Did you want to be an architect when you were growing up?

I have always held great interest in architecture and design. With both of my parents involved in architecture and having grown up in houses they designed themselves, the experience proved to be a strong influence on my career choice and design ideas.

Can you describe your architecture career thus far?

I have had the opportunity to work in some very different architecture firms in New Zealand and in the UK. All of them produce beautiful work and all have had an influence on my way of thinking, from carefully-detailed light-weight timber frame structures at Cook Sargisson & Pirie and Sheppard & Rout to large-scale buildings at Architectus and London firm Cousins Wojciechowski. I have also had the opportunity to design for very different sites and all of my work so far has been what I feel to be the best response to the given project, site and brief.
I have been strongly influenced by contemporary European architecture. There is a strength of form in the likes of Carlos Ferrater and Raphael Moneo’s work that focuses on the effects of light and shadow. My work so far reflects this with strong, simple lines and a focus on rational space planning and quality materials.

What are you working on at the moment?

After three years working in London, I returned to Christchurch last year to be involved with the (daunting) rebuild of our broken city. I currently have a number of houses underway and am working on the master-planning of a school, several large-scale housing developments and the design for our new architecture office. Our office has an increasing number of inner-city commercial/mixed-use buildings that I look forward to becoming involved with.

What do you enjoy most about working in architecture?

Architecture, for good or for bad, becomes a way of life. It affects the way you think about the world and gives you the opportunity to get to know many different people from all walks of life. I look forward to involvement in the continued development of sustainable design and how we integrate it to build increasingly energy-efficient architecture.

If you could choose to design a house anywhere in New Zealand, where would it be?

As much as I love living in the city, I have always had a fascination with the West Coast of the South Island. There is a ruggedness and remoteness there that fascinates me. I would love to find a secluded valley or ocean-edge spot for a studio where I could just get away from it all from time to time. It would need to touch the earth lightly and be self-sustainable.