Tucked into the fabric of suburban Auckland, this architects own home by Paul Clarke of Studio2 Architects reveals a curated yet deeply personal narrative through 10 unexpected design elements. Informed by a career immersed in material exploration and crafted detail, the residence moves beyond typical domestic gestures to create an architectural reflection of memory, family and play.
From the moment of entry, a concrete emblem set into the facade signals a layered story – one that honours the original home while embracing transformation. Referencing the number three, in alignment with the home's address and Clarke’s three sons, the motif is a tactile fusion of legacy and intention. Across the property, design solutions emerge not from convention, but from lived experience, marking this architects own home as both a testing ground and a personal archive.
Layered artworks – like a vibrant Pat Hanly painting from Clarke’s university days or a rare John Drawbridge piece – infuse the interiors with cultural history and sentiment. These objects aren’t mere decoration but spatial anchors within a home that celebrates the unexpected. Bespoke elements such as exposed double-hung window mechanisms, chain-lifted sashes and adjustable agricultural shutters speak to a fascination with movement and mechanical honesty, elevating everyday rituals with a sense of theatre.
The kitchen, often the emotional centre of the home, features iconic pieces like the VOLA tap, selected not for show but for their quiet endurance and design integrity. This sensitivity to longevity extends into flexible furnishings like a rotating leather chair and Charles Eames’ sculptural 1948 La Chaise – both functional and formally significant. Each selection in this architects own home reflects a design process shaped by curiosity, memory and tactility.
In the outdoor areas, design gestures such as a yo-yo-inspired lamp add humour and adaptability, transforming the deck into a luminous, interactive zone. These layers of utility and playfulness resist the static and underscore the home’s adaptive nature. Whether through robust materials or movable features, the architecture always returns to the human – how people gather, reflect and grow within space.
This architects own home stands as a personal anthology of design ideas that remain grounded in craft. Rather than a polished display, the home invites imperfection and evolution, holding stories in each patina and corner. There’s an inherent joy in its shifting forms – from the sunlight filtering through a hand-pulled shutter to the pivot of a leather chair echoing daily rituals. These moments, simple yet refined, reinforce that architecture at its best is a backdrop to life.
Beyond the physical, the house also captures the intangible: atmosphere, sentiment and rhythm. Designed not just to house a family but to reflect one, the spaces operate on both a functional and emotional register. This architects own home isn’t a statement – it’s a conversation between time, use and imagination. It reminds us that the most powerful architecture often comes from the places we call our own.
00:00 - Unexpected Things: A Tour with Paul Clarke 00:33 - Craft, Detail and the Art of Making 01:23 - Art, Objects and Design That Endures 02:26 - Light, Movement and Interaction 06:59 - Living with Design: Stories of Home and Connection
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Location: Auckland, New Zealand
The Local Project acknowledges Māori as tangata whenua and Treaty of Waitangi partners in Aotearoa New Zealand. We recognise the importance of Indigenous peoples in the identity of our respective countries and continuing connections to Country and community. We pay our respect to Elders, past and present, and extend that respect to all Indigenous people of these lands.
Curating this really beautiful haven so far was really exciting to me.
It just transforms and it feels like it's got an energy to it because you can interact with it.
Hi, I'm Paul Clark from Studio 2 Architects here in Auckland,
and I'm going to share with you today some of our unexpected things.
Come and take a look.
So this is one of the first unexpected things that you'd see when you enter the property.
And the idea here was to work with the old weatherboards off the old house
and then create some patterning that related to,
one, the property in reference to number three being the street number,
but also having three boys in the family and my wife being the square,
which is the heart of the family.
She's the controller.
Yeah, it's a wonderful craft working with concrete,
but it's also a labour of love because it's so labour intensive.
Thinking about how you actually create this emblem is thinking and inverting the whole idea.
And that unveiling is also quite special because when you take all the
boxing away, you're hoping that it's actually turned out all right.
So this is another one of our unexpected things.
It's a work by Pat Hanley.
Pat taught me at architecture school.
He taught us slide drawing and we were able to experience Pat
in that beautiful way that he was able to teach people.
It was about scale and proportion,
just that idea of being able to put pen to paper and not be afraid of it
and enjoy the experience.
So yeah, it's a pretty special piece.
This is the bowl of tat and one of my unexpected things.
The kitchen's really important to us, you know,
having the objects or the beautiful things that are sort of part of that.
It's not necessarily about showing it off or anything like that.
For me, it's actually just a beautiful piece of design.
So it just fits in really naturally with everything else.
The era of the design is quite important.
That reflection back in time of quality, good architecture,
good design should just stand the test of time.
The next unexpected item is the shutters.
The shutters is a very similar idea to the double hung window
where we're actually recreating the screen.
We love working with screens,
but this being a very agricultural way of dealing with that transition
between what's happening inside and outside
and being able to manipulate the light into the space.
It just gives that ability to allow it to connect directly to the outside
but also when needed, shut off.
All the mechanism that sits holds it all together.
There's all the joy of the design as well
because they're all the things that people don't really appreciate.
