Design Principles Pod

Flying High: From Dezeen to Design Dreams

• Sam Brown, Ben Sutherland and Gerard Dombroski • Season 2 • Episode 1

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Step into the new year with us as we reopen the doors to our podcast, diving deep into the vibrant world of architecture and design. We'll share our personal highlights from the recent Dezeen Awards, a celebration of exceptional creativity, and inspire listeners with the remarkable projects that put New Zealand on the global design map. Throughout the episode, we unpack the differences between local awards and their international counterparts, examining how to enhance the celebratory aspects of these events.

Join us as we advocate for the revitalisation of competition in the architectural landscape, encouraging fresh ideas and innovative approaches to design. From discussing Wellington's thriving talent to recognising the need for more dynamic celebrations, we aim to uplift and inspire the architectural community. Our conversation challenges the norms that often dampen creativity and emphasises the necessity for an engaging environment where designers feel confident to share their work.

Within this episode, we reflect on the rich potential within New Zealand’s architecture, and the exciting prospects that lie ahead. The dialogue encapsulates our belief that architecture should not only be about buildings but about community, creativity, and recognition. We invite you to engage with us, share your experiences, and collaborate in shaping a brighter future for design in our country. Don’t forget to subscribe, share, and leave a review—it truly helps us connect and grow our community!

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If you wish to contact us hit our DMs or email us on info@designprinciplespod.com

Sam Brown:

happy new year 2025 and we're back the design prince principles. Pod a bit of a hiatus, but we're ripped and rearing to go watch out, how are you guys back by popular demand?

Sam Brown:

well, do you know what's funny is? I have, I reckon, in the last week I've just like caught up with various people and they've been like when are you guys doing the podcast again, which is cool. So, um, actually had coffee with andy, spain yesterday and he he was like have you guys, andy, spain yesterday? And he was like have you guys done any recent episodes? And I was like no, we haven't. But here we go.

Gerard Dombroski:

Oh, should we get Andy on.

Sam Brown:

I reckon he's keen to jump on Yep. He wants to have a yarn. He'd be a good one to get around for the pint, yeah, I don't have any beers today.

Gerard Dombroski:

Those are the rules, mate. I don't have any beers today.

Sam Brown:

Those are the rules, mate. I know I'm also going booze-free at the moment, so I've just got water.

Ben Sutherland:

So the bent has already gone downhill.

Sam Brown:

Yeah, I know. Well, we've got no sponsorship. That's what we're at, you know. So if there's any liquor sponsors out there that want to want to, hit us up. That'd be great help. The chat the chat yeah, or just any in general I reckon, because that's I mean, that's why we started this right. Well, that's the the initial like idea behind us. Starting the pod was to kind of take those pub chats, get some free booze.

Sam Brown:

Yeah, Get free booze. No, it was to take those pub chats and kind of just bring them out to the masses. But we sort of got a bit serious in a good way. But you know, you kind of want to bring that jovial, inebriated, slightly lubricated chatterback.

Ben Sutherland:

Yeah, and we certainly dropped off Ender last year, didn't we? Hey, we're all busy, but we never got to hear about the Dazeen. Your experience at the Dazeen Awards.

Sam Brown:

Yeah, well, do you want me to jump straight into it?

Ben Sutherland:

Oh yeah, if you don't mind, I want to hear about it.

Sam Brown:

So firstly, actually, I just want to have a quick shout out to Wellington just in reference to the Design Awards, because I'd actually even realised well obviously I knew going over there that Thomas Seabard had been long-listed for his MK house out in Eastbourne, which was really cool because we sort of had two the only two projects from New Zealand that were long-listed was Seabard Ross and that MK house and us at a rep with our Krakatau. Both projects were in Eastbourne and both projects were by architects from our graduating class from Vic, nice.

Ben Sutherland:

So it was kind of a cool, kind of like a cool like a new dawn, which was pretty sweet.

Sam Brown:

But then what I didn't realise is when I was at the awards, the design firm that won designer of the year, studio sabine marcellus, um, they're like hero image for their design work and I think she's based out of rotterdam. I might be wrong there, but um yeah, and the her installation is currently outside tapapa and that was like the hero image um at the awards when they went up on stage to collect their gong and I was just like shit yeah what a like, what a um expose for Wellington design that, like three you know, highly ranked projects Thomas Longlisted, ourselves shortlisted, and then um Sabine Lasalas, winning designer of the year we all had like a connection to Wellington.

Sam Brown:

So I thought that was really sick and, you know, I tried to reach out to the Don Post to see if they wanted to try and, like you know, uplift Wellington wellington a little bit. You know something nice to talk about in terms of wellington, but radio silence. So if anyone out another pitch of anyone out there's in pr and wants to help me out, that'd be great. Or if anybody wants to just like, make wellington feel a little bit warmer and a little bit fuzzier, um, there's a nice little story for you is it?

Ben Sutherland:

is it not warm down there?

Sam Brown:

no, no, I just mean like the general vibe, yeah.

Ben Sutherland:

Gerard, you had a shortlist for the Dazeen Awards yourself, didn't you?

Gerard Dombroski:

Was that the year before?

Ben Sutherland:

Yeah, I think it must have been the year before. It was me and Ollie Booth were the New Zealand ones. Also both from Vic.

Sam Brown:

Was that for your piccolo? Yeah, oh, sick Long list. Long both also, also both from that. Was that for your piccolo? Yeah, oh, sick long list.

Gerard Dombroski:

yeah, so there we go somebody nominated for, uh, the arc daily world building of the year, which is hilarious for like a max three thousand dollar project look at.

