Freemans Bay School, re-designed and renewed by RTA Studio led by architect Moshin Mussa, is the overall winner of the Nightingale Award at the 2018 Resene Total Colour Awards.

The RTA Studio team have chosen groupings of colour to reference Māori culture and the school’s proud multi-cultural heritage. Moshin Mussa says: “The cladding panels are painted in rich and vibrant colours to encompass the school’s diverse cultural community and the children’s different ethnic backgrounds.”

He says blue Resene paint colours are used on the Whānau Ata Library to express the sea. Greens are used for the admin building to reference the forest. An orange palette is used for the Learning House for sunrise and reds are used for the school hall to reference the earth.

Mussa says: "Colour is a relatively cost-effective way to bring a project to life. We used colour to characterise the school’s identity and also to enhance the architecture. Resene paint colours were selected as they best represented our conceptual design ideas. They proved to be exactly what the school was after and we’ve had numerous comments from visitors and from community members on how striking the colours are.”

Resene has a long history of colour and today's colour range of thousands of hues is a far cry from the handful that was available when Resene started 72 years ago. The Resene Total Colour Awards were launched to encourage and celebrate excellent and creative use of colour; to showcase striking colour palettes and combinations and provide fresh inspiration.