In Praise of the Picturesque

Miss M and I have just returned from a trip around Northland.  It was in 2002 when I last visited the Far North. The Kerikeri Stone Store and Kemp House in Kerikeri, The Mission House in Waimate and Pompallier House in Russell, were all looking pristine, gorgeous in their settings, and were attracting hordes of tourists. The Stone Store As I was steering around the lovely Far North roads, I got to contemplating what has happened to the design of... Read More

Plan to keep breathing

The team from Walker Architecture and Design was in Christchurch last night to hear the Minister of Building and Housing announce the winning project for the Breathe Urban Village. By now you may well know through media coverage that ours was not the winning scheme (at least not in the eyes of those who made the decision!)   The news was not new to us.  After a period of intense meetings and negotiations with us and one other team, organisers... Read More

THE TEZUKA’S TALK

Another warm, humorous and imaginative Japanese architect popped up in our soup last night. Takaharu Tezuka began a talk at the University by speaking of the importance of family. ‘I dress always in blue, my wife in red, and our daughter in yellow’ he explained. He said architects should be happy in order to make other people’s lives happy. Apparently Takaharu and his wife Yui’s career began with clients who regularly climbed out their window... Read More

New Plymouth Redux

In 1975 I designed a large house perched high above New Plymouth for a local businessman. This was a challenge to a young frisky architect, and I gave it my best. My client ran a successful and innovative furniture company, based largely on wood as a material. Read More  Read More

Melbourne surprises

When I was at university in the sixties, I wrote an essay about sex in architecture. It wasn’t about bedrooms, it painted a bigger picture. My metaphor was the ‘Dance of the Seven Veils’, a biblical story in which the fertility goddess Ishtar removes an article of clothing at each of the seven gates leading to the underworld. Of course there is such a thing as architectural strip tease, and Professor Toy took my essay seriously. In real life,... Read More

Park Mews – Wellington Modern

  Roger Walker’s Park Mews has been featured in Designer Hamish Thompson’s recent work “Wellington Modern”. The series includes an A1 poster and individual gift cards of Wellington’s most iconic modern architecture.     Support the local and celebrate NZ Architecture by clicking to buy a copy of the poster for yourself. Or look out for the fantastic cards in Unity Bookstore and other locations around town!        Read More

RIP Oscar Niemeyer

One of the most enjoyable and informative architect documentaries I’ve ever seen is Fabiano Maciel’s A Vida e um Sopro. The seated interview with Oscar Niemeyer, interspersed with images of his life’s work, is a format that allowed Brasil’s most famous architect to rove freely on his philosophies of life and architecture. We thought that Philip Morris must have funded the film, as here was a fit 99-year-old chomping on a cigar all the... Read More

Awkward Debates

For those of you who think architecture is for the wealthy, perched on their stunning sites overlooking some stunning estuary waiting for the glossy magazine photographer to arrive, let me tell you about my friend Mark Roberts. Over several years Mark has worked the gritty side of life. He has worked in three challenging areas:  prisons (correction facilities) in New Zealand,  aboriginal communities (think the film Samson & Delilah) in the Northern... Read More

A walk around the Red Zone

On March 9th I had to give evidence at a frustrating planning hearing in Christchurch. Afterwards, and to escape the confines of windowless Hearing Room No 2, I went for a long walk around the red zone.  Its still very secure courtesy of Health and Safety official-dom and the prospect of still-unemptied ATM’s. Anyway, here are captioned images from my circumnavigation.   ... Read More

Conference inspires

Following the successful and enjoyable 2011 conference at Auckland’s Sky City, I was full of anticipation about this year’s conference. But it got off to a good start simply by being held in Gordon Moller’s recently completed ripply-roofed , sparkly glass jewel box Viaduct Events Centre. Moller has finally shed Wellington’s Queens Wharf Events centre shedness. After the disasters in Christchurch, last year’s theme was about architects and... Read More