Te Kaitaka
Te Kaitaka is nestled amoungst the tussock covered hills of Roy’s Peninsula on the shores of Lake Wanaka, in the South Island of New Zealand. It is situated on the edge of Te Wahipounamu / Southwest New Zealand World Heritage Area and Mt Aspiring National Park. The area is renowned for it’s dramatic landscape with […]
McIntyre Lane
Photographer: Avodah Photo + Cinema The owner of this unique home had a clear vision of incorporating his hill country-farming heritage and creating a modern yet rustic home! On a private section and designed to capture the surrounding views, this new home is perfectly positioned onsite to enjoy both sunsets and the rolling Manawatu […]
A Classic Beauty
Photographer: Avodah Photo + Cinema The vision was clear from the beginning; take timeless traditional style and add the conveniences of modern living and great indoor/outdoor flow. This classic 267sqm beauty now sits on a well-appointed Manawatu section, specifically set aside to build this magic family home. The exterior is encased in classic timber […]
Control Tower Inspired
Photographer: Avodah Photo + Cinema Our client’s vision was very specific. They wanted to live a rural lifestyle, but build an aviation-inspired home, that allowed them to operate an aircraft right from their doorstep. This stunning architectural build has been carefully designed and now sits on 20 acres of land adjacent to the Feilding […]
Inland House
Awards: NZIA Auckland Architecture Award 2017
Milford Beach House
Whangaparoa House
Awards: NZIA Local Architecture Award: Auckland
Albany House Alteration
Awards: NZIA Auckland Architecture Award 2017
Poured House
The house is in Auckland’s inner suburbs, dug into a sloping clay site. The main living spaces are on a raised platform formed by the basement garage, creating views over the houses opposite. The living room opens directly onto a large outdoor room, sociably placed above the street. The building is a deliberately rugged expression […]
Twin Peaks
An adaptation of a small square front villa, incorporating a self-contained studio. A pair of pleated roof forms let in light and views of sky and trees. These ‘twin peaks’ read as broken shards of the original villa roof. The interior is subtly divided into distinct spaces via the changing geometry of the ceiling. A […]
Devonport
This is an extensive alteration in a suburb where heritage values are cherished. The original villa form is retained, but simplified – the entire ground floor becomes one living zone, loosely divided into two by a double sided concrete fireplace. A sense of order predominates. The project as a whole is a careful balance of […]
Valley M
The bungalow alteration manipulates the original gable roof into a series of folded beamed ceilings, breaking out the formerly closed end of the building into a light filled space addressing the back yard. The kitchen is arranged to connect directly with the new covered outdoor space and garden, and also screens the house from its […]
The Stables
This small brick building was originally a horse stable from the early days of Ponsonby. It had been converted into office space but its poetry had been lost. We reconfigured the space as a residential apartment and a small commercial tenancy. The constraints of the original footprint with its associated quirks have been carefully addressed. […]
Poured Pleats
This unusual site has two street frontages, one occupied by an Edwardian villa, the other was a large lawn. This presented the opportunity to have a second front to the house, in the form of a significant addition that faces the rear street. The addition is stridently modern but takes compositional cues from the gabled […]
Scotts Landing
The house is composed as four ribbons of single pitched roofs, meeting in different configurations. This creates a subtle series gables and butterfly roof forms within one continuous shape. There is a diversity of character created by this simple but exactingly executed strategy. The rooflines are at a gentle rake that is familiarly rural. The […]
Matakana
The house sits in a large rural landscape, and is a play on rural vernacular barn forms. It appears closed, on closer inspection opening panels within the rough-sawn cladding allow the interior to open up. The house is deliberately linear; a long gable form interrupted by a low entry roof. This same roof form soars […]
Wedged-in House
The house is on a long narrow inner city site, bounded by high neighbours. The ground floor is triangular in plan, creating a deep courtyard garden that runs along the length of the living spaces. The house ‘wedges’ in to the site, and the site ‘wedges’ against the house. Bedrooms are on the upper level […]
