Winners revealed: Auckland Architecture Awards 2025

Thirty-six architectural tasks throughout the Auckland area obtained a Te Kāhui Whaihanga New Zealand Institute of Architects Native Award at an occasion at Holy Trinity Cathedral in Parnell on 30 April.

Within the Housing class, the Onetangi Cliff Home by Herbst Architects gained an award for responding to the positioning limitations of an unstable cliff face and overlooking a public beachfront promenade with a home that judges discovered “effortlessly addresses problems with context and resilience.”

In the meantime the Catalina Bay Residences by Architectus gained a Housing – Multi Unit Award for utilizing the protected view shaft of a close-by trig station because the catalyst for a fragmented, stepped kind that engages its waterfront setting in a very elegant method.

“This 12 months’s awards spotlight the worth architects carry to tasks in response to constraints of website, dimension and price range. These had been all drivers for distinctive outcomes and a testomony to the power of architects to show challenges into alternatives,” says jury convenor and architect Man Tarrant.

Within the Auckland CBD, the Horizon by SkyCity resort by Warren and Mahoney and Moller Architects adopted a dynamic elliptical plan in response to a covenanted microwave sign hall from the neighbouring TVNZ constructing in claiming a Industrial Structure Award.Within the Small Challenge class, Lloyd Hartley Architects reworked a leftover sliver of land at a 24-hour carwash enterprise right into a sculptural bookend whereas additionally making a storage room and employees facilities.

Initiatives this 12 months additionally highlights architects’ continued dedication to exploring inexpensive housing options, that includes clever planning and modern makes use of of recent and sustainable supplies. “With their Pocket Homes at Avenue Highway, Dorrington Atcheson Architects have provide you with a viable yard housing mannequin that challenges accepted norms of multi-unit housing design,” says Tarrant.

He was joined on the jury by Andrea Bell from bell + co in Dunedin, Katrina Keshaw from Keshaw McArthur, Elspeth Grey from Roberts Grey Architects, and Jasper van der Lingen from Sheppard & Rout in Christchurch.

The successful tasks are:

Housing

Onetangi Cliff Home by Herbst Architects 

This mission is an exemplar of intense constraints driving an architectural response that’s each poetic and delightful. Located on a sliver of land between an iconic, extremely public beachfront promenade and an unstable cliff face, this home effortlessly addresses problems with context, privateness and resilience via a singular materiality and a rational however extremely efficient plan. An outstanding constructing.

Palimpsest Home by Monk MacKenzie 

Ordered round a largely symmetrical plan that’s nearly Palladian in kind, this home manages a degree of element, refinement and materials restraint that’s seldom current in homes of this type. Residing beneath one huge horizontal sq. roof airplane, each indoor and outside areas calmly comprise and body views of a particular panorama.

Sand Bins by Herbst Maxcey Metropolitan Architects 

Casually stepping up its wooded website, this timber constructing evokes being in a chic treehouse. The journey as much as the principal residing areas is rewarded with stunning views over the cover of mature pōhutukawa beneath. A choreographed sequence of terraces of skillfully managed laminated timber put up and beam building orchestrate spatial drama and help a sequence of mounted and operable layers, which management mild and privateness whereas offering textual richness. The actual triumph of this constructing is the variable high quality of sunshine as you progress vertically via the inside, an expertise paying homage to being inside a forest cover.

Palmers Seaside Home Aotea Nice Barrier by Leuschke Group Architects 

Responding to the conundrum of view and solar mendacity in reverse instructions this pavilion-style home permits its occupants to stay engaged with the great thing about its coastal setting whereas being shielded from the weather. Glazed galleries afford views via the home from a sheltered courtyard carved out of the centre of the pinwheel plan kind and preserve a connection to the shoreline whereas shifting via the inside. Separate bed room wings at reverse sides of the central residing area see the home broaden and contract as vacation numbers flux. Mindfully chosen supplies cut back the home’s visible presence and panorama disturbance inside this particular island setting.

Kawau Island Home by Novak+Middleton 

Set excessive above the seashore at Little Vivian Bay, this elegant retreat displays generations of household historical past and a deep connection to put. Referencing a Nineteen Thirties kitset bach, the modular timber house sits calmly amongst surrounding kānuka forest. Designed and delivered via a detailed collaboration between the architects, homeowners and constructing staff, each element was rigorously thought of to go well with the positioning’s distant challenges. Prefabricated timber parts low-impact with minimal excavation. Shimmering mesh curtains present shade and softness. Off-grid and low-impact, it is a house of quiet energy — deeply private, fantastically resolved, and constructed with care and dedication.

