Supreme building award won for ground-breaking project

Jeff Vivian, project manager for Arrow International, together with the late Ivan Mercep of Jasmax, scooped the GIB Supreme Award and the James Hardie Innovation Award at this year’s New Zealand Institute of Building (NZIOB) Awards for their work on Te Uru Taumatua, Tuhoe’s new $15 million headquarters in Taneatua, near Whakatane.

Te Uru Taumatua is New Zealand’s first ever Living Building, constructed under the stringent requirements of the Living Building Challenge (LBC), making it the most environmentally and socially sustainable building in New Zealand by a country mile. Not only is it the first of its kind in New Zealand, it’s also a world-first for its timber structure and seismic methodology and marks a new beginning for Tuhoe, which after a turbulent past is now leading the way in what is possible for New Zealand’s future.

Jeff and Ivan, together with Tuhoe developed the building’s design in a deeply collaborative and detailed process in order for it to meet the LBC guidelines. As well as LBC’s stringent requirements, Jeff also had to ensure that Tuhoe’s cultural requirements, sensitivities and social needs were taken into consideration on the build. Wherever possible local people, businesses and materials were employed, including using clay sourced from two culturally-significant sites for Tuhoe to make the earth-bricks used in the project; and wood sourced from the Te Ureweras.

"Jeff and the Arrow construction team have been proud to work alongside Tuhoe and the community of Taneatua to pull off this remarkable challenge,’’ says Mark Hopwood, CEO. "Jeff had to endure many personal sacrifices including being away from his young family for weeks on end to make sure this unique and amazing project met all of the expectations surrounding it. We are all extremely proud that Jeff’s received this recognition. It is well earned and well deserved and it puts Arrow at the forefront for more leading edge construction projects in the future."

Sadly Ivan, who was also key to this project’s success, passed away just prior to the opening of the new building. His son Simon attended the awards ceremony to accept the award on his behalf.

Other awards for Arrow

Jeff also won the Colorsteel $10-25 million Award for the Tuhoe project, while Samantha McGavock, Arrow’s Sustainability Manager won a Highly Commended Award under the Progressive Building Young Achiever category for the same project.

Robb Noble, a Project Manager for Arrow also picked up a Highly Commended Award in the Colorsteel $10-25 million category for his work on the IGC student accommodation project in Wellington. This $23.3 million design-build project was tendered early with very limited documentation and incorporated the concurrent refurbishment of three separate non-adjacent sites.

"Robb walked the sites five times a day, and kept connected with his team. His approach exemplified committed, hands-on, solution-focused leadership. We are also very proud of him and Samantha and all the other Arrow guys who were finalists in this year’s awards," says Mark.

In total seven of the 26 finalists were from Arrow. Other finalists included: Rhys McKenzie (Arrow Auckland) for Auckland Prison East: Exercise Yard Modifications, Projects under $2.5M; Gordon McGregor, Robert Blandford and Brad Barrett (Arrow Christchurch) for STAND Children’s Services, Projects $5-$10M; Tamati Parker (Arrow Auckland) Young Achiever Award.