Parnell chapel wins Los Angeles Architecture Award
The Bishop Selwyn Chapel in Parnell, designed by Fearon Hay, was given a top award at the Los Angeles Business Council Architecture Awards earlier in the year.
The design of the chapel features a glittering glass box and a grand, sloping gold roof; it provides a tangible link between two historic churches in Parnell.
The award was given in a tripartite category that came about from a collaboration of Auckland, Los Angeles and Guangzhou. The alliance aims to share knowledge of urban design and planning between the cities.
The Bishop Selwyn Chapel in Parnell won Auckland architecture firm Fearon Hay an award at the 2018 Los Angeles Business Council's Architecture Awards.
The award was given as part of a tripartite category that grew out of an alliance between Auckland, Los Angeles and Guangzhou. The alliance was established when Auckland hosted the Economic Tripartite Summit in 2016 and the GALA Design Alliance was established among the three cities.
Jeff Fearon and Tim Hay, directors of Fearon Hay, received the award earlier this year in Los Angeles at the Beverly Hilton Hotel. Jeff Fearon was honoured to represent New Zealand design and said, “The most exciting aspect was the nature of the awards and the opportunity to participate alongside the architectural community in Los Angeles, which is notoriously difficult to do from New Zealand.”
The aim of the GALA Design Alliance is to share knowledge of urban design, sustainability and smart city technology from each of the cities to strengthen them all. The alliance now includes three parties, one from each city: the Tāmaki Makaurau (Auckland) Design Alliance (TMDA), the Guangzhou Urban Planning and Design Survey Research Institute (GZPI) and the Los Angeles Business Council (LABC). Several exchanges have been organised including the TMDA hosting three interns from Guangzhou and Los Angeles for three months this year.
Henry Crothers, landscape architect and urban designer and chair of the TMDA, attended the awards ceremony in Los Angeles. He said, “The win works across several layers. It supports the emerging strategic relationship between our partner cities, enables the sharing of information about urbanism, city making and good design and creates opportunities for future collaboration and interaction with Auckland designers.”
Cathy Veninga, CEO of the Designers Institute of New Zealand – which is a member of the GALA Design Alliance – also attended the LABC awards and said, “The chief value of Fearon Hay’s win and our attendance at the awards is to showcase New Zealand and Auckland design to a global audience. The audience at the awards was a very powerful group so it was really useful for relationship building and it also marked another significant step in the strategic alliance between our cities.”