 Muriwai Farmhouse by Mercer and Mercer Architects 

In response to a gently eastwards sloping website, this beneficiant home steps and fragments to scale back its expansive plan and supply a number of views of its rural setting. From arrival, the journey via the home is damaged into half-metre intervals earlier than arriving at a pure amphitheatre. Deceptively giant and accommodating an intensive artwork and sculpture assortment, it is a home that avoids pretense. The fractured plan creates a number of in-between areas which each shelter and enclose the inhabitants, whereas principal areas are related by linear galleries that defer and prolong discovery of the home.

Sefton Home by Ashton Mitchell 

It is a welcoming household house that manages to beat its steep and constrained context. Knowledgeable by Wellington housing typologies, the architect homeowners have created a sectionally wealthy, raking gabled home, which feels a lot bigger than its modest dimension and unlocks expansive south-west views. Plywood wall linings and timber flooring make for a heat and glowing inside, offsetting the extra recessive and prosaic metallic exterior cladding.

 Prospect Home by MAUD 

This thought of and fantastically detailed household house was a collaboration between the architect and an inside designer shopper with a ardour for mid-century design. Lengthy and low, this house pulls away from the perimeters of the positioning, permitting the creation of a sequence of distinct outside courtyards and gardens which are related through views via the house. A rigorous 2.4 metre module was used as a structuring machine to supply rhythm and order, with refined shifts in plan, quantity and light-weight including richness and selection. Materials choice impressed by the clien’s recollections of her grandparents’ house are of the interval and using color is refined and constant all through.

Bush Block by Patchwork Structure 

This modest house with its environment friendly rectangular plan floats above and displays its bush-clad valley website. The architects’ impressed choice to exclude the automobile from the positioning implies that the driveway is changed with an entry bridge, a secure place to experience a motorcycle and have a morning espresso. The storage turns into a ‘bus cease’ half method alongside the bridge, a space for storing for bins and bikes. The usage of full-height glazing extends the inside areas out into the tree cover. A sq. hallway absolutely bathed in pure mild is a intelligent software used to create a way of generosity. Robust, earthy colors and easy supplies akin to cork and macrocarpa add richness and texture.

Housing – Alterations & Additions

Gentle Catcher by Jose Gutierrez 

Addressing the challenges of a slender south-facing website, this elegant alteration gives an L-shaped courtyard targeted round a shallow reflection pond that visually extends the unique villa’s central circulation. Tall vertical volumes with clerestory home windows oriented to the north and west punctuate the lineal plan. A serene and spatially dynamic alteration that effortlessly addresses the constraints of its context by creating lengthy inner views and adjustments in quantity.

Wainamu by Bureaux 

This home speaks to the picture of a home as a container for folks’s lives and recollections. Organised round two cherished present rooms, a easy beneficiant verandah unifies an informal assortment of recent areas of which the kitchen is the centre, effortlessly facilitating the shoppers’ love of internet hosting. Splendidly relaxed and inviting.

Lava Move by Pac Studio 

Perched on the sting of a volcanic precipice, this villa extension reclaims a once-disconnected house with grace and ingenuity. Stepping down via three ranges, it follows the positioning’s steep terrain to reconnect with the land and open into a cover of mature bushes. A pyramid roof and sculpted skylight attract shifting mild, whereas a volcanic color palette grounds the design in place and persona. Delicate to heritage, mild on carbon and wealthy in spatial storytelling, this mission balances outdated and new with confidence and care.

 St Heliers Home by Stevens Lawson Architects 

This elegant transformation revives a Twenties Arts and Crafts house, mixing heritage with trendy household residing. A brand new pavilion opens to restored gardens, enhancing mild and circulation. Wealthy supplies — oak, marble, and fluted particulars — harmonise previous and current. Rigorously curated interiors and landscaping protect the house’s character, whereas considerate planning maintains its unique road presence. Sustainable selections, together with improved insulation, photo voltaic panels, and rainwater assortment, guarantee long-term efficiency. The result’s a refined, grounded household house, completely attuned to each its historical past and its future.

19Q by SGA – Strachan Group Architects

Perched on a steep bush-clad website, this renovation to a Nineteen Eighties pole home has rationalised the inside plan and streamlined the home’s exterior kind with out including considerably to the unique footprint. By simplifying roof varieties, squaring off angled partitions and making minor extensions to the plan, a calmer and extra ordered sequence of areas has emerged. Beneficiant present decks have turn into a shuttered outside room that extends the accessible residing area and celebrates the home’s elevated place. Inside, hovering double-height areas are contained and ordered by a sequence of slatted timber screens. This skillful remodeling retains the quantity and materiality of the unique design, utilizing them as a springboard for a home that’s light-filled and ethereal with locations for retreat and repose.

