What to do with a large block of land, overlooking the river and minutes from the CBD but encumbered with an old chemical testing laboratory and a structurally frail historic building¹ from when horses dominated the high street?

It would be reasonable to assume complete demolition of the science lab and a bun fight over the fate of the heritage building. In the hands of Stark Property and Edwards White Architects, however, the former Hills Laboratory has been transformed into Hills Residences, a high-end apartment building for Kirikiriroa Hamilton’s budding inner urbanites.

Making the most of a sweet spot on the eastern bank of Waikato Te Awa, alongside restaurant studded Grey Street and adjacent Victoria Bridge into the city, Hills Residences is part of a bigger master plan — Hills Village — that includes two commercial premises, another apartment building and terraced townhouses. It’s also part of a broader vision to turn the city to the river, something that the Stark and Edwards White combo has been pushing for a while. Hills Residences gives a taste of what this reorientation could be for a city that’s only just beginning to find its own place and story. Leaning into a southern bend of the river and framing views of its dense treescape, the architecture ascribes to a (re)fresh(ed) way of seeing Kirikiriroa: one that honours Waikato Te Awa and centres its presence at the heart of growth, community and cultivation.

I visit the building on a sunny day in December, chaining my bicycle to a convenient tree due to a lack of bike parks. For a design that just won the Sir Ian Athfield Award for Housing and a New Zealand Architecture Award on a sustainability ticket, it’s not immediately singing to me. I find the lead architect, Daniel Smith, who proceeds to struggle with the security lock on the back gate. He climbs the wall instead. You know you’ve got a good architect when they can scale a six-foot wall without blinking an eye. There’s something in the clothes — black casual with just a hint of stretch; ankle boots with steelcap. It speaks to an ability to move seamlessly from boardroom debates to the best of can-do creativity, and it is here that the true grit of this project begins to emerge. Smith himself seems a bit bemused by the accolades. “I think it’s hitting the right narrative at the right time at the moment, in terms of adaptive reuse, sustainability, like that’s a big push right now. Which is awesome, but yeah, maybe it just fits the bill.”

As self-deprecation is a national pastime, I take this assessment with a grain of salt. It becomes clear that environmental sustainability was a key part of decision-making as Smith leads me through the design. The 1970s’ science lab was a four-storey pebbledash concrete box (pictured left) with slot windows on the short end walls and long spandrels along the northern and southern longitudinal façades. Initial optimism about the building’s ability to absorb a complex change of use was to prove, well, optimistic. The whole structure was, to use Smith’s technical term, “stuffed”. Inter-floor acoustic control was nonexistent, fire protection was from a different era, and the whole thing threatened to meander off down the steep slope to the Waikato River if given half a chance.

What followed was a labour of love (and safety): a retaining wall on the western boundary the depth of the river itself; new acoustic floor systems and fire separation; seismic strengthening to each end wall with new steel K bracing and floors reinforced with fibreglass strips to tie the whole system together. If the ability to visually expose and celebrate original raw concrete and steel was limited by these constraints, the project more than compensates in creative floor layouts, bespoke detailing and richness of materiality. The four storeys are reconstituted as 10 two-storey townhouses accessed at ground-floor level, plus nine apartments across the two upper floors comprising a range of sizes, outlooks and price points. In overall form, the two original end walls are retained while the long northern and southern façades are loosened up for change, bringing together a solidity of black brick cladding with lightly framed steel balconies and window detailing.

The balconies’ uneven distribution across the northern façade creates a sense of individuality in the collective, an impression that extends to the diverse townhouse gardens and interior design. The building is almost entirely owner-occupied, with keen future residents buying off the plans and able to customise their own fitouts. A French bulldog enthusiastically welcomes us in one back garden; a couple of kids’ scooters are lying around in the next. A profusion of potted plants and hanging baskets fills one balcony; another features deckchairs and a barbecue. It’s clear that a diverse range of residents are making this building their own, embracing a design that has the flexibility to accommodate them.

Then there’s the clever things that good architects are made of. Careful sunlight access diagrams to ensure that ground-floor townhouse gardens get continual northern light. ‘Snorkel’ bedrooms, where one room has a big northern aspect and the other snorkels out to it, creating a cunning little desk nook as a side effect. Attention to storage, flow and canny layouts that make each apartment feel generous and roomy even as 19 homes occupy less than half an acre of land.

Adaptive reuse. Tick. Density. Tick. Was there space to push the sustainability envelope further here? Some long-term environmental sustainability initiatives are built in — good design results in low energy consumption, all HVAC is centralised, as is hot water, which runs off a series of solar panels on the roof. Recycling and waste are collected communally. But there’s no space for composting food scraps or garden waste — is that Council obstacles on collectivised collection systems or is there an architecturally ‘clean’ aesthetic at play? And what about (sore point) bikes? In the deep recesses of the underground car park there’s a small bike stand but the dominant vibe is still cars first. In a city that was built in the motorway era, it can be hard to move the dial.

The end result emerges as a success story in adaptive reuse and density done well, and is rightly celebrated. But it also speaks to the difficulties in Aotearoa currently in achieving these critical aspirations. The financial burdens of committing to rehabilitation of existing built form are real, and are simply too much for many projects. Hills Residences succeeds due to the tenacity of Stark Property and to being part of a bigger master plan that softens the blow. How we make this easy — normal even — and build on these first steps is the big question.

Smith farewells me to join the body corp for celebratory drinks and I wander off to find my bike, passing that heritage building on the corner on the way. What’s happening with that old thing, I hear you ask. Its contemporary surroundings may be a far cry from its origins as the headquarters of the Waikato County Council, built in 1910 at a time when Hamilton was barely fighting off Cambridge for biggest regional settlement. But with a complete structural overhaul and new paint job it will be here for a while yet, linking Hills Village with older stories and speaking to continual change in a city that is just getting started. Just don’t rely on ‘camerated concrete’ for longevity.

References

^{1 The historic Waikato County Council building was built in 1910 with a recently patented aerated reinforced concrete called ‘camerated concrete’.}