New Zealand home of the Year

Home magazine by Bauer Media Group New Zealand is one of the best home publications on the market. It is well designed and intelligently presented. Editor Jeremy Hansen has done a fine job of keeping the title interesting with lively design and written content that isn't either so worthy it is unreadable or so trivial it might as well have been set in Zapf Dingbats*.

The home of the year issue is, obviously, an annual event. As an award for architecture it has the prestige of being the gong that lay people notice - I'm sure the architectural community can be as dismissive and jealous of their patch as any other field that distinguishes itself with awards. It is impressive how the publishers engage other media to promote the issue - this years winners have had airtime on primetime current events shows like Campbell Live (who confected an angle about local peasants being disgruntled by the presence of these alien structures - which should, apparently look more like farm buildings. Plainly a nonsense - it would be harder to design structures that look more utilitarian than these).

'House porn' is a strong media category with shows like Grand Designs growing in popularity along with unscripted drama shows like The Block. Maybe interest will wane when mortgage interest rates spike later this year?

*David Carson's dingbat layout

David Carson is an influential designer and art director whose fame erupted from his work on the surf culture magazine RayGun. His deconstructed layouts and experimental use of photography and type were ground breaking, made possible by the emergence of the Apple Macintosh and the democratisation of desktop publishing and PostScript. In one issue of the mag Carson was presented with an interview with Bryan Ferry for layout. He deemed it so boring that it may as well be set in Zapf Dingbats - making publishing gold out of journalistic straw.