Material Acts: Session 4 – Craft Practices: Crafting New Materials

Join us for a facilitated dialogue with Emina Petrovic, Rachel MacIntyre, and Min Hall about the processes of imagining, encouraging, and realising local material cultures in architecture in Aotearoa.

This event is part of Material Acts: a two-day event that offers the opportunity for architecture practitioners, students and enthusiasts to join workshops and discussions with those working in material innovation, presented by The AUT Material Cultures Lab.

This session sits within the theme of Craft Practices, exploring how hands-on crafting intersects with the discovery of new material processes.

Emina Petrovic, Rachel MacIntyre, and Min Hall will consider what it means to create new material processes and how material crafting contains inherent political dimensions and potentials, including challenges around how new materials intersect with the marketplace – from BRANZ testing to building standards.

Hospitality will be provided.

Other Material Acts event sessions are listed on our website and are free and open to all.

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Min Hall is a Registered Architect with a career spanning 35 years and is also a Lecturer at Unitec School of Architecture where her research focus is on sustainability, particularly low carbon materials. In 2012 she received a Master of Architecture degree for her thesis, “Earth and straw bale: an investigation of their performance and potential as building materials in Aotearoa New Zealand.” She is also a member of the New Zealand Standards Committee responsible for the suite of Earth Building Standards. Min’s teaching focus is on sharing her passion for low carbon materials with students on their way to becoming architects of the future.

Rachel MacIntyre is the Strategic Sustainability Advisor at Te Kāhui Whaihanga New Zealand Institute of Architects. Rachel’s career spans architectural practice and public sector roles in Copenhagen, London, New York, and Aotearoa, as well as lecturing at AUT’s School of Future Environments. In her current role, she supports architects by equipping them with the skills and knowledge needed to design with minimal environmental impact, focusing on low-carbon and circular design principles. She ensures practitioners have access to the tools and resources required to drive positive change. Alongside this, she actively advocates for sustainable and regenerative practices across the architectural profession and the wider built environment industry. Rachel is passionate about being a kaitiaki of the built environment and is committed to embedding the principles of kaitiakitanga into architectural practice and the broader community of built environment professionals - showcasing the vital role architects play in decarbonising the industry and addressing the urgent challenges of climate change, biodiversity loss, and pollution.

Dr Emina Kristina Petrović is a Senior Lecturer in Sustainability in Design, Wellington School of Architecture, Te Herenga Waka – Victoria University of Wellington. Petrović is recognised for her expertise on sustainability and toxicity of building materials, and more recently for the research on bio-materials. Petrović emphasises the importance of informed building material selection for both the built and natural environment, calling for a more detailed consideration of building materials for the totality of their impacts, from ecosystem health to ethics of production. Because knowledge itself is not enough, Petrović has also contributed a Sustainability Transition Framework, and researches aspects of behaviour change in building industry.

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