Around the motu
While the number of people spoken to by LAA often exceeds the capacity for telling all of the stories there are to be told in as quick a turnaround as intended, a new series is on its way to highlight our kōrero with landscape architects, designers, educators, students and more. People like Bridget Gilbert, Peter Sergel and Rod Barnett.
What’s looming large for 2026? Apart from finally knowing what’s on the table for replacing the Resource Management Act, there are plenty of landscape architecture projects - exemplified here by Studio Pacific - and big picture infrastructure initiatives in the mix. Meanwhile it’s also time to take a break!
2025 has seen a cornucopia of awards events - here’s a wrap on the Barcelona International Landscape Biennale, the Landscape Institute Awards and World Architecture Festival - all of which took place in November.
October-November is a peak time of year for landscape architecture students and academic staff - with an added emphasis given to exhibiting the excellence of everyone’s hard work; simultaneously providing members of the public an opportunity to take it all in.
On 3 November Te Whare Wānaka o Aoraki Lincoln University formally announced a pivotal new chapter in climate resilience with the establishment of the Kāika Institute of Climate Resilience - to be directed by Professor Paora Tapsell (Ngāti Whakaue and Ngāti Raukawa).
Adaptation Futures 2025, held in Ōtautahi Christchurch between 12-17 October, was in part a showcase for the leading role landscape architects can and do play in climate adaptation. This article is the beginning of a small series on topics and issues that arose from this important international event.
Heat! Now up to Vol. 21, No. 2, this flagship journal from Lincoln University offers six papers that bring a “range of perspectives on landscape architecture design and the complications of collaborating in this heating world”.
Ōtautahi Christchurch has been overflowing with international events, including welcoming more than 2400 delegates and exhibitors to the combined 10th International Water Association ASPIRE Conference and Water New Zealand Conference and Expo.
The countdown to the Adaptation Futures conference from 13 to 16 October at the Te Pae Christchurch Convention Centre in Ōtautahi Christchurch is almost over. It will have all the elements of a UN-level gathering and will put issues and expertise from Aotearoa New Zealand on a world-level stage.
Given the range of conjoined events that it brings together - from speaker events to exhibitions - the NZIA’s Aotearoa Festival of Architecture is an illustration of the power of both diversity an collaboration; deserving of being captured for and promoted to a wider audience.
Boffa Miskell’s Mark Brown has been working on a ‘retrospective’ that highlights the recovery and rejuvenation of Ōtautahi Christchurch. To begin with he has written a first person perspective on the immediate aftermath of the Canterbury Earthquakes, now nearing their 15th anniversary.
Work by Isthmus and Boffa Miskell took centre stage at the awards night of the Resource Management Law Conference held in Marlborough in September. Issues and topics brought to the fore at the annual event sparked “courageous kōrero”.
The Aotearoa Festival of Architecture 2025 is putting an extra spring in the step of all forms of architectural practice around the motu this September, with a diverse programme that in its first week incorporated an NZILA Branch event featuring Dr Emily Afoa, Marty Andrews and Will Hatton.
If you're still looking for ways to engage with Conservation Week (1-7 September) this short film - fronted by conservationist Sam 'The Trap Man' Gibson and backed by Pure Advantage - will definitely assist.
Sian Reynolds, of Boffa Miskell’s Biosecurity team, rings an alarm bell that without adequate investment in a wilding conifer programme “we risk undoing years of gains, allowing these pests to reclaim ground we’ve already fought to protect”.
Reset recently celebrated the opening of the new Ōpaheke Park in Papakura. In this contribution, experienced landscape architect and urban designer James Paxton reflects on the past, present and future of the project.
The announcement of the 2025 New Zealand Architecture Awards shortlist on 31 July featured Hayman Park Playground in the Planning and Urban Design category - a further recognition for the work of Athfield Architects and Wraight + Associates (Wā).
In a round-up of news from Tāmaki Makaurau, LAA highlights progress on the City Rail Link (CRL) the addition of ten sites of cultural significance to Auckland’s planning documents and a victory for the berm gardens created by Mark van Kaathoven.
Interest in the upcoming Adaptation Futures 2025 event - as alerted to LAA readers in June - is mounting. Including pre- and post-event ‘extras’ AF2025 will be up and running from Ōtautahi Christchurch between 12-17 October.