Star Flats
Star Flats (so-called because of their butterfly roof and cross-like shape when seen from above) refers to a form of medium-density state housing in New Zealand. The flats were designed in the late 1950s by Ministry of Works architect Neville Burren, working under the Ministry's Housing Division's chief architect Frederick Newman (formerly Friedrich Neumann). They were built from 1958 and throughout the 1960s. Each building was named after a star. Background and Implementation In the 1950s, the Government became increasingly concerned with issues stemming from New Zealand's rapidly expanding cities, including the loss of good farm land and the growing pressures on urban infrastructure. Academics and architects noted that the current state housing scheme was partly to blame for this, as it generally promoted the creation of low-density suburban developments. Note that some higher density developments were actively being built by the Government. However, these were usually semi-detached duplexes which were given an equivalent amount of curtilage as a fully detached house. In 1957, the Second Labour Government increased the ratio of new medium density developments from one fifth of total new builds to one third. It later increased this to half and half. Older medium density designs were no-longer