11 June 2013

Architecture students redesign Lower Hutt

More than 100 students from Victoria University’s School of Architecture have been applying their creative skills to inspire the future of Lower Hutt.

Their work will feature in an exhibition titled Victoria designs the Hutt which will be opened by Hutt City Mayor Ray Wallace and Victoria’s Head of the School of Architecture, Professor Jules Moloney, on Wednesday 19 June.

The project signifies the start of a partnership between the University and Hutt City Council, with the students looking at landscape, urban design and housing issues in four key areas—the Central Business District, Petone West, Wainuiomata and Naenae.

The exhibition showcases work from Landscape, Interior Architecture and Architecture students, who were presented with the complex dynamics of a real-world situation when thinking about the future shape of Lower Hutt.

The students’ work tests possibilities, rather than proposing fixed solutions: Petone West is looked at for its potential to support new types of mixed-use housing; Naenae and Wainuiomata provide the ground for shifting ideas of house and home; and the CBD is reoriented towards the river.

“The intention is that our students’ work will provoke public discussion and, at the same time, build a resource of design research on the region,” says Senior Lecturer Simon Twose.

Victoria designs the Hutt is a pilot project toward on-going design research by the School of Architecture to contribute to key issues in Lower Hutt. Next year, the Master’s students will have the opportunity to study the region in more depth.

The exhibition will be open to the public for three weeks in a pop-up venue in Queens Arcade, on Queens Drive in Lower Hutt from Thursday 20 June to Thursday 11 July 2013.

Exhibition launch details

Wednesday 19 June, 5.30pm

65 Queens Drive (Queens Arcade), Lower Hutt

ends

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