Sam Brown:

Look at that from a Vic perspective, though. That's pretty cool. That's a great alumni success.

Gerard Dombroski:

Yeah, you raise a really good point there. There actually are some pretty good things coming out of Wellington, but I think Wellington's done an absolutely horrendous job of noticing its own talent in the city.

Sam Brown:

I think they're too busy focused on the, the glum. So I think I mean, I still think there's a. There's definitely scope for a story there if anybody wants to sort of get involved. But anyway, um, yeah, the awards. So I'll tell you what. Do you know? What's really funny is I got back um from the awards and I had lunch with nick officer from first light, and that um st helder's church renovation project.

Sam Brown:

Um won at the nzia national awards, which is really awesome yeah, I was chatting to nick about how the awards ceremony was and he said it was the worst awards show he'd ever been to. It was basically like sitting in a school assembly, but for architecture. So, nzia, if you're listening, listen to what I'm about to tell you.

Ben Sutherland:

You're just throwing Nick under the bus here.

Sam Brown:

No, I'm not throwing Nick. Well, Nick could stand by it. I mean guys, you're supposed to be out here, like you know, uplifting architecture and promoting it, and you just like throw the lamest party ever and razine's gone.

Ben Sutherland:

Who is there? Who's doing parties these days for architects and designers? No one do you guys know that?

Gerard Dombroski:

that, um uh, architecture. Have we talked about this before? I probably have. I bring it up all the time. Ice Cube celebrating the Eames yeah, but just how he delivers architecture, like architects could learn a lot. Oh man Talking about architecture a lot less boring, yeah yeah, we fall into the trap. And you could zest it up a little bit.

Sam Brown:

Just get somebody on the page who's not monotone hopefully we fall into the category of zesty architecture chat and not boring architecture chat we're definitely a bunch of zesty boys, but work on the tone so anyway, back to the awards ceremony and where I was going with the NZA thing is, you know, nick was telling me about their very school assembly type night, while I was telling him about essentially what felt like going to the Oscars of architecture and design. You know Like you arrive. It was at Hackney Church, which has recently been renovated, and there was like this big immersive light show by a local designer and the whole thing was catered by this London chef and everything was sourced within like a max. 7k radius or something from his kitchen and I must admit, I got about two canapes, that was about it, but the drinks tray managed to find us pretty regularly, which was, which was not bad. Um, but you know, you like you're basically the whole thing's sponsored by bentley. You're like walking the red carpet. There's all these like beautiful, like concept bentley cars you know, beside you and everything.

Sam Brown:

You walk into this room and it's just packed the rafters. I think there's like 600 people there, maybe, um, full international. You know there's everybody from. You know I asked you know, myself from new zealand met a guy from bikini faso. There was, you know, people from throughout europe and america and south america, and you know we're chatting to architects from Spain. I chatted to one from Portugal, one from the Czech Republic. You know, it was pretty amazing and obviously, like on a design scale, everybody is just like dressed to the nines. So you had to come correct, that's cool.

Sam Brown:

Fortunately, I sort of thought about that, thought ahead about that, so tried to dress up a little bit, but even then, you know, still felt kind of slightly underdressed.

Ben Sutherland:

Nice Did you wear like a nice house hat. I did not rock the Jaden Smith, oh you didn't.

Sam Brown:

I didn't rock the Jaden Smith black castle on the old building. Apparently that's worth, like I don't know, like four and a half grand or something well before or after before yeah, no before ridiculous.

Sam Brown:

Just thinking about that for a minute, though I definitely vote that we get Bentley on as sponsors because the design sounds epic for the podcast exactly it's just a no brainer yeah, but yeah, like the thing is no expense spared, and like they had DJs playing and then they had, like they had live entertainment, this like really beautiful spoken word poem.

Sam Brown:

Um, I think his name was lionheart, uh, a british poet, um did a piece which was really cool. And then the way that they actually ran the awards and I think there's something to be said for this, particularly from like a new zealand awards point of view, if anybody else has been to one rather than there being like this very long preamble and introducing the shortlisted projects, and then everybody gets up on stage and everyone has a chat, you know, has a welcome speech and all that. Blah, blah, blah, blah. They literally just went bam, these are the shortlist Winner. There you go, here's your prize. Go over there, take a photo, see you later. Next one boom. And at the time it was sort of like whoa, this is like intense, and you kind of like never had a moment to like revel in your like little project up there being shortlisted.

Sam Brown:

But in hindsight, the actual like exactly, bro, like the in hindsight, the actual like awards part of it probably only went for like an hour and a half, but we were at the venue for like five hours and the rest of it was just a big party and it was sick, um, and I think it's the way that it should be. You obviously have this little moment in the sun, but you're there celebrating with your peers and just like enjoying, like architecture and design, rather than listening to. You know every no offense, but you know everyone's life stories, yeah snappy speed that whole set seat thing is um, really does it for me.

Sam Brown:

Yeah, yeah that's one way to put me straight to sleep as well you've got to be standing because that forces you to go quick, otherwise you're going to get people fainting, yeah, collapsing from tired legs or something I.

Ben Sutherland:

I got a haircut just before and I barely even made it through. My haircut are you part of that tiktok generation it's just like when you finally, when you finally sit still for a minute, your body's like, oh, it must be bedtime shampooing, massaging your head. Yeah, exactly.

Sam Brown:

But yeah, but it was just such an amazing event, so well run. Like you know, it was what you'd expect from an awards ceremony of an international scale, but it kind of exceeded my expectations a little bit and I'm fortunate enough to get invited to the after party, which was pretty fun.

