Case Studies

58 Totara St

    House Profile There’s much that’s noteworthy about this new townhouse in Christchurch. Many carefully considered decisions led to this, the first certified Passive House project for boutique property developers Nest Residential. This is a family home for Nest director Mark Teesdale and he used all of his experience as a property investor, developer, and urban designer to produce …

Christchurch

2023 208.1 m2
View building

Milton Road Passivhaus

Passive House is a performance-based standard and those who used to criticise it as “something only useful in cold places like Germany” failed to grasp its relevance to all manner of different climates. Auckland (and even Northland) are still heating climates*. But Auckland’s is indubitably a mild climate by New Zealand standards and that creates a broader range of choices …

Auckland

2023 214 m2
View building

Chingford Park Passive House

Chingford Park is a charming outlier, a newly built Passive House that echoes the past and embraces all that is technologically possible in modern times. It’s a unique result of a close and effective collaboration between a client who knew exactly what she wanted, experienced architects/Passive House designers and a building team that delivered meticulously crafted work. The modestly-proportioned two-storey, …

Dunedin

2023 127.8 m2
View building

Dunedin City Council Community Housing

Here’s another significant Passive House milestone met: New Zealand’s first certified community housing project. Dunedin City Council (DCC) shares the glory with the experienced Passive House design team at Architype. This project owes a lot to the Toiora High Street co-housing development for which Architype provided architectural services. Firstly, DCC was deeply involved during that project’s long gestation period and …

Dunedin

2022 358 m2
View building

Leith Street Apartments

Dunedin’s student housing is notoriously bad, even worse than its winters. However, a new Passive House certified apartment block smack in the middle of the student housing precinct is a stark contrast. This project was built by a private developer who was persuaded to build to a higher standard by a compelling business case. The developer has built other student …

Dunedin

2022 807.2 m2
View building

Watterson Residence

The Watterson residence is already famous, being that Passive House build in Featherston that featured on Grand Designs in November 2022. The home is an outstanding example of meticulous planning and through project management, easily hitting all Passive House metrics with plenty of margin. It also notably proved that this level of performance is possible on an average budget—and without …

Featherston

2022 177.3 m2
View building

Rose House

Napier South

2022 102.4 m2
View building

Arthur Street Townhouse

This compact Dunedin home on a tricky site is notable for being a build-to-rent project. The owner is a local investor steadily growing his rental property portfolio. This was his first high-performance build but like a growing number of Architype clients, he arrived having already educated himself about the benefits of building to the Passive House standard. The project benefited …

Dunedin

2022 113.4 m2
View building

Whakatū Passivhaus

Whakatū Passivhaus deserves close investigation. It’s the first for its builder and architect/Passive House designer and the first to be certified in Nelson City (the nearby Orr Residence is located in the adjoining Tasman District.) There’s a lot more going on here than the simple form suggests. Passive House performance is the gold standard for operational carbon efficiency. This project …

Nelson

2022 106.8 m2
View building