Misaligned House
The house is a series of offset timber crates, matching the scale and grain of its inner city neighbours. These taper and rake to accommodate the contour of the site and its trees. Living areas are arranged around a northern garden courtyard. Interior social spaces are designed to visually connect but be separated by changes […]
More Grown-Up House
The house is a carefully balanced play of spaces within a crisp gable form. The project is conceived as a finely detailed timber structure resting on a rock plinth. Every part of the small urban site has been carefully handled to extend the interior to the boundaries, and let natural light in from all sides. The […]
Top Notch
Photographer: David Straight This city house is a series of spatial discoveries. From the street, it appears to be a single-level home. Here it has a balanced and symmetrical composition, with a pair of notches in a hipped roofline revealing the city beyond. The house is in fact three stories, one at street level, […]
Fielding House
Photographer: Simon Devitt The house is a glazed pavilion sitting in the dunescape above a coastal golf links. The two planes of roof and main floor are joined by three timber clad conic forms that house fireplace, bathrooms and kitchen. A partial lower floor is reached by lift and houses guest suite, garage, storage and […]
Hilltop House
Photographer: Aaron Leitz The lodge is located on a hilltop within a former cattle farm that has been extensively restored and replanted to form the Walter C. Mountain Landing development. The project suggests an incremental occupation of the site with materials and forms reflecting three discrete elements: stone observatory and underground store and a long […]
Waiheke House
Photographer: Sam Hartnett Our clients found us because of two small charred timber cabins we had built. They sought an escape from their city lives – a place to come, pause and dwell. They were entertainers and wished a place to dine thirty and sleep none of their visitors. The owners had camped and picnicked […]
Eyrie
Photographer: Jeremy Toth Eyrie comprises two houses near Kaiwaka. Each is barely larger than four sheets of plywood. They are made from wood, are off-grid and autonomous, their outsides burnt black. This project is part polemic, part escape. Holiday homes have become this country’s decadence. Our sub-prime estuarine site permitted a 1500m2 palace. It forbade […]
Awaawaroa Bay
Photographer: Jackie Meiring The patrons of this home fell in love with this south-facing site and the idea of occupying it without formality and off-grid. We proposed an encampment: three small buildings embodying different parts of that occupation, clustered around a loose sun-drenched courtyard. We hoped to celebrate the difference between inside and outside – […]
The Additions to the Clifftop House
Photographer: Sam Hartnett The additions to the clifftop house are a horizontal spreading along the cliff, embracing the maritime approach to Tāmaki Makaurau from northern approaches, past Rangitoto Island to North Head. The original house is a lantern like staircase within a collection of stacked cubes tumbling down the cliff. A single-storey dining room volume […]
Ford Lofts
Photographer: Thomas Seear-Budd This project began with the dilapidated old Model T assembly building from which the lofts have been fashioned. Recycled brick, oil-rubbed timbers and finely gridded windows seek to reintroduce integrity to the long-bastardised shell. The Lofts site is cornered by buildings on all four boundaries. Detached from a street front there […]
Vineyard Residence
The Vineyard Residence at The Landing is a house made up of two simple forms straddling a stone landscape wall. Its tectonic and material strategy is drawn from the land and pursues mass and organic warmth. A long wall of stone pulled from the ground of the site, emerges from the hillside, slips through the […]
Mountain Landing Boathouse
This small but highly serviced building is on the water’s edge in Northland and is a base for farm holidays. The interior aesthetic is ‘mid-Pacific’ with large scale furniture and clearly defined by interior space and as with the other Northland houses, the materials are selected to avoid maintenance and to weather softly becoming part […]
Mountain Landing Lodge
Photographer: Patrick Reynolds This building is a lodge for a family resident offshore and is located on a beautiful piece of coastline in Northland having high heritage and landscape values. We were interested in making a building that, from the outside, would start to relax into the land over time and take on some […]
Davis Bure
