The David O. McKay Stake and Cultural Events Centre, developed for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints as part of the Temple View project, has won a gold Civic and Arts Property Award at the 2018 Commercial Project Awards.
Livingstone Building on site project manager Chris Haswell says the company is proud of what it has achieved, integrating structural elements into the architectural design.
“The thing for me on this project was the fact the structural component has an architectural finish,” he says.
“The building is made out of 423 precast concrete panels, which are generally used as a structural component then we go on to dress the rest of the building up with lovely facades of timber and steel. But these Monarc panels from Nauhria are a structural component and also an architecturally finished feature. It made the build very challenging because all the panels had to be installed perfectly.”
The 4000sqm multi-use community building has two distinct areas joined by a central courtyard. The Stake Centre houses where the Stake President, Bishops, and Clerks are on the ground floor, while the first floor has teaching rooms, a nursery, and parent’s rooms.
The Cultural Hall incorporates a large central area with basketball and volleyball courts on a strand woven bamboo sprung floor.
At the north end of the Cultural Hall, there is a chapel with the ability to seat more than 300 people.
The south end of the Cultural Hall is a multi-purpose area with a kitchen, and the west wing encompasses a Relief Society and Young Woman’s room. The project had a dedicated onsite team to help with its high-level demands.
The Livingstone project control group included a project manager, quantity surveyor, junior quantity surveyor, site manager, and site staff to manage the day to day operations of the project, and mitigated risk through working together. “Livingstone is a great believer in creating a team environment,” Chris says.
“And through holding meetings with the site team, architects and engineers, we all were able to work together to achieve an award-winning end result.
“From the site team’s perspective, they were all aware of the importance of what we were doing. We weren’t just building a building, we were building
a statement. We were building a landmark which was years in the planning, and there is not another Stake Centre in the world like this one.”
The building’s design reflects the church’s uses and is also appropriate to the religion.
The underlying idea was one of permanence which like a religion, is a rock in society and a trusted element. “The history of the area was brought into the design,” Chris says.
“The building has five parts and is designed to look like square boxes down the road side, resembling the teachers’ houses from the historic Church College of NZ which used to be on site. That’s the sort of detail they went into.”
The David O. McKay Stake and Cultural Events Centre is a part of the wider Temple View Project, with the Livingstone team also completing upgrades to the historically listed GRB Building and Kai Hall.
This article was brought to you in association with the following businesses…
- ABBAS
- F B Hall & Co Ltd
- Fernlea Cabinetry & Joinery
- Australasian Audio Engineering (NZ) Ltd.
