Jo Woods

Jo grew up in Cornwall, England and emigrated to New Zealand in 2007. She has always been very aware of environmental and social issues, and extremely focused on doing something about it. Jo would like to see all NZ homes well designed to improve the comfort and health of people living in them and minimise their effect on the environment. 

Jo received three Masters Degrees with Honours. Two from Imperial College London in Materials Engineering and Advanced Computational Methods and another from Brunel University in Building Services Engineering. Jo has worked in a number of fields including aerodynamics, building structural engineering, and solar energy systems design, before her current career as an environmental sustainable design (ESD) consultant. After nine years as an Associate at eCubed Building Workshop, Jo now consults independently to progressive building projects.

Building this house was a long term goal for Jo.

Jo has worked to define the ESD initiatives and model the thermal performance of the house. We would like to acknowledge the support from eCubed Building Workshop for the resources and knowledge that greatly assisted the design process.

Shay Brazier

Shay grew up and studied in Auckland, travelling and working in France, the Mediterranean, the Caribbean, and London before returning to New Zealand in late 2006. He has always had an interest in environmental issues but only really appreciated the magnitude of them after living in Europe where the effects of human activity are obvious on a daily basis.

Shay has a degree in Mechanical engineering from Auckland University. He worked as a development engineer at Fisher & Paykel appliances, a super yacht engineer, and a solar building product and system designer before establishing Southern Perspectives, a renewable energy consultancy focused on solar for buildings in 2006.

Southern Perspectives merged with SolarCity in 2010. Until the end of 2013 Shay lead the Design and Innovation team at SolarCity. Shay was on the Board of the Sustainable Electricity Association (SEANZ)  between 2007 and 2009 and represented SEANZ on the joint Australian and New Zealand EL-042 standards committee for renewable energy systems.

Shay along with Matt Co-Founded Evident at the end of 2013.

Shay has worked to identify the energy requirements of the house and design the renewable energy systems that allow the home to achieve zero net energy consumption.

A Studio Architects

We engaged Kendon and Jennifer from A Studio Architects for the project. They've done a brilliant job working with us to design an inspiring home that meets our vision.

A Studio is a multi-disciplinary design practice, primarily focused on architecture.  The directors, Jennifer Hanson and Kendon McGrail, are registered architects, with collectively over 30 years experience in the industry.

A Studio is passionate about design and architecture.  Both directors enjoy working collaboratively with clients and consultants to explore ideas and realise projects. 

Kendon and Jennifer are motivated to investigate design solutions that enable a symbiotic relationship with the environment.  The ZEH project presents an excellent opportunity to explore possibilities.

Evident

Evident emerged from the Zero Energy House project in late 2013 and combines Shay's technical understanding with Matt's knowledge of communication (Matt manages comms for the ZEH project).

Feedback from people who followed the ZEH convinced Shay and Matt they should explore more projects together. Evident has a vision where buildings inspire, enable and celebrate change.

In our first three years Evident have delivered projects for government and commercial clients, including creating the concept for a Smart Precinct for Waterfront Auckland, an an end-to-end residential design & build process for Auckland Council, and renewable energy market evaluation reports for Callaghan Innovation. We are currently implementing an extensive control and monitoring solution for a zero energy tourist development in Glenorchy.