82 | Assembly Architects ARCHITECTURE In harmony with harsh alpine conditions Richard Loader The home faces prevailing winds; the form affording views while sheltering a walled courtyard at the rear. After falling in love with their site on the Crown Terrace that lies between Queenstown and Wanaka, the owners entrusted award winning Arrowtown practice Assembly Architects to create a design for their home, selecting materials that harmonised with the harsh alpine conditions. Shortlisted for the Southern Architecture Awards, the home captures the breathtaking views of the Wakatipu basin and utilises locally sourced raw materials to tone and blend with the landscape that is the Crown Range. Local schist and concrete foundation walls ground the dwelling into the slope, while the home’s walls are rough rammed earth, locally sourced from nearby hills. The structure is complemented with textured corten steel roof slices. The home faces prevailing winds; the form affording views while sheltering a walled courtyard at the rear. Beyond this, a smallscale guest house provides a cosy and private retreat within a retreat. “Our project scope included all furnishings and interior designer Nikki Wilson from NW Studio joined the project team to select all soft furnishings and curtains,” says Louise Wright, who co-owns Assembly Architects with husband, Justin. “The house was completed June 2021, with all furnishings installed. The wee guest house was completed later during that year.” The project team included RBJ Construction, Down to Earth Construction, NW Studio, and Holmes Consulting. Being shortlisted at the local awards is quite an achievement in itself, and something to be celebrated. Louise says the NZIA Architecture Awards provide the perfect outlet to celebrate projects and the project team and a good opportunity to showcase their work to other architects and the public. “Shortlisting is taken off the information that we supply to the NZIA Awards jury. Once the project has been shortlisted the jury come in person to visit the project, which is a great experience. We really enjoy meeting the jurors on site and showing them all the features of the home and its design. Physically seeing the project is quite different to viewing a picture and the jurors commented that it’s so worthwhile visting the house because there’s so much more than photos can convey.” Established in 2005, Assembly Architects was originally based in Wellington and spent a period of time in central North Island, before the call of the South brought Louise and Justin to Arrowtown, where their focus has been on creating beautiful residential homes. “We love designing bespoke houses at that higher end, but we also do development Paul Rogers 027 442 3613 | Peter Rogers 027 442 3933 ROGERS BROTHERS BUILDERS & JOINERS Building rammed earth and conventional homes throughout Central Otago and New Zealand for over 25 years. CALL TO VIEW OUR SHOW HOME “The house was completed June 2021, with all furnishings installed. The wee guest house was completed later during that year.” homes in Wanaka, where design is kept to the level of the building consent for a builder to pick it up and do all the finishing. “We have a reduced scope of service so that we can still design a beautiful high quality home but with less design detail, tailoring our services to suit.” The beautiful homes designed by the team at Assembly Architects speak for themselves, with each project team assembled specifically to suit the project. “We all have very good relationships with our clients and contractors, with good communication at its heart.” With the final award night to be held in August, Louise says she is confident of success.
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