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Reconstructing a new two-level studio in place of the standalone garage allowed Divya and Nakul each to have their own workspace. Nakul's garage is below, with Divya's photography studio located above.

Framing the lightwell with a custom poplar wood screen painted white introduces a subtle modern texture throughout the home. The breakfast nook is anchored by a table from Nadeau and a set of wishbone chairs from Rove Concepts.

Relocating the ground floor landing helped concentrate the stairwell to a smaller footprint, and opened up more space in the downstairs rooms.

In the primary bath, custom oak cabinetry sits below wall sconces from Allied Maker. The freestanding tub is from Barclay and the tile is LaNova.

In the family room, a new set of French doors opens to a small terrace. An antique Indian coffee table is paired with chairs from Lulu and Georgia and 1st Dibs and a Charlotte Perriand wood side table.

The architects worked together with Divya to make interior furnishing selections. "My parents used to own a showroom here in Houston where they would import antique furniture from India,

The lower terrace, which features a hot tub, is farther down the hill to immerse its users in the landscape.

"At Tara Iti, south of the Mangawhai Heads, a former pine plantation is gradually being restored to native habitat on the windy coastal sand dunes. On a site overlooking the world-renowned golf course is the Dune House, designed by architect Julian Guthrie as a retreat for a family with four children. The clients had holidayed in Palm Springs, a city noted for golf, mid-century modern design and a California desert climate—all of which factored into the brief for an expansive yet relaxed house at Tara Iti."

"The 1970s houses of Whangamatā were the design source for this new beach bach—the simple gables, lean-tos, decks and yards. ‘The clients and I walked the neighbourhood to have a look at the existing character,’ says architect Paul Clarke. ‘They wanted to build sympathetically in the form and size of the building, so we’ve reused elements we know well, but combined them in a new way to put together something different.’"

"Set in splendid isolation in a small, surf-battered bay on the north coast of Horomaka Banks Peninsula, this rustic style dwelling is luxury accommodation at Annandale, a 4000-hectare beef and sheep farm. The bay is nature in the raw. Seals and penguins frequent the dense kelp beds offshore, whales and dolphins travel the coastline, and piled on the beach are tangles of bleaching driftwood. Faced with such an uncompromising location, architect Andrew Patterson eschewed a modern or abstracted path—which, he reasons, 'would have fought the timeless nature of the bay’—in favour of a rural vernacular form, albeit on a monumental scale.