Why it’s time for architects to get hands-on with energy modelling, airtightness, and real building performance.

During the design stage it is important to specify a drainage system that caters to the activity of the facility, allows for the desired layout and delivers reliable performance.

Clause E2 of the New Zealand Building Code, called 'External Moisture,' helps make sure buildings stay dry, safe, and healthy. It’s especially important for restricted building work (RBW) where following moisture rules is legally required. 

Not having a building consent has been a key theme in complaints to the Building Practitioners Board recently. This is the first in a series of articles looking at recurring reasons for complaints about LBPs.

Are tenders the best way of selecting your build partner? Are you going to accept the lowest tender? Does the lowest price ever deliver the best outcome?

When detailing channel drainage be it in a domestic driveway or in a public thoroughfare, load ratings will be important along with other aspects such as slip resistance and hydraulic performance.

Yet again there have been record rainfalls in the country with devastating outcomes for the local inhabitants and their livelihoods.

The Post Editorial published in THE POST of Saturday, July 12 2025, referred to:

‘… The Independent Reference Group on Climate Adaption released a framework this week. While not government policy, it was commissioned by the Ministry for the Environment. It said our unpreparedness for climate change is leading to “larger and more frequent recovery costs, unmanaged financial strain, and disproportionate impact on some groups.”…’

The EBOSS 2025 Builder Sentiment Report, funded by the BRANZ Building Research Levy, brings together significant data from a June survey of 431 New Zealand builders. The data reveals that New Zealand’s construction sector remains under significant pressure, however, many builders are adapting to the realities of a weaker market, and a looming skills shortage is set to create new opportunities for apprentices as the industry recovers.

Professor Anthony Hōete shares three recommendations from ModelDocs — a BRANZ funded research programme that delves into NZ’s building consent process to seek behavioural transformation.

What can LBPs, architects and BCOs do better to reduce consenting timeframes?

In my opinion it is only by analysing Terrace and Apartment housing developments with the use of Dynamic Simulation computational modelling processes that an objective evaluation can be made of the potential for passive summer over-heating to occur in the most likely vulnerable units.