Photography: Russell Kleyn

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Pukeahu National War Memorial Park

Wraight & Associates Ltd

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  • NZILA Category Winner / Parks — 2017
  • NZILA George Malcolm Supreme Award — 2017
Photography: Russell Kleyn
Photography: Russell Kleyn

Commissioned by the Ministry for Culture and Heritage and completed in time for the 2015 ANZAC Day centenary, Pukeahu is a hugely significant addition to New Zealand’s cultural landscape.

Photography: Paul Fisher
Photography: Paul Fisher

Commissioned by the Ministry for Culture and Heritage and completed in time for the 2015 ANZAC Day centenary, Pukeahu is a hugely significant addition to New Zealand’s cultural landscape.

As both a staging ground for national remembrance and a sophisticated piece of urban infrastructure Pukeahu has been beautifully crafted and succeeds at every level.

This complex, multilayered design has been executed with a clarity of vision, confidence, and restraint; the park offers much to the people of, and visitors to, Wellington.

The reverent Pukeahu is a place of utmost value to all New Zealanders.

 

GEORGE MALCOLM AWARD

Pukeahu is an exercise in sophisticated design and spatial planning, executed with a confidence and attention to detail befitting of its status as our National War Memorial Park. The design team expertly weaved together multiple cultural and historic narratives whilst navigating a myriad of complicated technical challenges to realise both a park as a place of remembrance and a piece of urban infrastructure that offers much to its surrounding city.

Masterfully manipulating the topography with subtle plays in geometry to create a series of connected ‘rooms’, the park culminates in a large square in front of the national war memorial that commands a sense of real gravitas. This is place making on a grand scale, and yet a feeling of intimacy is retained, allowing the park to be enjoyed for a range of activities and everyday use that keep it vital and engaging.

Employing a restrained palette of materials and beautifully executed finishes, the park exudes a strength and calmness that reflects a clarity of vision.

The design elements embedded into the DNA of the park will withstand the tests of time and taste, as future memorials are developed within its framework and
the city matures and grows around it. Pukeahu exemplifies the art and practice of landscape architecture at the very highest level. Those involved in its creation can be extremely proud of their work.

Name of Entry: Pukeahu National War Memorial Park

Name of Entrant: Wraight Athfield Landscape + Architecture Ltd (WALA)

Name of Client: Ministry for Culture and Heritage New Zealand

Press Release by Arts, Culture and Heritage Minister Maggie Barry - read here.

Photography: WALA
Photography: WALA
Photography: Russell Kleyn
Photography: Russell Kleyn
Photography: WALA
Photography: WALA
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