Ben Sutherland:

Did you get invited by any famous architects or anything?

Sam Brown:

Nah no famous architects. Didn't manage to talk to any famous people. I was trying to corner the people from oh man, now mine, now I've gone mind blank on their names this is embarrassing. You didn't say bjarke was at the after party then bjarke, wasn't there, no um I'm gonna trampoline with a fan but no, um, anyway, sorry that was embarrassing, kind of forgot who I was trying to. Um, oh why. Why can't I think of their name? They're like one of my favorite architecture snow eater, thank you.

Sam Brown:

Oh my god, that took a long time. Snow eater had been um shortlisted and I was hoping to try and like have a yarns with him, but no dice, um, unfortunately. Well, do you know what was actually really cool? The most of the socializing one. Actually, one criticism of the hackney church is not enough toilets.

Ben Sutherland:

Um, so most of the actual like networking or like socializing was done in the line of the toilets oh nice, you leave your business card on the toilet seat again yeah, was it that surreptitious?

Sam Brown:

leave it on the counter, the open home thingy.

Ben Sutherland:

Exactly, leave it on the toilet at an open home.

Sam Brown:

It's like a throwback to episode three or something, but like I chatted to the editor the like main editor of Tazine in the toilet line he's like oh, you're the guy from New Zealand.

Sam Brown:

You've got that little like tower thingy in the bush, so I really liked your project. You know, it was really cool to be able to feature that blah, blah, blah blah, which was awesome, you know, to have someone like that kind of like know who you are and what you do and stuff like that. So I think it's just I can't encourage people more to look outside of the New Zealand award scope, like, obviously NZIA Awards 2025 are coming up. I imagine people will be kind of focusing on those. But shit man, look internationally, because that kind of like peer recognition and exposure is so much better than what you get from just the local stuff.

Gerard Dombroski:

Yeah, well, I think there's something just in that format as well, like treating it more like a party than an old I don't know like a high school auditorium hangout. Well, you're kind of there, the peer-to-peer conversation, like that conversation with the editor guy. That's recognition in itself and like we actually get to meet people and the the community actually gets a chance to develop a bit more if you get to yarn with more people exactly, yeah, it's really nice.

Sam Brown:

The support that everyone had for everyone else as well is really, is really impressive.

Gerard Dombroski:

you get to express that more in a scenario where you actually get to hang out and have a few beers with people. Yeah, or you get too tired and you want to go home immediately. Yeah, we should definitely throw more parties. Yeah, just make it more of a party, the regime party is gone, so we need something to fill the gap.

Ben Sutherland:

Yeah, the design principles party.

Sam Brown:

The DPP party.

Ben Sutherland:

The DPP party, or DP party, a couple of DJs.

Gerard Dombroski:

You weren't laughing.

Sam Brown:

Yeah. Yeah, they had hot chip for NEOG sort of electro fans was the headline act, which was pretty funny. Hamish McLaughlin will write that. No, it was good, it was a good time, yeah. So anyway, that's my little Dazeen recap, I think.

Sam Brown:

But yeah, like I said, I just can't kind of encourage people to enter international stuff more. And it's cool the doors that it opens up. Like obviously you make those short lists and then you have since then we've been shoulder-tapped a bunch for articles and publications and stuff of that project. So yeah, it's kind of nice that it gives you a broader reach, particularly international reach as well, which I think you know us in little old New Zealand should strive a little bit more for.

Sam Brown:

And what I kind of liked about it is you know us in little old new zealand should should strive a little bit more for, um, and what I kind of liked about it is you know we're classic kiwis. Uh, you know that whole tall poppy syndrome. We don't want to get cut down so we don't try and stick our heads up too high. But when you're in that sort of environment you're forced to sort of just be a little bit more kind of confident and overt and it was quite nice, just sort of leaning into it, you know, and being like, yeah, I'm here because I did a thing.

Sam Brown:

This is sick you know whereas usually you're like oh, thank you so much for recognizing me. I'd you know, recognizing me I didn't. I didn't think my work was very good, but yay, thank you, whereas we should be a little bit more like shit. Yeah, we're the man this is awesome.

Gerard Dombroski:

The whole profession needs to be way more like giving each other props yeah, there's some people doing some epic work so, like people would need to be okay with giving some props to people yeah, I feel like there's like an I don't know.

Sam Brown:

There's an air of negativity around things and even I even find, like reading architecture and zed, sometimes like the, the underlying tone of a lot of articles in that is like not not necessarily negative, but like it's not uplifting, like a lot of the times it's kind of like a bit critical. Um, so yeah, I don't know like obviously there's a place for criticism, but I think there's also a place for just like buoyancy.

Gerard Dombroski:

Yeah, some positivity.

Sam Brown:

Yeah, bring the love. Is that what 2025 is about? You know, we've survived till 25. Now it's time to thrive. It's a little buzz for you.

Ben Sutherland:

Nice.

Gerard Dombroski:

Get it done, you're gonna hit up. Uh, some, you've got a few more competitions lined up that you want to think of entering well, I was about to just say I was about to get it like obviously like this is the you know the upcoming awards sort like program.

