By SIMON HENDERY
A centrepiece of Auckland's revamped Viaduct Harbour, The Point apartment complex has won the Tasman Sinkware Major Practice Award at the New Zealand Architectural Awards.
Judges at Thursday night's awards ceremony, sponsored by Tasman Building Products, said the Fletcher Property's project reflected a clear architectural intention realised through relatively minimal means.
The development's 85 apartments are clustered in groups of between 25 and 30. Each cluster has its own five-storey-high glazed atrium designed to soak up morning sun and maximise city views.
Every apartment at The Point has a full-width, 3m deck overlooking the water.
The judges said the development's plan was "simple and direct - a layer of circulation to the rear and a layer of balconies to the front effectively mediate between the public realm and the private world of city living."
Meanwhile, the judges have praised Canterbury University's Mathematics, Statistics and Computer Science Building as the most significant and innovative example of world-standard environmental design built in New Zealand over the past 25 years.
The building's architects, Architectus CHS Royal Associates of Christchurch, were presented with the Owens Corning Silver Jubilee Award, which marks 25 years of the architectural awards.
The managing director of Owens Corning Asia Pacific Composite Systems, Steven Zirkel, said the university project addressed environmentally sustainable design in an integrated way.
"While the focus of the awards has evolved over the years, the best projects exhibit a strong environmental thread," Mr Zirkel said.
"Instead of focusing on the object in isolation, they consider the total environment. The university project is representative of the increased architectural awareness of context and a sense of place."
Also recognised at the awards was a beach house at Matarangi on the Coromandel Peninsula, which won the AHI Roofing Small Practice Award.
Judges said the home's designers, Auckland architects Fearon Hay, had used a controlled palette of forms to create a balanced composition of contrasting architectural experiences.
"The Fishing Cabin" - a one-room hut designed by Wellington architects Architecture+ and built at Morrison's Bush, between Greytown and Martinborough - was commended in the same award.
The Tasman Insulation Small Practice Award went to McCoy and Dickson, of Dunedin, for the design of the St David Lecture Theatre at Otago University.
To the Point
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