Our new masthead - and cover!

Our next cover, which you'll see on newsstands from October 11, features our revised masthead, which you can see in the image above (the house is by Andrea Bell of Pete Bossley Architects).

A couple of months ago we decided that our previous masthead no longer fit as cohesively as we would like with the rest of the magazine. When art director Miranda Dempster started work here about 18 months ago, she introduced a family of rounded, friendly-looking fonts that she felt softened the harder edges of some of the architecture we feature, and enhanced the magazine's sense of approachability. Once she did this, the old masthead started to feel a bit dated; its pointiness and heavily 'constructed' feeling no longer represented what we wanted the magazine to stand for.

So we contacted Arch MacDonnell (that's him in the photo above) at Auckland design firm Inhouse and asked him and his team to come up with options for a new masthead that better reflected our vision for the magazine. We said we wanted something that felt evolutionary rather than revolutionary, especially considering the magazine only changed its name from NZ Home & Entertaining to HOME New Zealand three years ago. Change is good, but we didn't want to force too much radical change on our readers.

After a few meetings in which Arch showed us a really exciting set of options, the masthead you see above is the one we opted for. Interestingly, as we've been showing it around the office here, some people don't even notice that there's been a change, something that suits us fine, as we didn't want our regular readers to feel they no longer recognised us.

We like the new masthead's friendliness and approachability, and we also like how clean and graphic it feels. The period at the end containing the letters 'NZ' adds a nice sense of solidity, a feeling that we emphatically know what we're on about (which, most of the time, we like to think we do!). What we like most of all is how it sits so comfortably on our new cover, as if it logically belongs there.

Arch is on our next contributors' page answering questions about the new masthead. Here's what he had to say:

HOME New Zealand: How did you and your team come up with our new masthead?

Arch MacDonnell: We wanted to soften the hard-edged angularity of the old masthead. It needed to feel more 'homely' without being too cutesy or crafty. We opted for a customised weight of Gotham rounded, an elegant and modern font from the talented folk at Hoefler & Frere-Jones. We think the resulting letterforms are assertive yet not imposing. Friendly, yet not folksy. All in all, a well-rounded solution.

Did you enjoy the process?

It's always nice to work on a project that needs to evolve rather than radically change.
Getting up close and personal with the letterforms is something we like to do! And it’s amazing how little adjustments here and there have such an effect on the personality of a letterform.

What else are you working on at the moment?

As always there's a diverse mix of projects simmering away at Inhouse. There's a new wine label for &Co simply called The Supernatural, with a brief to break wine label conventions, a brand refresh for the Auckland Art Fair, a new book project with the irrepressible John Reynolds, and an identity extension for a coffee roastery/restaurant/bar in London (Caravan) as well as developing a series of our own graphic objects that we'll be releasing in the coming months.

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.

Meet the Architects

Over the next few weeks we're hosting a series of evenings in Auckland and Wellington offering our readers the chance to come and meet the architects in our Home of the Year issue, and see them present some more of their work. The first talk is tomorrow night in Auckland, with another in Wellington on Thursday evening.

Here are the details. Entry is free - just register by emailing the address below. Architects get 5CPD points.

AUCKLAND
Tuesday August 18, 6pm
David Mitchell & Julie Stout
Mitchell & Stout Architects
Team McMillan BMW
7 Great South Road, Newmarket
With three appearances in the Home of the Year finals, Julie Stout and David Mitchell discuss their unique approach to creating unforgettable houses

Tuesday August 25, 6.30pm
Andrea Bell
Bossley Architects
Jerry Clayton BMW
445 Lake Road, Takapuna
With two homes in the Home of the Year finals in consecutive years, Andrea Bell reveals the secrets behind her innovative, beautifully crafted designs

Tuesday September 1, 6pm
Nicholas Stevens & Gary Lawson
Stevens Lawson Architects
Team McMillan BMW
7 Great South Road, Newmarket
The creators of a series of unforgettable sculptural homes reveal some of their other plans in development and discuss their ideas of what makes a great home

Tuesday September 8, 6.30pm
Michael O’Sullivan
Bull O’Sullivan Architecture
Jerry Clayton BMW
445 Lake Road, Takapuna
The designer and builder of his own ingenious family home in Mangere Bridge talks about the joys and challenges of doing it himself

WELLINGTON
Thursday August 20, 6.30pm
Gerald Parsonson
Parsonson Architects
Jeff Gray BMW
138 Hutt Road, Kaiwharawhara
After designing three baches in the Home of the Year competition, Gerald Parsonson discusses his approach to creating uniquely New Zealand homes

TICKETS ARE FREE
Please register by emailing the names and email addresses of each person attending to
architectstalk@acpmagazines.co.nz

Please note that by registering you are giving your consent to receive promotional offers from BMW. If you don’t wish to receive such offers, please say so in your email.

Our Home of the Year finalists

Sorry about the silence, everyone. We've been flat out preparing our 2009 Home of the Year issue. Which brings us to the point of today's post, which is to show you a sneak preview of the five finalists in the award. (We'll be announcing the winner on August 5, with mags on sale August 6. TV3's Campbell Live will screen a story on the finalists on their show on Monday August 3). The finalists shown here are in alphabetical order.

1. Andrea Bell from Pete Bossley Architects designed this big, beautifully crafted house on a clifftop in Glendowie, Auckland. It was photographed by Simon Devitt.

2. Mitchell & Stout Architects designed this home on Waiheke Island, an open-plan living and kitchen area bookended by two intriguing sculptural volumes. The photograph is by Patrick Reynolds.

3. Michael O'Sullivan of Bull O'Sullivan Architecture designed and built his own family home in Auckland's Mangere Bridge, which was photographed by Florence Noble.

4. Parsonson Architects designed this simple, light-as-a-feather bach at Shoal Beach in southern Hawkes Bay. It was photographed by Paul McCredie.

5. And Stevens Lawson Architects designed this long, low, mysterious home on Hawkes Bay's Te Mata Peak, which was photographed by Mark Smith.

For those of you who don't know, the competition works like this: In April, we call for entries from architects around the country, who send us plans and photographs of recently completed projects. Then our three-person judging panel - which this year was made up of myself (HOME New Zealand ed. Jeremy Hansen), Hugh Tennent, the Wellington architect who won our Home of the Year award in 2006, fellow Wellington architect Alistair Luke, who led the restoration of Plischke's Sutch house in Brooklyn, among many other projects - chooses 10 homes for our shortlist.

We visit each of those 10 homes in person, a week on the road that involves a lot of in-depth discussion about the pros and cons of each place. After those visits, we choose the winner and four finalists to feature in the Home of the Year issue. The winning architects get a $15,000 cash prize, thanks to the generosity of our partner in the awards, BMW.

Keep an eye out for the new issue of the magazine, containing heaps more about these fantastic homes. We're sending the last pages to the printers tomorrow.