This mixed-use office and retail development completes the Westgate Town Centre on Auckland’s northwestern fringe.
The key challenge was providing a varied composition of forms and façades to break down the extensive massing of a long street frontage, while also integrating tenant fit-outs with existing landscaping and adjacent tenancies.
The development is set out as a traditional strip extending along ‘Main Street,’ and punctuated with a public square that includes landscape design prepared by others on behalf of Auckland City Council. The buildings are comprise ground floor retail and first floor office units, with building fronts facing the street and footpath canopies along the full frontage.
Façades are of a uniform height with some stepping at canopy and parapet level, to reflect the fall of the land and to break up the length. Fragmentation of façades has been articulated by varying the window module, the façade material and colour, along with the layering of applied shading devices such as fins or mesh screens.
The massing and composition is a deliberate response to the preceding commercial development on the opposite site of Maki Street, in order to produce a coherent urban fabric. Street canopy detailing is consistent around the project, as a linking element between façade types. Individual tenant signage is provided as a limited typology with variation catered for in the individual graphics.
To emphasise the entry to the town square, the corner buildings have been articulated with vertical elements. Entry canopies have been glazed over the relevant section to emphasise individual buildings. Vertical signage aligns with the entry itself and extends full height above the glass canopy, as a layered element that’s fixed over the concrete façade panels.
The resulting streetscape is varied and meets tenants’ requirements for individuality, while also producing a cohesive streetscape.