Photographer: Patrick Reynolds, Pip Cheshire The house at Whale Bay is located on a hillside in Northland and has the internal volumes of Pacific buildings and in that way stands at some variance with the more common open pavilion of contemporary New Zealand holiday houses. A main building with steeply pitched roof straddles the […]
The Clifftop House
Photographer: Simon Devitt This house is a celebration of descent and ascent, between roadside escarpment and Hauraki Gulf. The passage up and down a series of switchback stairs is hard up against a basalt wall which separates the house’s glazed circulation lantern from its living spaces The formal massing of the house reflects its […]
An Apartment for Art
Photographer: Jeremy Toth The activation of painting as object is at the core of the project; the apartment should be defined by the extraordinary collection of paintings it supports, not by architectural form. This is a reductivist project in which a baroque sensuality is sought in a space without decoration. It is a removal of […]
Congreve House
Photographer: Patrick Reynolds The house sits on a clifftop facing the Hauraki Gulf and Rangitoto Island, and is organised around the particularisation of the site’s relationship with the symmetrical volcanic cone. Within this general schema subtexts are explored. These include the qualities of ‘bigness’ and the relationship between robus ‘raw’ materials and the ‘cooked’ objects […]
Pic’s Not-a-house
When Pic Picot engaged us to design something for his holiday section at Mārahau, he told us straight: he didn’t want a house. No house at all. Not an unassuming bach, or a discreet retreat. No bedrooms, even. “If we’d built a house, the first thing we were going to think was, ‘Oh, I used […]
Otoparae House
Our clients, a family of four who are very aware of the sensitivity of the site, wanted a house that “fitted into” the landscape and asked that we maximise the outdoor experience by breaking the house into pavilions. The site in question is a prominent hill in Otoparae, King Country, with spectacular views of local […]
Narrowneck House
Two dwelling units and a studio allow for a variety of occupancies. The site is an elevated beachside section on a busy road with great views over the harbour. The concrete walls of the house associate with the old concrete fortifications along the coastline. They are covered with creeper. Plastic roofs, like wings, give privacy […]
Heke Street House
A house on a tight site in Freemans Bay. We have tried to make the most of interwoven spaces and light quality while maximising privacy, and to play with the aesthetics of “the wooden house”. “The Stout/Mitchell house gives an unmistakable message to all who see it: the achievement of real architectural quality comes not from […]
Belmont Garden Room
Small yet significant, this addition reflects the complementary abilities of its architect owners. In a reversing of the traditional process, the extension was first constructed as a garden, with a new addition then deftly grafted in, around and over the landscape. A small, staid state-house duplex has been enlivened and animated. Discreet pockets of occupation […]
Alpine Holiday Home
Photographer: Anthony Turnham Nestled amongst other homes in the small alpine community of Castle Hill, this holiday home was designed to meld into its environment. Designed as a getaway for a young family, this home is small enough to feel snug and warm on the coldest days, while it also can cater to large […]
Folded Roof Home
Photographer: Sarah Rowlands Photography Aerial Photography: Ian Hutchinson With the challenge of a narrow street façade, this home uses its folded roof form to guide visitors up through the interior spaces toward the amazing views of the Southern Alps. The family home, across two levels, responds creatively to the challenge of the beautiful location. […]
Lake Pupuke House
“Slid into a tight suburban site, this house, approached through a restricted and somewhat unpromising entry sequence, expands from the front door into a series of most agreeable domestic spaces. A free plan connects a series of carefully modelled rooms to the view and the sun. Courtyards, decks and roof gardens connect the rooms to […]
Waitamariki House
A house on a prominent hill is sunk into the ground with stone retaining walls. Services are underground with a grass roof. Living areas are nestled into the slope in copper-roofed pavilions that open out to the view. Awards: Auckland Architecture Award (Housing) 2015
Parnell House
