| 89 Sarah Ritchie Architect ARCHITECTURE Proud to have supplied and installed the joinery for the following awards … Contact: Craig Harison Daniel Lunn 021 503 289 021 251 7110 craig@mojojoinery.co.nz dan@mojojoinery.co.nz NZ ’Supreme House of the Year’ & ’Craftsmanship Award’ Winner 2019 NZ Institute of Architects ’Southern Architecture Awards’ Winner 2020 & 2026 Top 100 Award Regional Category Winner & Gold Award 2023 & 2022 Otago & Southland Regional House of the Year Winner 2023 & 2022 Proudly supporting Sarah Ritchie Architect and MacFarlane Building www.roofinghub.co.nz | 03 443-2794 EXCEPTIONAL HOMES DEMAND EXCEPTIONAL ROOFING. 2026 Southern Architecture Award Resene Colour Award Partnering with quality builders and architects to create exceptional homes Proud roofing partner for award-winning Garden House Illuminating Design with Sarah Ritchie Architects T T Alexia Anderson Winning Wanaka home a compact delight Garden House covers a modest footprint, while making great use of its 90sqm floor area. “I was delighted. I think it is really great that we can celebrate beauty and design impact, even on small projects and ordinary sites.” Award-winning architect Sarah Ritchie is proving great design is not defined by size. Her company, Sarah Ritchie Architect, was recently named a winner at the NZIA Awards for ‘Garden House’, a compact family home in Wanaka that ticks all the boxes. What was previously a standard suburban site, has been transformed using careful design and best use of space, with an end result worthy of an accolade. For Sarah, the award acknowledges how smaller residential projects can still be, and deserve to be, celebrated. “I was delighted. I think it is really great that we can celebrate beauty and design impact, even on small projects and ordinary sites,” she says. Built in the backyard of an existing 1970s home, Garden House covers a modest footprint, while making great use of its 90sqm floor area, or 111sqm when including the loft. The home was designed as a second dwelling on an 830sqm site, using natural materials and capturing views of the well-established garden. Various ceiling heights were also incorporated to create a sense of openness. “The key to feeling spacious has been the raked ceiling in the main living area and variable heights throughout the house, a small footprint but never too compressed.” Garden House was shaped by existing site constraints, including the original house and well-established landscape features. However, Sarah did not see them as obstacles. Instead, they allowed her to ensure both homes maintained their own identity, despite sharing the same surroundings. Sustainability was a strong focus throughout the design process. Sarah believes one of the most important environmental decisions she makes through her work is to ensure homes are appropriately sized. “The first step of sustainability in my mind is smaller, not tiny but not baggy either. Enabling us to live well, using spaces flexibly and of course more compact is more efficient to heat if it is built well, meaning less energy use over the span of its lifetime.” Timber features throughout the home, including for cladding, framing, lining and flooring, keeping the project true to its sustainability commitment. The design also reflects concepts of kaitiakitanga (guardianship), whakapapa (genealogy) and mauri (life force), with interior planting, natural textures and carefully framed views providing connection between residents and the surrounding landscape. That relationship is also captured outdoors, where a productive garden and glasshouse are part of everyday life. Rather than traditional lawns, the landscape focuses on vegetables, herbs, fruit and nut trees. Garden House was also designed with longevity in mind. Flexible spaces allow rooms to transform over time, while the glasshouse already serves multiple purposes, including greenhouse, office and library. Bringing the vision to life required close collaboration with McFarlane Building. Sarah says their flexibility proved invaluable, particularly when windows were delayed, which had the potential to affect construction timings. “They were always willing to implement new detailing ideas and were a great team.” Looking back, Sarah hopes Garden House encourages people to rethink what makes a successful home. “I feel most people building smaller are doing so purely from a financial necessity. This is why I wanted to share this project.” She says smaller homes can be “just as magnificent as larger projects”. 021 946 110 matt@lmatimber.co.nz www.lmatimber.co.nz Cladding | Decking | Flooring | Structural Beams & Posts | Joinery Australian Hardwood by: VISIT OUR SHOWROOM AT: 50 Anderson Road, Wanaka
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