Sam Brown:

I think we're into the NZIA Awards again this year and again look internationally at stuff. I think it's. You know, once you sort of rip that Band-Aid off, you realize it's not as daunting as it seems, and why not? You know what's the worst thing that can happen. People just say, oh no, we don't really like it, and you go okay, cool, it's fine. Moving on, um, but I think beyond I was gonna say I think beyond the awards sort of chat and kind of more focusing on the international thing. Um, gerard, you sort of just mentioned that that word competition, I think that's something that we neglect in new zealand and I think that's sort of where I want to try and lead. The conversation now is like where's competition?

Gerard Dombroski:

yeah, there are no competitions I have like. The only competitions I generally seem to find are like ideas, competitions, but in europe it seems to be like a pretty big model just for procurement yeah, totally.

Sam Brown:

You think, like every big civic, public, commercial building is all generally like procured through a competition format and what I really like about that is variation. You know you're not having the same three or four architecture firms that get every one of the big civic or public projects and they all end up looking pretty generic and similar, where you end up with a super diverse. You know landscape and, speaking the design awards, like they were held in london and london's a perfect example of like how diverse that architectural landscape is and it's not like they went out and went okay, you know, here you go, you can have um, here you go, renzo piano, you can have the shard, or you know, this is, this is for you like it was run through competition and so you get something that's like insane but, otherwise, you know, probably wouldn't have been developed.

Sam Brown:

You know, come out of that process.

Ben Sutherland:

Yeah, man they must spend a lot of time, you know, just working on competitions and a lot of unbillable hours and that sort of thing, until you kind of finally win one, so like, although it sounds all glamorous and must also be a huge burden for them yeah, risk reward, like if you're going to play the game yeah, but what if you're just like not? Is there such a thing as a competition architect?

Sam Brown:

well, we like you just know how to play the game better than everyone zaha was that yeah, it was that you know a lot of these like huge architecture firms now started out as paper architects. You know like they survived in the competition realm until they won that one. You know I god knows how they survived through those periods.

Sam Brown:

I'd love to see that business model, but you know they did I don't think there was a business model and then you know, you get that one commission and then you're away laughing, you know, but at least, like that whole time, you're being like creative, you're being forced to think. You know, think creatively, um, because that's what competitions do. Is they really push the barrier of the norm, which, which I like- yeah, I wonder why they don't do it in New Zealand.

Ben Sutherland:

Then there's definitely like a preferred contractor mentality here, isn't there?

Sam Brown:

Probably a time cost thing, maybe I don't know.

Ben Sutherland:

I've done a couple with Chris Moller before years and years, while I was at uni actually and they were actually really cool. They were down in Christchurch, well, but one was down in christ church, one was overseas um, a lot of fun. But yeah, you do, it's like get through to concept and to develop design.

Gerard Dombroski:

you know you like there's a lot of work and hours put into yeah, the project I'm working on was I don know maybe it was a little cheeky bizarre in that to tender you did a concept design. So I think a bunch of architecture firms around New Zealand did a concept design for this project up in Coromandel that I managed to pull them off, so I won that one.

Sam Brown:

Nice.

Ben Sutherland:

Yeah, is it about who's got the best render, do you?

Sam Brown:

know what's funny about that, ben is we? We did that. Oh sorry. What's funny about that, gerard is? We did that for a project down in in wanaka and johnny talked about it in his professional conversation for his registration he got slapped on the wrist big time.

Ben Sutherland:

Oh.

Sam Brown:

The NZRIB examiners being like you shouldn't work for free, blah, blah, blah, blah blah, and I was sort of like well, what are we?

Ben Sutherland:

going to do the rest of the time.

Sam Brown:

You know and like it's the whole thing about being properly remunerated and all that sort of jazz and we're like well, but then how else are you getting work?

Gerard Dombroski:

You know, but then how else are you getting work?

Sam Brown:

Survive jobs instead. Yeah, I mean, I think that maybe the reason that it doesn't. Maybe the reason that we don't have the culture in here is because it's been sort of like tamped down by the powers that be.

Gerard Dombroski:

Yeah, I think there is that big undertone of fear of risk or undervaluing, but man, the potential in that form of procurement is huge, I think maybe there's a fear of his career maybe there's a big fear.

Sam Brown:

I know, I see this actually a lot in new zealand there's a big fear of stolen ip. You know, particularly with some of the like bigger architecture firms are terrified of people taking their ideas, but but then Buildings look the same, so it's like yeah, and then you go on like QLDC e-docs, where they have every single building consent available and like take your pick out of details, you know.

Ben Sutherland:

I think, realistically, though, it's the same problem that it always is and it probably comes down to, you know, liability. Everything's about liability. It seems to be in this country, like if you're just like starting out a small firm and you win a competition for a big building, there's just huge risk involved. And like, why would, for example, the government you know they're really big on like making sure that whoever's involved is up to the task. So I don't know. I think it comes down to that really, at the end of the day.

Gerard Dombroski:

I think there's really easy ways around that. I think you just get paired with a big office or something and you're like design lead or something.

Ben Sutherland:

Because yeah yeah, but what happens if it? If it kind of just falls through like who picks up the slack, then you know, if one person can't do it, does it filter down to the next, the second best project. Like how does that work? Does it just keep going down the list?

Sam Brown:

I think this is the problem, ben. You're thinking too much about it. They should just run them, just let the let people come be creative, come up with good ideas and then sort out all the boring bullshit later you could let's say I'm certainly.

Gerard Dombroski:

You did a month of pre-labour and put a MENA's concept in and you managed to win. I think you would be pretty motivated to make that work and then follow through on the project.