“It may be luxurious, eclectic, even glitzy, but there is no duplicity or deceit. Only an overriding confidence, clarity and openness of spirit…..a house whose airy opulence combines purity with luxury – cool surface, clean detailing and an abundance of pure, unadulterated space – in direct line of descent from Neutra’s Californian Health House from […]
Orakei House & Gallery
A house inside and around a private art gallery. Cited by Hotere as one of the best architects to work with because he leaves artists’ projects to artists’ solutions, Mitchell has a reputation for being sensitive to the opportunities and demands of art within the architect’s sphere. (Jane) Sutherland (Fox Gallery) describes his design of […]
Matarangi House
Sited in pine tree grove at one of Coromandels’ loveliest beaches, the house straddles between two undulations in the grassed sand dunes. The house is composed of two double storey blocks with a single storey linking bridge which forms a ‘U’ shaped inner courtyard. An outdoor fireplace and pool placed centrally within the courtyard subdivide […]
Waiheke House
“With its poetically generated arrangement of volumes and forms, this house, designed as a retreat from work, offers a range of inventive and enjoyable spatial experiences and a generous and effortless relationship to the outdoors. The composition is assured, and rather quirky, too. The house offers several extraordinary moments: the ‘thinking room’, a double-height space […]
Waikopua +
Photographer: Simon Devitt, Ernie Shackles In 2005 DMA were commissioned to design a family bach on a remote beach on the eastern side of Waiheke. Once a valley of mighty Kauri, long since harvested, the site had become a valley crowded with macrocarpa, wattle trees and discarded farming equipment. The location of the house was […]
Upland Road
Photographer: Simon Devitt, Ernie Shackles DMA were approached by the clients after seeing another of our houses. Their site was a 600m2 recently subdivided site, with a rather unusual road frontage in that it was tucked below Upland Road and serviced by a feeder alley way. The clients had 3 boisterous teenage boys and were […]
Herne Bay
Photographer: Simon Devitt The house in Herne Bay is on a north facing slope, looking out over Herne Bay towards the Waitemata harbour. The site is zoned ‘Residential 2’, which recognises the significant heritage and character of the area. An empty site presented a rare opportunity for a contemporary re-conception of the Villa archetype which […]
Corunna
Photographer: Emma Smales The site is small, 100 square metres less than the minimum ‘single unit site’ under the proposed unitary plan. The site opens to a northern harbour view at the street frontage, engaging the public spaces of the house in a dialogue with the street. Given the small site and restricted budget, DMA […]
9 Elmstone
Photographer: Emily Andrews, Ernie Shackles A suburban context – the site splays out from the end of a quiet Auckland cul-de-sac and slopes steeply away towards the North. The brief was to provide a family home for a young family. It was important to maintain open ground for the boys to play whilst allowing for […]
Urban House
Photographer: Simon Devitt On a sloped site with a width of 10.5 metres that doglegs between two Freeman Bay streets, the client envisioned a modern house with a pool for herself and three sons. The main street frontage was conceived as a folding of form to adopt the facade lines of the two disparate neighbouring architectural typologies. The fold facilitates a pedestrian […]
Lucerne
Photographer: Emily Andrews, Ernie Shackles, Patrick Reynolds The dwelling is sited on the edge of the ancient crater that embraces Orakei Basin, with extravagant views to inner Waitamata harbour and Auckland city. The brief was very specific, with garaging a number of classic cars a primary concern. Daniel’s design response wraps the garaging around a […]
Raumati
Photographer: Patrick Reynolds, Ernie Shackles Access to the site is via a long right-of-way on a ledge carved out of a northwest-facing Remuera slope, previously occupied by an ageing house and a tennis court. The project for a new dwelling eventuated after an attempt to undertake an alteration proved expensive. The decision to start fresh came with the clients stipulation […]
Kopua
Photographer: Simon Devitt The site was a steep basin sloping down to the northeast, facing a sheltered bay on the eastern side of Waiheke Island. Two 100 year old Pohutakawa trees marked the transition from the earth to the sea. Three other houses occupy the bay, the adjoining house I designed in 2004 for another […]
Wanaka Alpine House
The suburban context was a large driver of the sculptural processes used to develop the design, as was the brief for a holiday home for a family of five.
