DINZ Designers Speak - Compellingly Commercial - Auckland

Designers Speak - Compellingly Commercial - 4th August
(Check out other speakers on the 7th July)

We shape our buildings and afterwards our buildings shape us (Winston Churchill).

Design Firm: Wingate + Farquhar - David Wingate & Blair Farquhar
Title: Creepy Design
Soundbite: A discussion around transmutation and stability

Design Firm: Samson Corporation - Marco Creemers
Title: Developers + Professionals = Landmark Design

Design Firm: Ellery Muir Associates - David Muir
Title: The Big Sell
Soundbite: How we change retail design. How retail design changes us

Design Firm: Jasmax - Alasdair Hood
Title: The Project with 200 Clients
Soundbite: Designing a design studio - walking the talk

Presenters

David Wingate PDINZ - Wingate + Farquhar 

David Wingate is an architect with a wide understanding of architectural design and management in New Zealand and the UK. Recently David has developed particular expertise in residential buildings and interiors, and has further experience in commercial buildings, interiors, public buildings, healthcare and retail projects.

David strives to produce high quality design solutions to meet clients' needs in all respects: visually, environmentally, technically, on time and on budget. David’s design method involves close dialogue with the client to explore and develop the brief and ensure that the design grows out of a shared understanding of the objectives. In this way the design can bridge the gap between what is desirable and what is possible.

Blair Farquhar - Wingate + Farquhar

Blair Farquhar is an architect with extensive experience in the design, coordination and delivering of demanding construction and interiors projects which require design input from all disciplines in order to achieve outstanding results. He has a substantial portfolio of work in design led private practice across a wide range of building types in New Zealand, the UK, China and Latin America. He has successfully handled from inception to completion technically complex and demanding projects but also has the proven ability to deal sensitively with design problems at all scales.

Blair is passionate about creating quality architecture, that engages with its cultural context. He is product driven but also process aware. He enjoys the active engagement of technology as a design generator and encourages the creative input from all participants in any project.

Marco Creemers - Samson Corporation

Bio coming soon.... 

David Muir FDINZ - Ellery Muir Associates

David started ellerymuirassociates 13 years ago, with Mark Ellery. The thoughts were to remain small, providing great design, great service and having a great time. The numbers soon grew, but the policies remain.

Ellerymuirassociates enjoy working with clients in most forms of commercial design – hospitality, office, banking services and retail – however are better known for their experience and expertise in retail design, working with some of the country’s leading retailers. With a number of national clients, there aren’t many towns we haven’t visited, or had an influence on the main street.

David’s approach, to any project, is to ‘Get the space right – first’. This usually involves lots of Butter paper and an HB pencil. If the space is right, the brand, merchandising, product, customers and staff will then fit – well usually!

Alasdair Hood FDINZ - Jasmax

Alasdair is an Associate Director of Jasmax leading the interiors and workplace team in the Christchurch studio he co-established in late 2008.
 
His last major project prior to heading south was leading the interior team designing Jasmax’s new Auckland studio in Parnell. Arguably a “poisoned chalice”, Alasdair saw the project as a unique opportunity to test and further develop much of the strategy and thinking applied to many of the workplace projects the studio has designed.

The Christchurch office has grown considerably since its inception with a range of interesting projects in a variety of phases. Alasdair is convinced that the success of the studio is in large part attributable to the focus they’ve placed on hiring the right mix of people and establishing a culture that clients feel immediately comfortable engaging with.

When he’s not working on other people’s projects, Alasdair is head down on his own – a house in the “Christchurch style” set amongst 2 acres of somewhat dilapidated garden on the plains. After more than a decade working on projects for other people, the opportunity to restore and refurbish such a unique property for himself is a treat (that doesn’t always feel like a treat). There’s nothing he relishes more than getting his hands in the dirt or onto the drop saw to fashion another piece of the enormous puzzle.

Posted on: April 30, 2010