Alberon by Jack McKinney Architects

This alteration and addition to a particular character Edwardian bay villa skilfully resolves problems with entry, connection and privateness. The brand new entry positioned between outdated and new permits direct entry into the center of the home. A voluminous new residing and eating space is created to the south, with a extremely reflective slender stainless-steel skylight offering mild and main the attention out to the attractive stepped backyard past metal French doorways. Contextual, moveable aluminium shutters to the sting of the newly fashioned elevated terrace create privateness and layered filtered mild to the inside. The primarily white color scheme is introduced alive by the feel of the chosen supplies.

Housing – Multi Unit

Catalina Bay Residences by Architectus

It is a giant constructing elegantly conceived as ‘a sequence of architectural objects’. Townhouses adjoin and conceal a podium/carpark, activating a waterfront promenade and referencing the adjoining Sunderland hangar. Two stepping towers, separated to protect views from close by Harrier Park to a distant trig station, comprise flats that have interaction intensely with very good water views. Vertical and horizontal fenestration and wealthy materiality additional reference surrounding hangar structural programs. Regardless of Catalina Bay’s formidable programmatic aspirations, this constructing by no means feels overbearing or dominating of its context. Virtually classical, it’s a reminder of how good structure can enrich the general public realm.

One Saint Stephens by MAP

This was a difficult context through which to insert a constructing of this scale. Bounded on one facet by an iconic cathedral and located on a outstanding ridge with views to the Auckland Conflict Memorial Museum in a single course and the Waitematā Harbour within the different, One Saint Stephens employs recessed nook verandahs to scale back its bulk and activate its road presence. Glazed vertical components additional diminish the constructing’s scale whereas delivering full-height panoramic views to the flats’ occupants. Materials alternatives imbue the constructing with a way of permanence and timelessness

Pocket Homes at Avenue Highway by Dorrington Atcheson Architects

An imaginative response to the challenges of making inexpensive multi-unit housing inside a built-up suburban context, these homes have only a 36m2 footprint, making them a viable yard housing resolution. An identical in structure however cleverly positioned to maximise each outside residing and privateness, the two-bedroom Pocket Homes handle to really feel surprisingly spacious by difficult accepted norms of end and structure. Plywood inside linings and a cultured concrete flooring lend textual heat to the beneficiant floor flooring residing area whereas bespoke color schemes for cabinetry permit occupants to use their very own persona. Raking exterior partitions clad with terracotta roofing tiles present a resilient end and contribute to the uplifting character of those refreshing addition to the multi-unit housing area

Lightbox by Novak+Middleton 

Positioned on a ridge in Lengthy Bay, with an open reserve to the northwest, views of town to the east and stepped topography, this multi-unit medium-density housing scheme takes full benefit of its context. The mix of 3- and 4-level models, a refined use of alternating white, gray and timber cladding, and the sunken non-public entry terraces create a layered pedestrian edge to the reserve. On the inside, the design staff created a central courtyard that’s open to the sky within the coronary heart of every unit. This easy technique gives daylight, nature, pure air flow, and connection each horizontally and vertically all through the homes, making a dynamic spatial association that elevates the design and the liveability of those properties.

Inside Structure

InterContinental Resort Auckland by Warren and Mahoney Architects 

This adaptive reuse of what began life as a Nineteen Seventies workplace block gives guests to Tāmaki Makaurau a gateway place overlooking the Waitematā Harbour and a chilled retreat related to the busy Industrial Bay precinct. Maximising the unique constructing’s flooring peak and absolutely embracing its font row harbour views, the inside of the InterContinental balances luxurious and area with an intimate connection to the bustling waterfront panorama. The disciplined background palette is imbued with textual richness from darkish timber and volcanic references that additional communicate to the resort’s context. Works by New Zealand artists share tales of the positioning’s cultural significance and floor friends within the locality.

Horizon by SkyCity by Warren and Mahoney Architects and Moller Architects

Reimaging the romance of an period of glamour journey, this resort transports friends right into a extremely crafted inside imbued with quiet luxurious. Lofty public areas, together with an exterior courtyard with planting and energetic water components, are appointed across the elliptical plan kind, with a 12-storey atrium offering speedy drama on the entry. Right here the architects have referenced the pure world with 18 abstracted floating two-metre excessive pōhutukawa leaves. A bespoke and seductive inside that evokes a grand age of journey.

