RADFF offers another stellar season of screenings
It's that time of year again for the annual Resene Architecture & Design Film Festival (RADFF) - with the 15th edition promising its most ambitious programme yet, now available online and bringing together almost 30 films and shorts from nine countries.
The RADFF team of creatives Yasmine Ganley and Sara Gay, and Rialto's Kathryn Bennett and Kathryn Blenkinsop, are staging another stellar line-up.
Films to draw a circle around include:
The Time Traveller's Guide to Hamilton Gardens - a documentary featuring the mastermind behind the gardens, NZILA Fellow Peter Sergel, directed by Grant Sheehan. The premiere will be held at Rialto Cinemas Newmarket, Auckland, followed by a special advance screening at Wellington's Embassy Theatre - both on Tuesday 28 April.
At the Garden's Pace - focused on construction of a long-awaited pavilion inside the Hilversum botanical gardens in the Netherlands.
Anna Mariani Photographic Notes - a film that retraces the dirt roads that photographer Anna Mariani (1935-2022) followed between the ’70s and the ’90s, when she published her most famous works and helped an entire country rediscover the richness of the façades of popular houses as a phenomenon of visual perception and cultural identity.
Tracing Light - an exploration of light that brings together leading physicists and artists from Scotland, England and Germany.
Ngā Mokopuna the Living Pā - A short film showcasing Ngā Mokopuna and interviews with architects, a sustainability expert, the head of Māori Studies at the Victoria University of Wellington and sustainable building suppliers.
Notably the schedule will see screenings take place across 12 centres between 30 April and 3 June, just in time for some winter-time reprieves and group bookings:
As noted in the RADFF programme this year is also Resene's 80th birthday.
Tracing back to the company's pioneering beginnings in 1946, managing director Nick Nightingale calls to memory the back story of his grandfather, Ted Nightingale, a builder by trade, creating his own paint in a concrete mixer in his Wellington garage.
Paying tribute to the "architecture and design space", Nick writes in the programme that "all those things we think can’t be done, there’s most likely someone out there working on the solution".
Coincidental with their 80th celebrations was the 16th annual Resene Total Colour Awards ceremony held in Auckland on Friday 27 March. There were 16 winners, including Ka Mua Ka Muri, one of the 2024 Te Nohonga Toru designs created by a team from Boffa Miskell.
The full list of 2026 winners is:
Resene Nightingale Award Overall Winner and Resene Heritage Tone-e Award: Metropolitan Cathedral of the Sacred Heart by TEAM Architects Wellington and Paul Cummack Conservation in association.
Resene Heritage Colour Maestro Award: Massey House by Architecture +
Resene Landscape Colour Maestro Award: Ka Mua Ka Muri by Boffa Miskell
Resene Landscape Tone-e Winner: Yellow Post, Brick Bay by Elliot Western, Oliver Prisk, Andre Vachias, Henry Mabin and George Culling
Resene Installation – Experiential – Product – Tone-e Winner: Into Ocean & Ice: Five Artists Reimagine Shackleton’s Antarctic by The Letter Q
Resene Neutrals Tone-e Winner: Port Tarakohe Harbourmaster and Amenities Building by JTB Architects
Resene Education Colour Maestro Award: Ruakaka School New Classroom Block by designgroup architects h+k
Resene Education Tone-e Winner: Wainuiomata High School Redevelopment by Stephenson & Turner
Resene Residential Exterior Colour Maestro Award: Aro Valley Refresh by Athfield Architects
Resene Residential Exterior Tone-e Winner: Biophilic Glamour by South Coast Colour
Resene Residential Interior Colour Maestro Award: Roseman Whare by Sunday Architects
Resene Residential Interior Tone-e Winner: Yarraville Peak by Weaver+Co Architects
Resene Commercial Exterior Colour Maestro Award: ESR – Chromatic Oscillation by Drez
Resene Commercial Exterior Tone-e Winner: Totara Store by Annabell Berry Creative Co
Resene Commercial Interior & Public Space Tone-e Winner: Te Whare Awhi Ora by MODE
Resene Rising Star Tone-e Winner: Denise Jillian Saso