Looking back at last year's award

If you're looking at David Mitchell and Julie Stout's house that is a finalist in this year's Home of the Year award in our earlier post, you might also like to check out their winning design from last year, the Home of the Year 2009 on Waiheke Island.

Waiheke retreat wins Home of the Year 2009 - Video Archive - Video - 3 News

This footage was screened on TV3's Sunrise breakfast programme, which we miss... it was shut down earlier this year.

Sunrise

Here at HOME New Zealand, we were really sorry to hear that TV3 was shutting down Sunrise, our favourite breakfast TV show. This means, of course, that our weekly house feature won't be running. We want to thank the Sunrise team for their support and enthusiasm for good design, and to wish the team there well.

HOME New Zealand on Sunrise - an Auckland heritage apartment

Last week's Sunrise slot featured an Auckland apartment that will feature in our next issue, a Renovations special that will be on newsstands on April 5 (Easter Monday). It's a sensitive update of a gracious old space by Schulze Poursoltan Architects.

Home design - New York-style apartment in Auckland

This photograph of the living space is by Florence Noble - see the full feature in our next issue.

Tomorrow on TV3

Tomorrow on TV3's Sunrise we'll be featuring the McCahon houses in Auckland's Titirangi - the artists' residence designed by Pete Bossley and Andrea Bell, and the cottage that McCahon himself and his family owned in the early 1950s. Here's a view of the artists' residence, designed to snake its way through the trees. (The photographs are by Patrick Reynolds.)


The artists' residence is administered by the McCahon House Trust, which selects the artists who, lucky things, to get reside and work there for three-month periods. The artists who have spent time there since it opened in 2007 include Judy Millar, Rohan Wealleans, Gavin Hipkins, James Robinson, Richard Lewer, Luise Fong, Eve Armstrong and Lisa Reihana. You can find out more information about the trust, its work and the artists it has hosted on its website, www.mccahonhouse.org.nz.

In the image below, you can see both the artists' residence and the original McCahon cottage, and how they relate to each other on the site. The original cottage is further down the hill, and while it's lovely in summer, it would have been very damp and gloomy in winter.

The restoration of the original McCahon house was managed by architect Graeme Burgess, while Rick Pearson designed the discreet displays that tell visitors about McCahon, his life and his work. I remember wanting to use this shot below of the kitchen (with its painting by McCahon on the cupboards) on our April/May 2007 cover, but then getting cold feet. I wish now that I'd been braver about it, not only because the image is one which would resonate with many New Zealanders, but because I think the house is a very eloquent building that tells us a lot about an aspect of our history. It's a place I always like to take overseas visitors to - even if they don't know McCahon, there's something about visiting the house that feels like a very authentic New Zealand experience.

And here's the exterior of the original (and very humble) cottage, with the artists' residence just discernable in the background. Tune into TV3 tomorrow around 8.40am to see more, or check the link on the website when we post it.

Building a bach at blustery Bethells beach - Sunrise - Video - 3 News

Here's a link to this morning's house on TV3's Sunrise - a bach by Gary Hopkinson at Bethells Beach that we originally published in our December/January 2007 issue. One of the nice things about working with TV3 is the chance to revisit great houses from past issues like this one.

Building a bach at blustery Bethells beach - Sunrise - Video - 3 News

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HOME New Zealand on Sunrise

A Grey Lynn house by Malcolm Walker that was a finalist in our Home of the Year 2006 was our featured home on TV3's Sunrise last Friday. Here's the link if you want to see the footage. We'll be featuring another house sometime after 8.30am this Friday, so look out for that if you're interested.

Turning bad into good: Building on a soggy hill

Architecture at Sunrise

TV3's Sunrise featured architect Guy Tarrant's own home in Auckland this morning. You can take a look at this link:

www.tv3.co.nz/sunrise

Click on 'latest video' and you'll see the link there (we seem to be having trouble pasting the link into this site). It's entitled "Take a peek into a home on a slope".

Sunrise

I'll be back on TV3's Sunrise this Friday continuing our series of tours of well-designed homes. This week, the camera crew is filming a house designed by architect Guy Tarrant in the Auckland suburb of Grey Lynn. Patrick Reynolds photographed it for the magazine back in 2005. It's a lovely example of how effective planning can make the most of what many would see as a far-too-difficult sloping back-section.


The home is predominantly north-facing and on one level, with one bedroom and a study located downstairs and opening onto a lawn. The living area in the image below is a single open-plan space that opens onto a terrace.

One of my favourite spaces in the house is the study, which is really a clever occupation of what in lesser hands would have been a simple corridor. You can also see in this photo how the upper and lower levels connect, via a timber-lined stairwell.

Tune into TV3 on Friday morning (I think I'll be on around 8.20am) for a full tour of the house. I'll also put up the weblink to the footage when it's available online.

TV3's Sunrise focuses on architecture

TV3's Sunrise has recently been featuring a series of great homes that have previously been seen in HOME New Zealand. We see it as another opportunity to tell people about the importance of using a good architect when creating a home, whether it be a new home or an alteration. You can see the footage for their feature on artist Michael Shepherd's home and studio, designed by Stevens Lawson Architects, at this link:

http://www.3news.co.nz/Take-a-peek-inside-a-city-home-with-a-difference/tabid/572/articleID/133720/Default.aspx