We're just looking at a screen,
but within it there's these fantastic hinges
and a really simple track system with a lovely little wheel
and then they're completely out of the way.
There's just a completely different experience that it creates within the space.
There is this quite playful thing with them
when you're actually in the garden.
From my perspective as an architect,
you can manipulate it into, I suppose, like an artwork
and that's quite joyful.
It actually creates a different feeling and experience
I do know that some people from across the valley
find it quite interesting when the house has been manipulated in that way.
It's probably not a daily task,
but when you're here and you're actually using the spaces,
there's something that's really lovely about being able to manipulate that
and have that ability to change it.
So another unexpected thing.
We were in the old house here a number of years ago
and there was no way of being able to light the outdoor space.
This yo-yo, designed by two Swiss designers back in 2000,
was just a wonderful way of being able to actually transport light
around the outdoor space.
It sort of has that simplicity about it that reflects to a childhood.
It's just this wonderful object where you can manoeuvre it around
and it just creates a difference to the space that you're in.
It has been picked up and toiled around and it has been fixed.
It's changed from an incandescent to an LED lamp.
You're just making things more robust
as you learn about the people who you have as friends.
So this chair is another wonderful unexpected thing
and it's in a great spot here.
It has this ability to sort of swing and connect
and be part of the morning sun and having a coffee here
and in the evening sitting here with a glass of wine in front of the fire,
connecting with family or friends.
That's pretty special.
It's a leather chair, beautifully stitched.
It has this rotation ability as well,
which means that when you move,
your coffee moves or your glass of wine moves,
you've got to be pretty careful.
We have lost a couple.
It's so easy to keep.
You give it a fresh bit of love with some leather polish.
It feels so good.
Smells great.
Love it.
So the idea here was about reinterpreting
the traditional double hung window,
but within that,
wanting to be able to just slide the top part of the window down.
We were looking at the mechanism that actually does that work.
So we wanted to expose that.
We wanted to express it so you can actually see it.
So we've used stainless steel tube.
We've capped that tube.
We've filled it with gunshot because the lead has the weight
and then the chains that we've used is a self-lubricating chain
that you might have on a motorbike.
Rob Piazzin from Grand Rue Joinery,
he worked very closely with us
and he came up with a lot of the mechanism.
It was a really beautiful reinterpreted way of joinery
and it also creates a really nice way of being able to open up the space
and enjoy the weather when it's great
and shut it up and even shut the shutters when it's not.
So this unexpected item was one of those wonderful stories
where we got this 23 years ago when our first son was born.
My wife spent a lot of time sitting here feeding him
and I must admit I spent a lot of time sitting nursing him at that time too.
When the kids got a bit older,
it definitely became with their mates one of those great chairs.
You know, you can obviously do the rocking,
but the spinning
and look it's the other thing about great design
is that it's still the test of time.
It's faded a little bit like me,
but I think that's all good.
This unexpected item was, I believe it's a beautiful piece
and it was on an unexpected trip down south with my mother.
We went to one of our favourite little galleries.
At the time when I saw the piece and they told me the price,
I wasn't going to buy that with my mother around.
She needed to know what silly money I spend on things.
John Drawbridge, who was one of our New Zealand modernist artists,
he did this work as an experimental piece back in 1965.
It's really beautiful to see it in our own home.
To me, it's sort of quite a historical piece.
It's older than me, so that's pretty cool.
When the piece was originally designed back in 1965,
they had fluoro light in the back of it
and then after John's passing,
the family looked at upgrading the lighting in it,
so it's got LED in behind.
The shadows are quite beautiful when the artwork is off
and at night time in this space with lights low and that much,
it's just a really gorgeous ambience.
So the idea about the placement was the arrival into the house
is through this beautifully crafted pivot door
and then this painting is centered between the passageway
that you enter the house to.
So there's sort of just these moments,
I do love that about architecture,
that you can create objects that you look towards
for the space to be individual in the way that it's seen.
So another unexpected item,
designed back in 1948,
Charles Eames' The Laches.
I stumbled across it at a sale a number of years ago
and it's just always been part of the furniture.
It's got this amazing sort of smoothness.
The way that it's been sculpted
is having the hole in the back.
Is it a seat?
Is it a chair?
Is it an object?
Is it something that can just be looked at and appreciated?
It's a pretty special piece.
And thanks everyone for coming on this journey
with The Local Project
and experiencing our home and our unexpected things.
I'll often describe furniture layouts in particular
as a landscape.
This idea of layering and feeling that everything we touch
has a different feeling as well.
Finding that balance of where to be theatrical
and exaggerate something
that's actually quite plush and plump
and then where to have more delicate or hard objects
that you can touch and interact with.
I think that's when the joy is there
when you can interrogate how you use a space
and then it becomes just so much more authentic to you.
Curating this really beautiful haven sofa
was really exciting to me.
Having this sort of split feeling across the haven sofa
is quite incredible.
It just transforms
and it feels like it's got an energy to it
because you can interact with it.
It's sensory visually as well as when you touch it.
The chaise sort of lily pad as I call it in the corner
which is great for cosying up
epitomises a lot of the things I look for in a sofa
for myself and for clients.
