Pakuranga Children’s Health Camp

Client:
Te Puna Whaiora Children’s Health Camp

Location:
Tāmaki Makaurau Auckland

Completion:
2003

Size:
5,000m²

Project Value:
$4.5m

Contact:
Patrick Clifford

The Pakuranga Children’s Health Camp is one of seven health camps throughout New Zealand. The Camp mission rests upon improving child and family/whanau health through the provision of residential and community based services.

The facilities required included a school, a residential and recreation building for children, accommodation for parents, and an administration building. In responding to the brief three fundamental relationships had to be addressed; that of the buildings with their site, the buildings with each other, and the complex as a whole with its maritime suburban context. An overarching concern was to produce buildings that meet the needs of an institution without declaring themselves to be ‘institutional’ buildings.

The buildings were designed with low linear building forms that follow the site contours, with a central courtyard providing a pivotal link between the separate building elements.

The Camp is approached from above, its scale is comprehensible and its appearance is welcoming.

Children are encouraged to walk in and filter down the site, occupy its spaces and make them, for a few weeks, their own.

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