76 | Phone: 03 983 5500 waterfordpress.co.nz Your Business, Your Industry, Your News. DO OUR READERS KNOW YOU EXIST? ARCHITECTURE Sur Architecture Embracing your heritage The fit-out won a regional Resene Architectural Design award for commercial interiors. T Virginia Wright Given that the co-founders of Sur Architecture, husband and wife team Maria Callau and Juan Puricelli, are both from Argentina it’s not surprising to learn that the “Sur” in their company name is Spanish for ‘south’. Their choice of name highlights their decision to live and work in the southern hemisphere, and in the south of the South Island, in the city of Dunedin which they now call home and where they set up on their own six years ago. Sustainability and in particular healthy homes are a driving force in their core business of renovations, alterations and extensions in residential homes, but recently they also won an award for a commercial job they did for a Queenstown restaurant “The Meat Preachers”. “We were just starting the company and I definitely wanted to take work from as many areas as possible,” says Juan, “and my own experience in the past working for other companies was more commercial than residential so I knew exactly what needed to be done.” The resulting fit-out won a regional Resene Architectural Design award for commercial interiors, a fitting reflection of Juan’s desire to do his best for his clients, especially as they were friends, setting up a first-of-its kind business cooking food in a way that spoke directly to Juan’s own background. “It needed to be a modern premises for a very old, rustic cooking technique using smoke. It touched my culture because this is our traditional way of cooking.” They collaborated with a design company Makebardo also owned by an Argentinian, and together with the restaurant owners, Nicolas Karlsson from Argentina and Matias Mautone from Uruguay, they brainstormed design solutions to a complex array of problems, not the least of which was how to make it easy to cook raw meat long and slow using smoke in a restaurant situation that needs to be able to take and fill orders speedily. It was a process of trial and error using protype grills made of steel, measuring 1600mls wide by 900mls deep, and having to fit that plus the other kitchen apparatus in a very small space and with an eye on modern health and safety requirements for safe, sterile environments. While Juan enjoyed that challenge Sur Architecture’s work is more typically finding architectural solutions in the residential space, and they’re very clear about what they want to achieve. “What we want to do is make a difference. We try to do architecture to solve people’s problems, and we encourage people to think outside the box.” Juan and Maria both did their architecture studies in Buenos Aires where it’s a solid 6 year degree. More recently Maria did some post-graduate study on state housing stock in New Zealand, and especially in the south, and her research clearly identified where heat was typically escaping in many older houses. They had both struggled when they moved to Dunedin with how cold the houses were and they were determined to make houses warmer. Maria’s research convinced them that paying attention to the insulation envelope was the key, and their use of thicker materials for internal structures as well as the insulation itself is paying off, literally. “Clients keep telling us they’re using twothirds less power than they were plus it didn’t break the bank,” says Juan. “We always design to exceed the minimum requirement of the building code by at least two or three times which makes a huge difference to energy consumption and comfort when compared with standard houses in NZ.” Ph. 03 442 3036 www.queenstownengineering.co.nz 120 Glenda Drive, Frankton ‘Delivering beyond expectation’ Certified Steel Fabricators
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