Deloitte Auckland by Fisher Companions and Custance Associates 

Vertical motion generated by a central stairwell spanning six flooring creates social vitality and cohesion and helps a clear work tradition. Versatile planning permits for a variety of working strategies from collaborative group conferences to particular person breakout areas. Catering for a most workforce of 900 workers, it is a giant workplace that manages to really feel intimate and private even when not absolutely occupied. Delicate design references acknowledge the importance of its gateway waterfront location.

Small Challenge Structure

Washworld by Lloyd Hartley Architects

The Washworld HQ efficiently utilises a small, triangular piece of land, becoming a practical two-storey constructing into the southernmost nook of a busy 24/7 carwash website. With a 40m² footprint, the decrease degree accommodates storage and employees facilities, whereas the higher degree gives a north-west going through workplace. The design makes use of sturdy, strong supplies, together with precast concrete and metal to resist the calls for of the atmosphere. The refined use of cedar on the higher degree softens the in any other case utilitarian constructing, making certain it performs properly in each operate and longevity

Karanga Altering Sheds by Pac Studio 

The Karanga Altering Sheds embody sustainable design with a playful, vibrant method, mixing architectural presence with a carbon-positive ethos. Developed with Eke Panuku, the modular buildings use recycled and pre-consumer waste supplies, together with timber shingles and panels produced from ocean plastics. Prioritising longevity and adaptableness, the architects carried out a round economic system method, making certain supplies are reusable and the mission has minimal environmental impression. This initiative not solely meets speedy wants but additionally units a precedent for sustainable, momentary city interventions, displaying how such buildings can contribute positively to each the atmosphere and the city expertise. 

 So Contemporary, So Clear by W3

Utilising a set of rigorously thought of key methods inside an especially tight price range and website, the architect has elevated a banal typology to create a balanced, sculptural kind — a beacon of hope amongst a sea of beige. This four-bedroom home instantly addresses the ever-increasing want for low-cost high quality household properties and reveals the worth that architects carry all through the entire technique of design and building to ship a top quality consequence to the mainstream.

Enduring Structure

The Level (2000) by Moller Architects 

Twenty-five years on, The Level flats are nonetheless an exemplar for the way any such constructing needs to be performed. As a response to the poor high quality of flats being designed and constructed within the late Nineteen Nineties, Moller Architects determined this residence constructing could be totally different. Livable areas, intuitive and beneficiant circulation and expansive outside rooms that correctly operate had been a part of the manifesto. Defining and activating an city edge, the Level Residences flip their harbourside location right into a vibrant promenade. Deeply recessed verandahs, articulated by visually mild metal construction with operable cedar screens present privateness and local weather management for the flats’ occupants whereas dynamically enriching the general public realm.

Industrial Structure

RTA Studio – Studio by RTA Studio and Jack McKinney Architects in affiliation 

A former engineering workshop introduced the chance for RTA to create a brand new studio that extra intently mirrored its core values of sustainability, collaboration and design excellence. Celebrating the constructing’s heritage, this new structure shed elegantly accommodates a wide range of open and enclosed areas. Organised by a linear timber-lined ‘field inside a field’, assembly rooms and personal areas are effortlessly hid. A useful insertion right into a rejuvenating mild industrial space on town fringe.

SeaLink Wynyard Ferry Terminal by Architectus 

The SeaLink constructing is a powerful presence within the industrial port atmosphere, clearly expressing its operate as a portal to the Hauraki Gulf islands. It transcends its prosaic goal with a folded perforated metallic display cladding that evokes the encompassing context of containers and sheet piling in a poetic method. The perforated sample that tells the story of its maritime setting was designed by native mana whenua artists Maaka Potini and Ted Ngataki (Ngāti Tamaoho). It is a clearly laid out economical constructing that expresses its goal, context and cultural narrative in a chic, robust method.

303 Remuera Highway by Fearon Hay Architects

This workplace constructing varieties a powerful addition to the Remuera Highway business space, terminating the vista and main one across the bend within the street in direction of the suburb’s centre. The range in peak and openings mirror the adjoining retail grain and scale, mitigating the potential dominance of this main addition. A palette of uncovered concrete and terracotta solar screening gives a sturdy, sturdy impression organized in a restrained method whereas nonetheless offering curiosity to the general public realm. The tall, mixed car and workplace entry, with a café additionally sharing this area, is an surprising association that provides a way of scale and drama to the doorway and the road, elevating it to extra than simply a carpark entry. A significant insertion into a major a part of the Auckland atmosphere, this high quality improvement stands robust by itself whereas additionally reflecting and enhancing its speedy context in refined and significant methods.

