Chris Barton

Chris Barton is the current editor of Architecture New Zealand. He has been a respected architecture critic for Metro and multi-award winning journalist for many of the nation's leading print media publications; he also holds a Master of Architecture from the University of Auckland.

The space between

Practice | Chris Barton explores Te Wānanga, the long-planned replacement public space for the former Queen Elizabeth II Square, and Te Ngau o Horotiu, the new Downtown Ferry Terminal.

Editorial: Chris Barton on no more blah, blah, blah

Practice | Rays of hope emanated from the COP26 ‘Build Better Now’ virtual pavilion, showcasing 17 “exemplary sustainable projects” and explaining the ways in which construction has contributed to climate change and how future buildings could be less carbon intensive.

Editorial: Chris Barton on a wound upon a building

Practice | “The architecture of suicide is not an easy topic but, for architects who might adhere to an ethical position akin to “first, do no harm”, it’s a topic that can’t be avoided.”

Editorial: Chris Barton on a duty of care

Practice | Architecture NZ editor Barton notes a lack of language regarding sustainability in our professional bodies’ codes. “Distressingly … there is no mention of climate change in the NZRAB’s code.”

Te Ao Mārama: A new order

Projects | The second in our series: Chris Barton contemplates the new column-fins of Te Ao Mārama’s design and their connection to the nautilus shell spiral and the golden mean.

Editorial: Chris Barton on male architects

Practice | Please no, not Alvar Aalto. Finnish female director Virpi Suutari’s brilliant examination, Aalto, lays bare some uneasy home truths about the man lauded as an icon of modernism.

The technology of the trees

Projects | Chris Barton finds at Scion’s Innovation Hub, Te Whare Nui o Tuteata, in Rotorua – by RTA Studio, in collaboration with Irving Smith Architects – a showcase of radically new methods in multilevel timber construction and a benchmark for achieving net-zero embodied carbon.