The house that Ath built
Recently, I was lucky enough to be given a private tour of the site of Ian Athfield’s home.
Athfield, a New Zealand architect, became famous for unusual houses out of step with mainstream styles.
The home he built for himself, begun in the 1960s, grew to a huge complex on the side of the hills above Wellington.
When he died in 2015 the funeral was held there. His wife still lives in the house, and his architecture practice remains based on site. The complex still isn’t finished.
Architect Athfield (1977) provides a great run-down of Athfield’s early houses, as well as highlighting one of the more bizarre episodes in his career — winning an international competition to to house 140,000 people in the Philippines. https://www.nzonscreen.com/title/architect-athfield-1977
The Elegant Shed: The Extroverts (1984) situates Athfield historically and amongst his contemporaries, suggesting he and Robert Walker prefigured postmodernism. Somehow the Athfield being interviewed feels quite different to that of 1977. https://www.nzonscreen.com/title/the-elegant-shed-the-extroverts1984.