Horizon by SkyCity by Warren and Mahoney Architects and Moller Architects

Occupying a remnant of land between the brand new Worldwide Conference Centre and the TVNZ constructing, the Horizon resort plan kind is formed by constraints — a microwave sign hall covenant connected to its broadcast neighbour and a protected volcanic cone view shaft. The ensuing elliptical plan is a defining second for the mission, offering each extremely legible single-loaded circulation for friends and the constructing’s sculptural kind. Subtly referencing its TVNZ neighbour to the north, it additionally creates alternatives for entrance definition in a newly created laneway between the resort and its monolithic neighbour to the south. This is a vital and chic insertion into an space that’s changing into a gateway to the CBD.

Training

Pukekohe Excessive College Studying Block by DCA Architects of Transformation 

This two-storey faculty is a spot that via its structure demonstrates care and respect for the scholars and employees housed inside. The flexibleness of area, which permits for each separated educating areas and areas open to one another and the outside, gives for all kinds of pedagogical practices in addition to beneficiant transparency all through. The supplies and hues give a way of high quality, sturdiness and vibrancy to the constructing and create a stimulating and pleasing place to be and study. The usage of exterior solar screening and references to cultural narratives, such because the Pātaka on the entrance façade, raise the mission past a easy prosaic faculty mission and make it a spot that’s inspiring to be in and a studying software.

AUT Tukutuku by Jasmax 

An formidable college constructing that rationalises and ties collectively the structure of the AUT North Campus, Tukutuku demonstrates how an actual dedication to sustainability and carbon seize can create a pleasant place to be that may be a pleasure to each inhabit and transfer round. This constructing is an exemplar, from the placing angled aluminum fin façade, organized to mitigate warmth acquire whereas nonetheless offering views out and good daylighting via, to the heat of the uncovered mass timber construction and the dramatic atrium. It reveals how well-considered, absolutely embodied, sustainable ideas can infuse a major piece of structure that’s an inspiring place of studying and uplifts the spirit.

Manutara – Murrays Bay Major College by Warren and Mahoney 

Manutara is a strong, well-proportioned two-storey constructing housing 10 educating areas. Instantly seen as you enter the college grounds, it presents a strongly modelled and welcoming gatehouse to guests. A big, brick-clad, easy gable kind, a tall colonnade going through the courtyard provides it actual presence. The colonnade gives a layered edge to the outside gathering space and has a delightful sense of scale and permanence with out fuss. The inside is essentially mobile in nature, with some connectivity between areas through glazed sliding doorways giving a level of flexibility for numerous pedagogies. It is a constructing with a easy, strong magnificence that may serve the college group properly sooner or later and supply an inspiring place to study.

Hiwa – College of Auckland Recreation and Wellness Centre by Warren and Mahoney and MJMA Structure & Design Toronto 

This state-of-the-art health and wellness facility has redefined the centre of the College of Auckland campus. Historically an inward going through typology, the architects have as a substitute created a constructing that absolutely engages with the general public and concrete realm, in addition to offering world-class services for sporting, social and group actions. An modern stacked vertical composition with spilt ranges and clear vertical circulation gives a horizontal connection via the constructing on each degree out to the campus and metropolis past. Cultural design narratives have been seamlessly woven and embedded into the design. This pulsing vitality patterning is used all through, from the fantastically carved timber handrail particulars to the cladding the place the rippling, reflective floor mirrors the encompassing buildings and bushes.

Heritage

 St Mary’s Previous Convent Chapel Restoration by Salmond Reed Architects 

This delicate restoration of a landmark historic chapel throughout the grounds of Auckland’s St Mary’s Convent has faithfully returned a cherished constructed taonga to its unique kind. Beautiful leadlight home windows, Gothic Revival timber detailing and the chapel’s unique heritage color scheme have all been reinstated as a part of the intensive restoration works. Honouring the chapel’s robust religious, social and cultural values and harnessing the skills of expert artisans and tradespeople, the architects have ensured this traditionally important constructing continues to serve the St Mary’s group as a particular place of worship, schooling and gathering. 

Gray Lynn Public Conveniences by Matthews & Matthews Architects 

This delicate restoration of a public constructing that has quietly served the Gray Lynn group for greater than 80 years has created an uplifting atmosphere that celebrates its elegant Moderne structure whereas adapting to modern-day wants. Timber-lined mild wells introduce softness to a freshly deliberate inside the place finishes honour the constructing’s Artwork Deco origins whereas delivering resilience to a hard-working public facility. Richly detailed utilizing a contemporary palette of supplies delicate to the constructing’s heritage values, the Gray Lynn Public Conveniences fulfil their service function with newfound grace and dignity.

The NZIA Structure Awards programme is supported by Resene and APL.