Heading South (again) for the ADNZ Masterclass

There's something about Invercargill. Maybe it's the long drive, maybe it's the people, but every time we head to the bottom of the South Island for the ADNZ Masterclass, we come home with more than we brought. This was the third time we've had the privilege of facilitating this workshop for Architectural Designers New Zealand, and somehow it gets richer each round.

The brief, on paper, is simple: spend the day with a room of fellow designers and talk about the craft. In practice, it becomes something far more interesting than a lecture. It becomes a conversation.

From a boy with a pencil to a practice

We always begin with the story, because the story is the point. Tony walks the room through his architectural design journey, right from the very first sketches he made as a young boy, long before any of it had a name or a career attached to it. That thread, from those early drawings through to establishing Imagine Architecture, runs straight into the way we work for and with every one of our clients today.

This is what we call our Design Philosophy, and it isn't a tagline. It's the accumulated result of decades of decisions, mistakes, and small revelations. Sharing where it came from helps the room understand that good design isn't handed down from on high. It's built, slowly, out of curiosity and care.

When the room starts talking

The best part of the day is the part we can't script. As Tony puts it: "What's really cool about this workshop is that we get a lot of feedback and it activates a response in the class and everyone starts to share their stories as well. And through those conversations we discover there are often parallels in the reasons why people do what they do and how they go about it."

That's the quiet magic of it. You put a handful of designers in a room, invite them to be honest about why they do this work, and the parallels start surfacing on their own. Different backgrounds, different regions, different paths, yet so many of the same motivations underneath. A wish to make spaces that genuinely improve how people live. A discomfort with mediocrity. A belief that a building can do more than shelter.

Why this matters back home

It's easy, in the day-to-day of running a practice, to stop articulating why you do what you do. You simply get on with it. A day like this forces the question back to the surface, and that's healthy. It's genuinely beneficial to articulate and share why we are architectural designers and how we achieve our designs, because clarity on the why sharpens everything that follows.

For us, that why has long been settled. We design high-performance buildings that transform lives. As a Certified Passive House Designer, Tony brings those principles into every project, whatever its size or budget, creating homes that are energy-efficient, comfortable, and built to last. The Masterclass is simply another place where that conviction gets tested, refined, and, happily, shared.

Come and have a chat

Tony travels the country often, and there's little he enjoys more than walking a new block of land or talking through the bones of a transformation. If you're starting to picture your ultimate home, give him a call or drop him an email directly. Bring the idea, he'll bring the sketch pad, and we'll see if there's a connection worth building on.