Lin House
Photographer: Sam Hartnett We were approached by the Lin Family to design a 4 bedroom house on a reasonably suburban site in Remuera, Auckland. The challenges of the site was that the northern aspect was facing the street and the site was surrounded by neighbours which need to be considered to maintain the privacy for […]
Tutukaka House
Designed as a refuge from the busy city lives of the owners, this house provides relaxed holiday living on the Tutukaka coast.
Piha House
The environment calls for an architecture which holds it’s own, an uncompromising exterior that resists the elements.
Railley House
Photographer: Sam Hartnett Jeremy and Emma approached DMA late in 2015 after they had recently purchased a 1970’s St Heliers house designed by the architect, Robert Railley, for his own family home. The house had been poorly maintained since the Railley’s had moved on, but the original house had fantastic potential and the clients were […]
Diagrid House
Photographer: Patrick Reynolds This house is a strongly sculptural exploration of in-situ concrete. A basement garage forms a podium upon which a 56-tonne diagrid concrete roof is propped up to create a living, kitchen, and dining area. The main living space is open to the East and the North. In places, daylight is brought through […]
Light Box
The project involved the removal of an existing lean-to living space at the back of a traditional Ponsonby villa, replaced by the addition of a contemporary light filled living zone, opening up completely to the rear yard. The new building form presents as a dramatic contemporary contrast to the detail and filigree of the existing […]
Recrafted Art House
The project involved an extensive restoration and refurbishment of a 1910’s era Bamford and Pierce Arts and Crafts home, the addition of a contemporary living wing connected to the existing house, and a re-planning of the site with two new additional outbuildings – a pool house and a separate garage with guest accommodation above.
Matakana House
The brief was for a house following sustainable design principles, and reflecting rural, shed-like forms that would sit comfortably on a bush-clad site.
Sentinel House
The formal inspiration for this home on this unique site came from the stone sentinels in the adjacent cemetery.
Whangapoua Beach House
Casually laid-back yet highly refined, this small-scale holiday home is oriented north-east towards the ocean, sun and distant islands.
Town House
Photographer: Jeremy Toth “It’s a house of light and shadow, with layered spaces that are intensely private and happily public. It’s built from the most prosaic of materials…and yet achieves an elegant sort of poetry. When you visit a house like this, you can’t wait to go back. And that’s what makes Home of […]
Kuaotunu House
The intention was to renovate an existing holiday home for a family on a dramatic site in Kuaotunu
Bach Bach
This house for an opera singer and her husband takes elements of the Bach Oboe Concerto – a favourite piece of music – and reflects this in the cladding and lining elements which form a part of their daily interaction with the spaces.
Red House
The building is conceived as a simple abstract cube sitting within its natural surrounds – a sealed container under and within the trees.
Coromandel Bach
Conceived as a container sitting lightly on the land, this long rectangular house sits halfway up a north-facing manuka-clad hill north of Whitianga.
Fe304 House
A lifetime spent in the boat-building industry provided the inspiration for this project. The location at the margin of the bay and exposed to the elements – wind and ocean called for a rugged response.
DNA House
Designed as a retreat, the DNA house is an exercise in contrast, delight, strength, and elevation.
Hut on sleds
The Coromandel beach site lies within the coastal erosion zone where all building must be removable.
Kawau Island
Designed to provide a restful escape from the busy city lives of the owners – a family with three young boys – the house needed to be modest, flexible and hard-wearing.
