APARTMENT 3B,
24 DOMAIN DRIVE, PARNELL.
KEY POINTS:
Look out Cameron Brewer: your job promoting the neighbourhoods of Newmarket and Parnell could be taken over by Mark and Debbie. Transplants from the North Shore more than four years ago, they have become extreme fans of living on this side of the bridge, on the edge of the city.
"We walk through the Domain every day, down to Newmarket and Parnell, and not just for the cafes, but for the everyday services that you need," says Mark. "On weekends, we'll even walk through the city and across to Ponsonby."
Another favourite walk is from their apartment on Domain Drive along Parnell Rd to St Stephens Ave, and down to the waterfront with its glorious views of Rangitoto. The cars barely get an outing.
The couple had decided to move into the city as their sons got older to be near university and the boys' activities.
They had looked at five apartments and, while Debbie had liked the design of one in Remuera, they wanted something closer to town.
As luck would have it, the same architectural designer was also working on a block right next to the Parnell tennis courts, and the couple were sold.
The apartment by Brian Cullen, of Paterson Cullen Associates, combines classical detailing - traditional skirtings and architraves, well-proportioned rooms - within a modern shell.
Debbie and Mark were particularly taken by the formal, informal living and master bedroom opening on to a covered loggia: perfect for Auckland's changeable weather, as it captures low winter sun but is sheltered in the summer.
Louvres control breezes and privacy, and the couple find they can leave the floor-to-ceiling glass doors open in all but the wildest weather. Picture windows frame the third floor's views of the trees on the Domain, tennis courts and floodlit museum building, with the Sky Tower in the background.
The rooms flow from the lift lobby and a proper internal lobby (a rarity in apartments) through the formal living room. Sliding walls can close this off from the kitchen and family room, or open it up for parties.
A warm colour scheme of creamy composite stone and milk-glass is the perfect backdrop to the couple's collection of sea-themed artworks: reminders of their former seaside life in Milford.
Because most of the owners moved into the apartment block together, they have created a ready-made community feeling, with the body-corporate Christmas party already a legend.
Residents regularly host friends to dinner before strolling over to the summer concerts in the park or a ramble around the sculpture walks.
The building's detailing and the classic entry and formal gardens (meticulously maintained by a weekly gardener) give the low-rise block the air of a much older, gracious mansion block.
Cullen also paid attention to that usual bugbear of apartments, a lack of storage, by detailing extra pantry cupboards in the casual dining room, large closets in the three bedrooms (one of which is a light-filled office) and a generous walk-in wardrobe in the master bedroom.
Generous storage lockers by the three-car garaging mop up any of the extras for the family and their now-grown sons.
But with their business sold and younger son about to graduate, the family have decided it is time to do an extended OE.
They are packing up their belongings and heading first to Antarctica, then South America and onwards, no doubt still singing the praises of their favourite corner of Auckland.
