (or garage), reckoning that the days of building houses (or cities, for that matter) around cars are nearly over.
Walsh also applauds the architect’s refusal to build around a car (or garage), reckoning that the days of building houses (or cities, for that matter) around cars are nearly over.
There is no such thing as typical
Project: Kotare House
Location: Kaipara, Auckland
Architect: Dave Launder
As a publisher, Walsh says he finds it gratifying how clients want to support their architect to get published (and publicised). He observes that the best houses are when clients approach an architect whose work they admire in a collaborative way. “They don’t say ‘I want this house, replicate it’, but more ‘I like the spirit of this house’,” he says. “You see some sort of philosophical approach, rather than ‘I want those taps or that handle’.”
He does admit that building a house, as with anything bespoke, does require financial resources, but noted that more clients are prepared to think differently – building a small and well-detailed home rather than just buying a bigger house in the suburbs for the same money.
Project: Kotare House
Location: Kaipara, Auckland
Architect: Dave Launder
As a publisher, Walsh says he finds it gratifying how clients want to support their architect to get published (and publicised). He observes that the best houses are when clients approach an architect whose work they admire in a collaborative way. “They don’t say ‘I want this house, replicate it’, but more ‘I like the spirit of this house’,” he says. “You see some sort of philosophical approach, rather than ‘I want those taps or that handle’.”
He does admit that building a house, as with anything bespoke, does require financial resources, but noted that more clients are prepared to think differently – building a small and well-detailed home rather than just buying a bigger house in the suburbs for the same money.
Architect Dave Launder’s house for himself and landscape ecologist Isabel Gabites took a brave approach, with twists and turns of complex geometry in a house that’s arranged as three ‘fingers’, with courtyards and framed views of the harbour to the west. Steel portals, wood, concrete block and black finishes are a recognisable enough palette, but the central towers covered in anodised aluminium in kingsfisher blue (’Kotare’ is named for the local bird) are anything but.
“The Kotare House is a real architect’s house: the design bespeaks a plentitude of ideas, and the construction is testimony to a capacity for sustained hard work,” says Walsh. He and Reynolds selected projects that say something about what good architecture is, and how it is achieved in what Walsh calls “little chapters in the story of this country’s culture”.
An open brief produces a house with spirit
Project: Arrowtown House
Location: Arrowtown, Central Otago
Architect: Bull O’Sullivan Architecture
If there is one thing Walsh has learned in the 125 projects his books have covered (and in his years as an editor) is that there is no such thing as ‘typical New Zealand-ness’ in architecture. But what is outstanding, he says, is the way houses relate to the landscape, most often with timber featuring prominently.
Project: Arrowtown House
Location: Arrowtown, Central Otago
Architect: Bull O’Sullivan Architecture
If there is one thing Walsh has learned in the 125 projects his books have covered (and in his years as an editor) is that there is no such thing as ‘typical New Zealand-ness’ in architecture. But what is outstanding, he says, is the way houses relate to the landscape, most often with timber featuring prominently.
“What is clear is the enjoyment and dedication to the craft that is so lovingly detailed,” he says. “The timber is beautifully worked, that craft of making everything is considered. The built culture of the country is a product of what they’ve done before.”
Auckland architect Michael O’Sullivan’s design for his friends’ place let a creative couple self-build on a tight budget, helped by a team of local tradies selected on the basis that they were good people. The innovation and delight everyone took in the smallest details made for a disciplined, personal house.
Auckland architect Michael O’Sullivan’s design for his friends’ place let a creative couple self-build on a tight budget, helped by a team of local tradies selected on the basis that they were good people. The innovation and delight everyone took in the smallest details made for a disciplined, personal house.
Importance of the house in the landscape
Project: Vauxhall House
Location: Dunedin
Architects: Kerr Ritchie
While not every New Zealand house has stunning mountain, bush or sea views, Walsh writes that projects in the book “strike a sensitive balance between architecture and context: the architects were aware of their responsibilities to the places that attracted their clients to begin with.”
Vauxhall house, perched on a narrow strip of land above Otago Harbour, got simpler and simpler as the design progressed, with places to shelter inside for reading and outside to watch the sunsets. It’s a building the author describes as “quiet and strong”.
Project: Vauxhall House
Location: Dunedin
Architects: Kerr Ritchie
While not every New Zealand house has stunning mountain, bush or sea views, Walsh writes that projects in the book “strike a sensitive balance between architecture and context: the architects were aware of their responsibilities to the places that attracted their clients to begin with.”
Vauxhall house, perched on a narrow strip of land above Otago Harbour, got simpler and simpler as the design progressed, with places to shelter inside for reading and outside to watch the sunsets. It’s a building the author describes as “quiet and strong”.
The simplicity extends to having only one bathroom. But what a bathroom, with a view over the harbour and crisp, white finishes.
Good practices take a while to emerge
Project: Wanaka House
Location: Wanaka, central Otago
Architect: Lovell and O’Connell Architects
Walsh notes that there are a number of architectural practices whose work has appeared in all three of their books, but many of these big names’ work has moved on.
“Architecture is a field that is relatively difficult to build a reputation, we see a lot of the same practices, a layer of very strong people who are very good at what they do and they are now emerging into a larger scale,” he says. “Developers are seeing the point, we are a lot more sophisticated about the designed environment. Design is a selling point.”
Project: Wanaka House
Location: Wanaka, central Otago
Architect: Lovell and O’Connell Architects
Walsh notes that there are a number of architectural practices whose work has appeared in all three of their books, but many of these big names’ work has moved on.
“Architecture is a field that is relatively difficult to build a reputation, we see a lot of the same practices, a layer of very strong people who are very good at what they do and they are now emerging into a larger scale,” he says. “Developers are seeing the point, we are a lot more sophisticated about the designed environment. Design is a selling point.”
So the book deliberately features young emerging practices too. Often these architects’ first commissions are from family, as with this house for Tim O’Connell’s parents in their Wanaka holiday location. He and Anna O’Connell solved the design under strict planning regulations and a tight palette of materials, as a setting for his parents’ collection of modern classic furniture where they host active grandchildren, his mother’s music socialising and father’s library.
‘City House, Country House’ by John Walsh and Patrick Reynolds (Godwit) is available at book stores nationally for NZ$85 or through Penguin online.
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‘City House, Country House’ by John Walsh and Patrick Reynolds (Godwit) is available at book stores nationally for NZ$85 or through Penguin online.
TELL US
What’s your stance on contemporary New Zealand architecture? Share your thoughts in the Comments below.
MORE
Read more stories about architecture
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