This is not Tuscany, warn architects

By KATHERINE HOBY

New Zealand's "wild climate" is too much for the flat-roofed, Mediterranean-style houses favoured by its residents, senior lecturers at Unitec say.

The Herald has been spotlighting issues such as changing house design in its coverage of the "leaky building crisis", which could cost $1 billion to put right.

Other causes include shoddy workmanship, untreated timber (which rots more easily), declining building standards and the replacement of weatherboard and brick with new claddings.

Sources have told the Herald that as many as one in ten new homes - 2000 of the 20,000 built each year - are at risk of leaking.

They say dozens of large developments built in the past five to ten years, some containing 100 units or more, have serious problems.

In the past decade, the Mediterranean style of house - sporting no eaves, flat roofs and floor-level decks and balconies - has taken off.

New Zealanders were fairly consistent in house design up until the 1980s, favouring houses with pitched roofs and eaves to keep out the rain. Chris Murphy, a senior lecturer at the school of architecture at Unitec, says the Mediterranean style is wrong for the climate.

"They get very little rain somewhere like the Greek Islands. Here we get horizontal or even uphill rain," he said.

Without the protection of eaves, rain was more able to lash the top joins of the roof and wall.

Mr Murphy says modern features, such as balconies straight out from bedrooms, must be well designed and detailed.

"There is much less room for error," he said.

John Sutherland, professor of architecture at Unitec, says Mediterranean and Tuscan-style houses constructed here generally have much thinner walls. One of the problems was with external balconies.

"They used to be outside the edge of the building. They're very difficult to get right when they're over top of another room."

Those balconies often had poor drainage and held water.

Mr Sutherland said he was not sure how to solve the construction problems.

"But I do know this: everybody in the industry has to up their act. There are still members of the industry in denial about this."

New Zealand Institute of Architects president John Sinclair says that having a good architectural design up front is a good investment.

He believed lack of professional involvement was to blame, rather than any single fault in materials, design or workmanship.

"The critical factor here is lack of professional detailing and supervision."

* A report yesterday on a North Shore home suffering serious mould problems incorrectly stated that the development had been built by Lonestar Construction - and that Lonestar Construction had since gone into liquidation.

The company involved with these buildings was Lonestar Builders and Contractors Ltd. Lonestar Construction Ltd had no involvement with the homes referred to. The Herald regrets any embarrassment or inconvenience caused to Lonestar Construction Ltd.