CONTEXT REPORT
GREY LYNN RICHMOND ROAD, AUCKLAND
KELLY C BOYD 5395566
E MEDIAN AGE: 30-34.9
GREY LYNN WEST 1176 DWELLINGS OCCUPIED 51 UNOCCUPIED.
‘THE PROFESSIONAL’ income > = $35,000
BUS 020
MALE 1683 (48.74%)
GREY LYNN WES:T: GENDER POPULATION
FEMALE 1770 (51.26%) MALE 1593 (48.98%)
GREY LYNN EAST: GENDER POPULATION
FEMALE 1659 (51.02%) 58.4 % NEVER MARRIED
GREY LYNN WEST: RELATIONSHIP STATUS
29.8% MARRIED 11.7% SEPARATED/ WIDOWED/ DIVORCED 62.3 % NEVER MARRIED
GREYLYNN LYNNEAST: EAST:RELATIONSHIP RELATIONSHIPSTATUS STATUS GREY
27.4% MARRIED 10.3% SEPARATED/ WIDOWED/ DIVORCED EUROPEAN 82.3%
GREY LYNN WEST: ETHNICITIES
MAORI 7.3% PACIFIC PEOPLES 10.6% ASIAN 8.9% MIDDLE EASTERN, LATIN AMERICAN, AFRICAN 2.2% OTHER ETHNICITY 1.1% COUPLES WITH CHILDREN 44.6%
GREY LYNN WEST: FAMILIES
COUPLES WITHOUT CHILDREN 39.2% ONE PARENT WITH CHILD 15.8%
Grey Lynn is a suburb in Auckland surrounded by Ponsonby, Herne Bay, Westmere. Where the Bay Villa is the vogue choice of occupation. Typically seen as the locale for the artistic, free thinking young couple. The standardised conception of the area, is that it is the home to the privileged; opined as “Artsy Fartsy”. The area’s community and domination of European inhabitants are the result of the gentrification of the previously Polynesian dominant neighbourhood. Due to the interest in the area’s urban renewal in the 1990s, demand for the new trending house aesthetic caused prices and rent to rise. Pushing out inhabitants who could no longer afford to live in such an environment, replacing the majority of the population with ‘the young professional’.
“Grey Lynn, if you don’t know, is the home of the converted million dollar villa, a lot of Volkswagen Golds and Touregs, and children who eat organic food. There are more Lattles consumed in Grey Lynn per head of population than anywhere on Earth; it’s a little known fact... Grey Lynn Runs on Soy, Bolga Wheat and Quinoa. The School kids carry their salads and their gluten free muffins in recycled paper bags, having dispensed with plastic years ago.” -
Mike Hosking on ‘The Grey Lynn Fruit Fly Crisis’ TVNZ’s Seven Sharp Aired 18.02.2015
Although considered to be Superficial by an outsider due to the presentation of Specialty food stores, gluten free bakeries and luxury bed linen stores. The Grey Lynn community is not only physically close, but socially as well. With the community centre holding a pivotal role in the functioning of the neighbourhood. One known as a community that upholds their values and beliefs, particularly in regard to the presentation and modification of the circumstances of architectural development in the area.
COLOURS OF GREY LYNN WITH METAL BACKGROUND
SHADES OF GREY LYNN Colour is an integral part of how we perceive an environment. Colours often generate an emotional response that is not always acknowledged. When one walks through the site and its surrounding area, there are recurring tonal themes in its colour palette. Be it through the older building fabric or the new infrastructure. New materials or fraying dilapidated ones. Unless actively looking for them, these shades go unnoticed and blur and immerse into their environment. The harmonious hues create almost a sense of visual ergonomics, the eyes do not strain due to contrast, brightness and boldness.
GRAFFITI VS STREET ART
One could argue that the premise of grafďŹ ti is as a scar on the urban background. It is a mark that merely exists, slapped into the environment, and when noticed, taken like one to the face. Often destructive and a mere stroke to the ego of the tagger. Whilst street art is reective of its time, community issues and thoughts, for its audience rather than the artist. Street art is seen to complement and add to the urban landscape. In this context, Architecture acts in a manner much the same. The commercial buildings that currently inhabit the site, do not enhance or add to their community. Like the tags that bedeck them, they merely exist in the space.
THE TREE & THE TOWER Telephone wires passing physically through well-established trees on Richmond Road created a moment of past meeting present. The tree, presumably grown from a young sapling, has grown up and around the telephone cables, where nature breaks through the existing infrastructure. It had created a moment of pause; unlike that of the surrounding buildings; where one could stop to determine the process of how the relationship was formed. Either via the coincidental natural formation of tree branches, branch trimming, and whether the trees or the towers were there ďŹ rst. This instance seemed to be the most directly corresponding moment between two elements, particularly evident in the disconnected site.
Surrounding park areas are wide at expanses of land, which decrease rapidly into small pockets of greenery when re-entering the suburban areas. From aerial photos these pockets can be seen as small islands of green amongst a sea of closely packed villas. Grey Lynn Park , Cox Reserve and other parks are in close vicinity to the site. This in turn makes the site appear as though it is one of the few large properties in the area that is not part of a park or reserve, rather one of the commercial.
SKTECHES
THE ELEVATED PARK
Grey Lynn as a community can be considered Green and Eco-friendly, this partly due to local business actively participating in environmental schemes. The inclusion of communal gardens in the neighbourhood are an indicator of this manner of thinking, as are the common use of compost bins and recycling. In such a walking-friendly suburb, the idea of the park becomes the destination, or in some cases the thoroughfare. In this case working with the surrounding context would allow for greater appreciation of the site and its history. Particularly through working with the existing ground levels, and reintroducing more of the park scheme into the urban fabric. The idea of extending the parks to a grander scheme through exaggeration of size and physical elevation seems to be relevant in the case of Grey Lynn, as is the enabling of public appropriation of space as well as commercial use.
Works such as Diller and Scofidio’s ‘High Line’, Wilkinson Eyre’s ‘Super Tree Grove’ and Mecanoo’s ‘University of Delft’ Library are examples of successful elevation of the park landscape within their urban context.