Sam Brown:

And equally, I think as well, gerard, if you didn't like, we put together a big tender package last year with a build partner for some government work and yeah again, we probably spent like six weeks full-time, three people, working on this thing and you know we developed six housing prototypes. That was part of this package. We didn't win the tender. I actually don't know who. They never announced who did win it, but that work's not lost. You know you still hold that IP and we've then, you know, been able to, like, take those designs and implement them elsewhere. So I don't think you need to look at it. You know the fear of it being like lost work or lost time or whatever. I think you'd look at it as opportunity, because it's giving you a framework to think, like, think creatively with a brief that you might not have otherwise had access to, and then you can just use those ideas somewhere else.

Gerard Dombroski:

Yeah, that goes back to some of our design conversations. I'm a big believer that design is like a muscle, so the more you use it, the better you're going to get. So, yeah, you definitely don't lose in that regard. Just financially.

Ben Sutherland:

You do get the opportunity to like submit proposals for a lot of jobs here, so what's the difference?

Sam Brown:

a lot of them don't involve design, though just do a design.

Ben Sutherland:

Then, hey, you want to stand out just and you're willing to work for free. Just do a design. You'll never regret the job.

Gerard Dombroski:

Yeah, just give me some building and set dogs, or something.

Ben Sutherland:

Hey, you're making fun of me now because of that suggestion, but that's what a competition is.

Sam Brown:

It's a fair point, ben, but I think also we're talking in the realms of government work, right, you know, like big public or civic work. But I think there should be the capacity for competition elsewhere as well, like from a residential point of view, like if you're particularly if you're a, you know, a high, you know, budget, money, budget client. I'd be looking at getting you know a high, you know, budget, money, budget client. I'd be looking at getting you know architects to put in like design competition ideas. You just don't really, and that may exist. Maybe we're just too small to you know, to be exposed to that, but I'd be cool if it was like, you know, if there was the capacity for that a little bit more throughout architecture, rather than just looking at that like government or civic or commercial work you know there was the capacity for that a little bit more throughout architecture, rather than just looking at that like government or civic or commercial work.

Gerard Dombroski:

you know, yeah, a lot of people won't like that idea, but at the same time, we always ask builders to do you know, three weeks of quoting to win a job. What's the worst of? You can put a couple of scribbles to a page along with a fee proposal for a client.

Sam Brown:

Exactly. That doesn't have to be. I mean, like we're all, we're classic, like over workers, right, you know, we're always going to deliver more than what's asked. That we like. Can you like draw a napkin sketch and we'll provide like fucking details and one-to-one full plans and like a scale model and like all of these renders and fly-throughs and shit, um, but you know, that's well, that's on us but like, if there was a thing, though, would you actually do it?

Ben Sutherland:

like? I'm not sure I would. I probably wouldn't. I probably would if it was in another country, but I probably wouldn't here I'd be like, why, why not here? Just because I, like, I want to get paid for my work.

Sam Brown:

But why would you not? Why would you do it? And internationally though?

Ben Sutherland:

because it's a. It's a removes that entrance into the market, right, it's like a removing that barrier to entry. So you, you actually have like market penetration yeah, gives you an in, yeah whereas here it's like you're already doing it. You just, you know, I don't know, that's just my thought anyway. I probably wouldn't. Maybe if it was like really cool and interesting, you'd do it for fun you could write in your proposal that you're submitting that.

Gerard Dombroski:

Oh, if you take this, you're always mixing up for the concept or whatever.

Sam Brown:

So then they'd have to like it that much to pay for the, the concept but equally like from a client perspective, like if there's prospective clients out there that are listening to this and thinking, oh, this actually sounds kind of like an interesting idea. What's the harm in fronting, you know, a few thousand dollars to run a competition, sort of paying everybody for their time and just like gaining a breadth of ideas? You know, because when you engage an architect directly one-on-one, you know like we're hiring, you know, try a Dombrowski workshop or whatever. You're going to get a concept that you develop right and you might get one or two, but you're not going to get like four or five, so you're not going to see a four or five, so you're not going to, you're not going to see a big range. You know what I mean. But if you say, okay, speak, we're going to front like five grand or something, um, to run this competition, everybody that enters, you know you'll get remunerated.

Sam Brown:

You're five people to enter. You remunerated a thousand bucks for your little concept whatever or just the winner gets five grand yeah, but no, the winner gets the job and five grand for their concept but then, like everybody else, you know you, what you've got out of that is, you've got this like huge spectrum of different design ideas that you can then cherry pick maybe not cherry pick elements, but you can like pick the one that you like the most and you might find a solution that you never even thought about.

Gerard Dombroski:

So I reckon that's just like an interesting mechanism for for gaining more sort of design breadth, um, at the concept stage as well yeah, and probably allows more architects to compete for work, because, yeah, yeah, I don't know, it kind of democratizes it a bit, doesn't it? Yeah, I think that's one thing that I just have much more of the agreement on how you, whether you feel like you're getting remunerated or if it's too much for you yeah, and you've done this really well, gerard.

Sam Brown:

But it's something that I struggle with is like, as a small architecture firm or as a small player, it's very hard to get a look in for like bigger contracts or larger jobs or even government work. You've done that really well. I'd be interested to know how you've gone about that. But generally speaking, those of us that are like sole practitioners or have a smaller firm, it's a very, very like hard barrier to entry to get into doing that like larger scale work.

Gerard Dombroski:

Incredibly hard because, especially in New Zealand, people want to see like a similar building before they'll trust you with yeah, trust.

Ben Sutherland:

I think that's I don't know the trust part is probably the key there. But like there's other ways you can gain trust, like networking, for example, like actually spending the key there. But there's other ways you can gain trust, like networking, for example, like actually spending the time to get out there and meet the people.

