Architectural vinification

Abstract

New Zealand is renowned for the production of high quality agricultural products from its rural landscape. This is exemplified by viniculture (winemaking), which when paired with the unique conditions of environmental location can produce internationally recognised high quality wine. This success has given rise to growing numbers of wineries populating some of New Zealand’s most scenic landscapes. Many wineries are architecturally designed, but focus on the building as a means of brand representation and marketing. Whilst this plays a contributing factor for the design of the contemporary winery, these industrial buildings must first be designed to house and optimise winemaking functions. This research considers wineries’ architectural performance as a component of winemaking technology that requires research through design. A case study design for a Central Otago winery is engaged as a vehicle to explore how winery architecture might be designed, such that its formal expression performs to the wineries core function; to house and optimise winemaking processes. Vinicultural processes require specific functional requirements that this thesis proposes winery architecture can respond to and support through performance-oriented, and synergetic design solutions considering environmental, spatial and material organisations. The resulting design, a series of terraced volumes, utilises the natural terrain as a means of promoting ‘gravity flow’ of wine through the stages of wine production. This configuration, where form follows process, is designed such that it simultaneously caters to the requirements for production flows, equipment, access and workers.