Te Pae
This year, global architecture and design studio Woods Bagot marks more than two decades of influence in the New Zealand market.
“At Woods Bagot, we pride ourselves on local knowledge combined with a global philosophy,” says Auckland studio chair Joe Murphy. “Our unique advantage as a practice is our intimate understanding of the local context, supported by a team of experts around the world.”
The global studio undertook its first project on New Zealand soil in 2005. Since then, its influence has steadily grown, with Woods Bagot opening the doors to its Tāmaki Makaurau Auckland studio in 2021.
For two decades now, the studio has had a hand in shaping the country’s built environment, authoring some of its city-shaping projects from Auckland to Arrowtown.
With a diverse portfolio of projects behind it – across public architecture, commercial, civic and events, and residential – Woods Bagot has become a household name in New Zealand, enriching every context and playing a significant part in the evolution of city skylines from north to south.
Since 2005, the practice has set new standards in sustainability; helped revive a devastated post-quake city; designed New Zealand’s first integrated transport-oriented development; and devised a new typology of later living residences.
“I am so proud of what we have achieved in New Zealand,” says Woods Bagot Principal and founding Auckland studio chair Andy Gentry. “Setting up an Auckland studio has helped to solidify our impact and cement our status as a studio by and for the people of New Zealand.”
This year also marks 21 years of collaboration with like-minded practices, pooling together collective resources and intelligence for the best design outcomes.
Here’s a snapshot of Woods Bagot’s most influential projects over the years.
The BNZ tower at 80 Queen Street was Woods Bagot’s first project on New Zealand soil, which commenced in 2005 and was completed in 2009.
The 24-level tower contains 18 levels of commercial work floors and six levels of podium, designed as the joint home for BNZ and Deloitte.
The new tower retained part of the existing Jean Batten Building façade – a decision that was celebrated as a “sympathetic gesture” between old and new.
It also marked the first time the studio partnered with Warren and Mahoney, who we would go on to collaborate with over the next 20 years on projects including Te Pae, New Zealand International Convention Centre, PwC Commercial Bay Tower.
The tower at 80 Queen Street became the first commercial high-rise commercial building in New Zealand to achieve a 5-star Green Star rating, breaking local records for building efficiency, environmental performance and carbon reduction. (Woods Bagot would also go on to design New Zealand’s first 6 Green Star Design & As Built-rated building, with 3 Te Kehu Way receiving this accreditation in 2024).
Te Pae Christchurch Convention Centre was identified as one of seventeen anchor projects initiated as part of the Christchurch Central Recovery Plan – an effort by government, architects and urban planners to repair the city in the wake of the 2011 earthquakes.
Located in the heart of Otautahi/Christchurch, the 28,000-squre-metre Te Pae was completed in 2022, boasting a fluid facade that represents the unique braided rivers of Canterbury Plains.
The facade is made from nearly 43,000 tiles in an ornate herringbone arrangement, each individually placed, with varied tones and textures are inspired by the rich palette of the natural landscape.
Within its first year, the centre generated over $60 million for the Christchurch region, according to Te Pae’s general manager Ross Steele.
“Te Pae was a cornerstone project, so it was always going to be vital to the regeneration of the city,” says Steele. “It’s a huge boon for community as much as it is a driver for economic revenue.”
Steele adds that the centre’s design has helped garner a new sense of local identity and reaffirm Māori sovereignty.
“It gives the Christchurch people a chance to puff their chests out again and be proud of their city,” he says. “There’s regionality to the design, where the architectural narrative around the braided rivers is built into the physical form. It gives the locals a sense of pride, but it also gives visitors the sense of coming to a destination, and a story that connects the building to place.”
Te Pae took six years to complete, and was a collaboration between the Auckland and Melbourne studios. It has received a handful of local and international awards, including the NZIA Public Architecture award, the prize for Civic Centres at The Chicago Athenaeum, and a shortlisting for the World Architecture Festival’s Cultural category.
Design and construction for the PwC tower in Commercial Bay required levels of complexity not seen before in New Zealand’s built environment. Standing at a striking 39 levels, the megaproject extends to 97,500 square metres of built form, with construction requiring deep excavation below sea level.
As another example of collaboration with practice Warren and Mahoney, the “brave and challenging” development on the waterfront near Waitemata Harbour represents a definitive silhouette on the city skyline, maximising its seaside location with a contemporary glass covering wrapped in a steel diagrid structure. The transparent facade offers panoramic views to the harbour and surrounding urban environment.
Commercial Bay tower won the Best Tall Building for Oceania in 2023 for the Council of Tall Buildings and Urban Habitat (CTBUH) awards. It was also recognised at the Australian Institute of Architects’ International Chapter Awards in 2022, and received the Supreme Award at the 2021 Property Council Industry Awards.
“The project is undoubtedly ambitious,” the design jury for commercial architecture wrote.
“Its unprecedented local scale and position has driven its architects to successfully address a plethora of complex, contextual and cultural conditions, whilst setting a world-class standard for major commercial architecture in New Zealand.”
Since its completion, the project has provided decisive economic and social benefits to the city and its community.
The PwC Commercial Bay tower was a design collaboration between Woods Bagot and Warren & Mahoney, completed in 2020. Read more.
The Symphony Centre over-station development is a $600-million urban regeneration project sited above Auckland’s new Te Waihorotiu / City Rail Link station, creating a vibrant new precinct in the heart of the Auckland’s city centre.
Building over the new Te Waihorotiu (Aotea) City Rail Link station at Aotea Square, the ‘Symphony Centre’ will be New Zealand’s first integrated transport-oriented development.
Designed by Woods Bagot, the Symphony Centre is slated to be the epicentre of Auckland’s cultural and entertainment quarter, creating a new landmark destination for night-time activation within the city.
Woods Bagot Director Bruno Mendes said the design is a compelling response to the challenges of Auckland’s rising population and rapid urban densification.
“Centred around creating an iconic, mixed-use vertical city that enriches Auckland’s arts precinct, the Symphony Centre provides a cohesive urban living environment where residents can seamlessly integrate their daily activities – living, working, and leisure – within a single structure,” says Mendes.
Read more.
New Zealand is facing a silver tsunami, with the number of people aged 65 or older expected to hit one million by 2028. As such, there is a critical shortage of retirement villages in the country, with demand only expected to increase.
Winton’s Northbrook portfolio is the New Zealand studio’s most recent acquisition, comprising five new retirement precincts dotted across the country, from Auckland to Arrowtown.
These projects represent a new architectural typology of luxury later living, with high-quality amenity and healthcare facilities integrated into five premium lifestyle developments. The Northbrook model aims to provide independence and privacy, while providing its residents with confidence and assurance as they age.
New Zealand developer Winton has engaged Woods Bagot to design five multi-residential developments for its Northbrook neighbourhoods, boasting a new tier in all-inclusive post-retirement residences that older adults desire from independent living.
Each development responds sensitively to its surroundings, the built form designed to sit sympathetically within its local context. The Arrowtown development, for example, borrows from local agricultural heritage buildings, while in Wynyard Quarter, the vertical village embraces vistas overlooking the Waitematā Harbour.
Across the portfolio, residences have been designed to assist ageing in place, with discreet inbuilt futureproofing to enable accessibility and autonomy, without compromising on aesthetic.
Read more about how, with Winton, Woods Bagot is shaping new standards for ageing in place.
Media enquiries Isla Sutherland Content and Communications Specialist (Australia & New Zealand)
Montenegro, Europe
15 Jan 24