Gerard Dombroski:

Getting out there and shooting some holes on the golf course.

Ben Sutherland:

So yeah, I'm not convinced. I think yeah, definitely for international and fun stuff, but I don't know if I'd do it for, like, a residential house. I just don't think there's enough in it. Yeah.

Gerard Dombroski:

It was a small, relatively uninteresting project, I think.

Ben Sutherland:

It would have to be cool and like. If it was like some sort of exhibition project, then for sure, but like, surely they already exist.

Sam Brown:

Yeah, well, to a degree I mean like think back to, to you know, the, the papa days when they ran a big international competition for that and ultimately it went to a new zealand firm, um, and you know, at the time they did a good job.

Ben Sutherland:

but, like the, what, what could nice?

Sam Brown:

slip that in there, just trying to, just trying to not incriminate myself yeah, why don't you tell us what you really think?

Sam Brown:

I guess what I'm getting at is if we continue to do that and we sort of have a little bit like with the cardboard cathedral and a little bit um with scott base rip, but, um, you know, being able to bring international talent into new zealand, you know, really helps everybody in the country as well because it opens up our exposure. This is going back to the conversation at the top of the pod about, you know, the design awards and having that, you know, being exposed to that international realm of design and architecture. Like, I feel like we're quite closeted and insular here because we're so far away from the rest of the world and we don't have that international talent coming here to ply their wares, you know yeah, the only talent is um our year at uni, apparently.

Gerard Dombroski:

Oh yeah the golden year. There was that recent um housing competition in australia, I think didn't yeah that um spacecraft spacecraft did really well, yeah, that was cool.

Ben Sutherland:

I really like their project too.

Gerard Dombroski:

I think I think that was the one me and Chloe actually competed in. That was quite a long time ago now, I think. Yeah, that was a little too out there, I think.

Sam Brown:

So, gerard, you've mentioned a few competitions now already, but where are you Because that's another thing that I've really struggled with Outside of bigger pie-in-the-sky idea competitions hosted by the likes of, like bildner, who seem to be like the international standard for design competitions, but like, where are you finding these comps? And like, where are you finding information about them?

Gerard Dombroski:

yeah, I did one a long time ago. One of those I think it was something like bildner um, which is like a chapel in Rwanda If you scroll back far enough on my Instagram there's like some little malls like that but I only got halfway through it and then I realized it was like an ideas competition. I was like, oh man, but I was in too deep at that point. So from there on I kind of only really wanted to go into projects that had I don't that had a building outcome.

Gerard Dombroski:

The Australian one I found through a good mate, chingy, who is here above us in architecture school. He lives in Melbourne, he's an architect but project manager now as well, so he found that one. So it was me, chloe and him that worked on that one. And then the Coromandel one was actually just through driving creek, so it was, I guess, through that little piccolo, and then one of the guys who was running driving creek at the time just invited me to it. So that was like a big invite tender. Yeah, with a lot of more north island, hamilton, auckland architects, but I think those are the only ones. So I've one real one and one lost, one lost one. But yeah, always want to sort of I don't know, go into that sort of work, because that's where I thrive.

Sam Brown:

I think I thrive on a design competition yeah, I think, just having that freedom right like and and the pressure a little bit as well, do you reckon that helps?

Gerard Dombroski:

yeah, yeah, yeah, like, and then, like you're forced to come up with something really interesting. I don't know you. You're sometimes where, maybe a little conservative with a client that is your client and whereas if they're not your client you're willing to take a few more risks, but then in the hope that it stands out amongst a few and gets a bit of attention. But yeah, sometimes that works, I think. Yeah.

Sam Brown:

I totally know what you mean and we did a couple of years ago. We did one of those build-no-competitions. It was for, like, toilet solutions, portable toilet solutions for Everest Base Camp, and we got an honorable mention for that, which was really cool, like a concept one, just a competition competition. But I guess what I'm getting at there is like you're right about that. It makes you do something that you'd never, ever think about because, like, if you would, if somebody came to you and said, I want you to design a toilet for everest base camp, you'd probably come up with a very practical, very like sensible, very like realistic because it has to be real at that point anyway Solution.

Sam Brown:

But that constrains you, whereas this, because it was just an ideas thing. You're just throwing shit left, right and center and some of the concepts and solutions were absolutely incredible, but there was also reality to them as well. I could have seen any one of those sort of honorable mentions up to the winners being really being built and I think, like you're right about it, when it being like a one-on-one client thing, you feel a little bit like conservative. Like breaking that shackle off is a great way to like produce better and more varied design as well yeah, I think you get some incredibly interesting things out of projects.

Gerard Dombroski:

Yeah, I think the I don't know if you did 25 years, say, of all public buildings as competitions, you'd get a pretty interesting city at the end of that.

Sam Brown:

Oh man, imagine how cool New Zealand would look, rather than everything just being like a carbon copy of the next one.

Ben Sutherland:

Yeah, it would be pretty cool.

Sam Brown:

You know you think about some of those well, actually like Christchurch Town Hall.

Gerard Dombroski:

That was a competition Epic building, One of my favourites.

Ben Sutherland:

Yeah, it must push the innovation and creativity side a lot, I would imagine, because you know there's just a lot more minds working on one thing at once, so I guess that's a huge benefit of one for sure.

Sam Brown:

And I guess it also opens up that like phenomenon of parallel thinking as well. Right, you get lots of different minds working on one solution, solution, you're going to come up with a lot of like different high quality designs high quality, different ideas, but you're also likely to get like a lot of the same solutions which, in a way, validates if it's really good, validates that design as well and validates the designers.