Light Mine
This house is an exploration of strong sculptural forms referencing the mine shafts of the long-abandoned gold mines within the surrounds of the once wealthy historical gold mining town.
Clifford Forsyth House
Photographer: Patrick Reynolds “…a certain antipodean lightness that comes of the logical economies of the new. There is a balance to this house that shows both a certainty and a courtesy towards its setting in both culture and nature.” MICHAEL SORKIN UME 4 The design concept began with an investigation of the relationship between […]
Kumutoto Bay
Photographer: Paul McCredie Accessible by boat only, this family bach provides permanent accommodation to replace years of holiday camping in the bush. Planning responds to past camp life with communal living and private sleeping areas. The ceiling and floors are carefully shaped and punctuated with openings to interpret and reveal the forest surroundings. Materials were […]
Nelson House
Photographer: Paul McCredie This project is a new home for a young family. Set on a sloping site in a suburban environment overlooking Nelson City, the harbour and mountains beyond, it is within walking and cycling distance to work and the town centre. The house is formed by two volumes. A tall two-storey steel […]
Zoolab
Photographer: Paul McCredie This house was designed for a busy family that relocated to Queenstown after the Christchurch earthquakes. It sits on an elevated rural site around existing earthworks and stone walls started by the former owner. It is a magnificent rural Queenstown location looking north towards Coronet Peak and the Southern Alps. The […]
Wilson Bay House
Photographer: Paul McCredie This hideaway near Queenstown sits above the water and surrounded by a newly planted native bush, it is a private, sheltered home where its owners enjoy the beauty of the natural surroundings. The house was built on the same site as an old cottage. Clad in black cedar, the house appears […]
Strathmore House
Photographer: Paul McCredie The house is set on a ridgeline with a steep south-east facing aspect in an area that has been traditionally known for its statehouses. It is adjacent to a forested reserve and overlooks the Wellington harbour entrance and hills beyond while also having views to the northwest over the city and […]
Palliser Road Houses
Photographer: Paul McCredie This project was for two new homes. The underlying land formed a leaky home that was demolished as well as a land-locked rear yard that was accessed via the leaky home site. It is set on a very steep site on the Roseneath Hills overlooking Wellington City and Oriental Bay. The […]
Dunedin House
Photographer: Paul McCredie This project is a new home for a couple and their young daughter. It is set on a very steep site on the Otago Peninsula overlooking Dunedin City, the harbour and hills beyond. The house is formed from a single tubular volume that traverses along the steep slope. This steel form […]
Dublin Street
Photographer: Paul McCredie This home sits on a sloping site above Queenstown with spectacular views south to the Remarkable Ranges, to Bowen Peak, and to the town and the lake below. The client requested a house unlike many of the other monolithic plaster houses in the neighbourhood. It is a dark textured cedar house […]
Dryden Street
Photographer: Patrick Reynolds This small project is a contemporary addition to a Grey Lynn Victorian villa. As is typical, the existing house had bedrooms to the street, a long corridor running through the middle, and some small lean-to structures to the rear as living areas. The brief was to open up the back and […]
Drift Bay House
Photographer: Paul McCredie This family home was designed as a single fluid form that reclines into the sloping landscape on the edge of Lake Wakatipu. The long black form shifts and expands to suit the sun, the occupants’ needs, and the site. The entry is through a hole punched in the middle creating a […]
Brooklyn Houses
Photographer: Paul McCredie This project comprises of two new homes, one is a larger house for the family of four and the other smaller for the grandmother. Set on a very narrow and steep site, close to the Brooklyn community shopping area, this project was the result of demolishing an existing dilapidated dwelling. They […]
Arrowtown House
Photographer: Paul McCredie This modest home sits on a small, sloping site on the edge of the historic precinct in Arrowtown. It was a local requirement to reference the small scale volumes and simple forms of the surrounding historic sheds and outhouses and to use a sympathetic material palette. In addition, the clients’ brief […]