State Block

St Paul St Gallery, Auckland, 2016

Symonds St Flats, one block away from St Paul St, were designed by Frederich Neumann (Fred Newman) and built between 1945 and 1947. 

Devoid of decoration, and with a distinctive concave façade, the Symonds Street Flats represent a transplant of International Style modernism to Auckland. Neumann was one of a handful of European émigré architects that came to New Zealand in the 1930s and 1940s. Many of them found employment with the Department of Housing Construction, and brought with them the architecture and urban visions of Le Corbusier and The Bauhaus. They believed in the power of architecture to transform society. 

Rendering the floorplan of the Symonds St Flats in remnant carpet, Kirsty Lillico’s work destabilises the ubiquitous hard-edged lines of International Style Modernism with questions of livability, affordability, and long-term homes.