Ben Sutherland:

So that's probably a really good way to like, uh, increase your brand awareness or your, you know, your, your personal um, your, for example, like you, gerard, get your name out there a little bit more. I guess, like that's a really good way to do it, especially if you're producing really good designs. You know, yeah, people will be looking there. There's a well.

Gerard Dombroski:

Brick Bay. Do you remember Declan? Declan, the last? Yeah, that's right, that's like probably the best one that they've done. And then, if I'm a bit critical, they've potentially turned into all the same project.

Ben Sutherland:

Yeah, I actually went there like a couple of weeks ago. It's still. It's still pretty cool though.

Sam Brown:

Is the Brick Bay Folly. That's a competition as well, though, right, yes, yeah.

Gerard Dombroski:

Sort of aimed at like early grades, yeah.

Sam Brown:

So there you go. There's another one.

Ben Sutherland:

I mean I'm just trying to like collect yeah and I guess, going back to the whole exposure thing, it's probably a good way to like find if you're like someone who's wanting or looking for designers, architects, et cetera it's a good way to like find someone with like a certain aesthetic that you're after or at least like gauge a whole bunch of people's work at one time. So there's definitely like some pros for sure.

Sam Brown:

Maybe we should run a design competition.

Ben Sutherland:

Yeah, what would we build? I don't know.

Sam Brown:

Did you guys do when we were at university? Did you guys do the 24-hour design comp that me and Hamish McLaughlin ran.

Ben Sutherland:

Yeah, we won it oh did you guys win it? Nice yeah, Ambrose as well.

Sam Brown:

What was your idea?

Ben Sutherland:

We had the data center in the middle of the harbor.

Sam Brown:

Ah, yeah.

Ben Sutherland:

It was an awesome data tower. That was sick, that was fun.

Sam Brown:

So I mean, I've got the framework sitting there me and Hamish will somewhere have the framework for running the design competition. But that was epic, and I think that's something that universities I actually don't know if they even still do them. I doubt it probably, but that culture of competition was so cool at university. You kind of have 24 hours, you get minds in one room. It's a buzz. It's free coffee.

Ben Sutherland:

Yeah, it is fun.

Sam Brown:

A party at the end of it. It's such a great time should have that we should have the same thing.

Ben Sutherland:

you know, we should have the same thing in the professional realm as well I definitely try and recreate that at throughout like concept phase for sure, like when you're like bringing everyone together and just like pump out a whole bunch of ideas and see what works best off the bat. I remember how fun that was on that design competition, so highly recommend doing one of those for sure.

Sam Brown:

And lack of sleep. Too much caffeine the creative juices are just flying.

Ben Sutherland:

Yeah, we just need to find someone. So if there's anyone out there who wants something built, we just need to find someone.

Gerard Dombroski:

So if there's, anyone out there who wants something built. Well, at Driving Creek we want to do more cabins, like more piccolos on the hill, so there's definitely an idea being floated. Friend Laurie keeps pushing on for like a residency again, but it's very low funding, so it's more of the same sort of stuff and I don't think you'll find many people that want to do that sort of thing for free or for very low money.

Sam Brown:

But the opportunities are out there.

Ben Sutherland:

It depends on the incentive, right, like, if there's not like a financial or like a built product incentive, then there needs to be like a brand, like an awareness, I don't know, like a publication or yeah, something like that, you know.

Gerard Dombroski:

Like if that was properly advertised and thought about more, like you could find funding and like that You'd find a magazine to pop that out.

Ben Sutherland:

Yeah, you'd have to find the magazine and then bring it all together.

Sam Brown:

The problem with magazines, though, is they're not open to the whole public. I reckon this is where the new zealand news media falls down, is they don't support architecture at all. They don't even really recognize it as being a profession to support, whereas it is inherent in everybody's day-to-day life, and I think it's actually like the news media, particularly newsprint media and online in New Zealand it's their responsibility to help, sort of like promote all this stuff.

Sam Brown:

You think about the NZIA Awards. They might get a small little bulletin, maybe even a one-pager or something on stuff. That's it. I've obviously got a bee in my bonnet about, like you know, having no recognition for the Dazeen Awards, although in saying that, is it Tequina's at the World Building Festival or something? There is a New Zealand building that's being like touted a little bit at the moment. It's at like the World Building Festival or something there's. There is a new zealand building that's being like touted a little bit at the moment. It's at like the world building festival or something like that. And I know the living pa is getting a lot of press, obviously because it is, um, you know it's past that living building challenge.

Gerard Dombroski:

But um auckland art museum won the world building of the year, like oh, 10 years ago I don't know, as we were, which is pretty like world building of the air or some metric. I'm not sure what that platform was, so we're doing some good stuff for sure it just needs to be talked about eh yeah, yeah, media, it's the giant failure of architecture for New Zealand. I mean, there's definitely a few people trying to push it, but, yeah, the major publications don't really need to do it. Show us some love.

Ben Sutherland:

Well, how?

Gerard Dombroski:

would you do it?

Ben Sutherland:

differently.

Gerard Dombroski:

It's the year.

Ben Sutherland:

If you had, like, if you were running Home Magazine, like, what would you do different? Because most of the content is good. Is it just how they're selling it? Maybe, like some people, just what's the hit?

Gerard Dombroski:

I just think this is more like a architect specific thing, like if I was running nzia or something and we had the budget for it. I'd just do little adverts like how long is an ad? 30 seconds or something we just do like a micro grand designs on, like one of the more recent epic homes New Zealand architects put together.

Sam Brown:

Yeah, think about, like you know well, think about like local project type things, or even what's their thing called kevin, who we talked to, what's their um show called what's their?

Ben Sutherland:

uh mara archie marathon yeah, archie marathon. Like their videos as well, yeah it's those little snippets yeah, yeah and then having them available speaking of which, I see they've posted an extra couple up there. Where were they?

Gerard Dombroski:

Yeah, they've been in Japan. No, there's a German one now which looks pretty interesting.

Ben Sutherland:

Nice, I think. Is it Holland? No, I'm not sure. I'll have to have a look again, but they look awesome.

Gerard Dombroski:

I saw on Instagram stories they were in some bathrooms in like China yesterday or something.

Sam Brown:

Nice.

Gerard Dombroski:

Some epic bathrooms. Yes, it's like a Richard Sierra sort of sculpture bathroom. Beautiful, china's got some good stuff.

Sam Brown:

Start competitions just for some nice public lows yeah.

Gerard Dombroski:

Yeah, I've used the Wellington waterfront. Dude, I love that they're going just as fun.

Ben Sutherland:

Quirky but weird yeah, and you get those outcomes from competition, that's oh yeah, so it is the netherlands and germany, and uh, june and july and they look pretty epic, I've got to say yeah, I think video is accessible to everyone, like and if you make it an interestingly enough video.

Gerard Dombroski:

Sometimes I think the local project videos are a little bit slow and if you're not into architecture you might find out pretty quickly.

Ben Sutherland:

But it was slightly more snappy if we got ice cube to narrate but just like diving a little bit deeper in what you guys are talking about, should it not be up to the own designer? I mean, designers do all that stuff all the time, right, like, do you make your own little snappy clips and, and, um you know, put together publication I just do one of hydroforming going fat and thin.

Gerard Dombroski:

We just have instagram stories, don't we? I think that's kind of what we have in our toolkit that's most accessible. I've got a couple youtube videos in edit, but I have never really finished and they're all like furniture based, because those are sort of short time frame project but like the the podcast from the end of last year. Listeners out there. There's a missing episode 18.

Ben Sutherland:

19.

Sam Brown:

Which is still in edit. Is it 19?

Gerard Dombroski:

I don't know Anyway it will come.

Sam Brown:

Eventually. There's a good one too.

Ben Sutherland:

It's a good one. Maybe we'll drop it at the end of this year see how much we've improved.

Sam Brown:

Oh good, good all right, all right then do we? Hate it or love it you've got.

Ben Sutherland:

I was gonna change my love it to tea puffer. Nah, because you know that sounds awesome. So, sam, to bother hate it or love it shit man, way to throw me under the bus. Hey, it's fine.

Sam Brown:

It's a personal opinion, it's totally fine I love it as an experience and I love what it um encompasses and what's inside it. Aesthetically, the building from the outside isn't my cup of tea.

Ben Sutherland:

Yeah, I think it's definitely like aged from the outside for sure, it's kind of like stuck in its oh I don't even know 90s or 2000s, I don't know what you'd call it. But uh, the inside. We did like a lot of um analysis on the inside of the building and I actually really, you know, quite enjoyed that, enjoyed the um, the double columns, yeah, yeah, no just like the journey around the place. Uh, so I'm on the fence probably more towards not to love it, unfortunately, but it's it's too literal as a museum.

Sam Brown:

It's too literal for me it's. I love it as a museum.

Gerard Dombroski:

I hate it as a building yeah, yeah, for how public the site is. It really does not interact with the surroundings.

Ben Sutherland:

Yeah, the wall representing the fault line that is yadda, yadda, yadda running in the same direction, and this representing that. It's just too literal for me. The design personally, but I get it.

Sam Brown:

I'll put a poll up on the ground and see what people say.

Ben Sutherland:

Hey, and get them to go visit while they're at it. Probably need some love.

Gerard Dombroski:

I do wonder how refined the big feather, how that would have looked, developed into a full building.

Sam Brown:

The Afield Gary. One, yeah, would have been interesting.

Gerard Dombroski:

Is that all three of them? F Field, Gary Thompson.

Sam Brown:

Yeah, might have been, yeah.

Ben Sutherland:

What about you, Gerard? Where do you sit?

Gerard Dombroski:

Well, yeah, it's a building, but it's definitely a lost opportunity. I mean, it's such a prominent site that it really should have interacted with all its surroundings a lot more.

Ben Sutherland:

Yeah, that's a good point as well. You've got the ocean right there.

Gerard Dombroski:

There's massive real, obvious potential there.

Sam Brown:

Is this our first Hater of Lovett consensus?

Ben Sutherland:

I guess, yeah, there you you go. Normally Sam's the odd one out. That's why we made him start this time, lovely, easy alright, guys, bloody good.

Sam Brown:

Well, we're back, better than ever. 2025. If anybody's got any suggestions or ideas that they'd like us to discuss, if anybody wants to come on have a pint chat, architecture and design with us, sing out, let us know. And equally, if anybody knows of any sponsorship opportunity to help us edit the podcast, because it's time consuming and expensive, uh, that'd be great. Uh. And equally, if anybody out there is an editor and wants to edit the podcast, then hit us up as well.

Ben Sutherland:

That would be ideal yeah yeah, nice, oh well, I'll see you in two weeks. Happy days, see you, boys, you later.

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Ben Sutherland

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Gerard Dombroski

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