''Design Review'' (originally titled ''New Zealand Design Review'') is the journal of the Architectural Centre Incorporated,

Wellington Wellington is the capital city of New Zealand. It is located at the south-western tip of the North Island, between Cook Strait and the Remutaka Range. Wellington is the third-largest city in New Zealand (second largest in the North Island ...

. The Centre was founded in 1946, and began the first architectural school in Wellington (1947) and the first town planning school in

New Zealand New Zealand () is an island country in the southwestern Pacific Ocean. It consists of two main landmasses—the North Island () and the South Island ()—and List of islands of New Zealand, over 600 smaller islands. It is the List of isla ...

(1949). The Centre was unique at the time of its founding in that it invited members interested in a broad range of design and the arts, rather than restricting membership to professional architects and architectural students. Internationally, it is one of the oldest organisations of its type.

Philosophy and Scope

The Centre began the two-monthly publication of ''New Zealand Design Review'' in 1948. The journal addressed design topics as broad as furniture, town planning, theatre and stage design, packaging, church design, book-binding, poster design, industrial design and of course architecture. It hence reflected the Centre's interest in architecture, design and the arts in the broadest sense and was the first journal of its kind in New Zealand. The editorial of April – May 1949 explicitly asked the question "What is Design?", answering it with:

Like everything that has to do with the arts, design cannot be tested for its quality in a laboratory ... The elusive quality that a consensus of opinion agrees to call good design is not to be defined in terms like an axiom in geometry ... So we will leave the making of formulas and rules to those who like that sort of thing ... we shall publish in each number a discussion on some particular object; a house, a chair, a teapot or what have you. The contributor will tell you his or her opinion about the merits or demerits of the way that thing is designed, omitting any waving of the big stick to lay down laws of design. It is for you to decide if you think they are right."

Contributors

Contributors included E. C. Simpson, Doreen Blumhardt, Helen Hitchings, E.H. McCormick, Odo Strewe, William Toomath, Gordon Wilson, Anna Plischke, Geoff Nees, film maker

John O'Shea John Francis O'Shea (; born 30 April 1981) is an Irish professional football coach and former player who is currently assistant manager of the Republic of Ireland men's national team. He was known for his versatility in playing several defensi ...

, writer Alan Mulgan, and photographers

John Pascoe John Henry Pascoe (born 10 December 1948) is a former Chief Justice of the Family Court of Australia and Deputy Chancellor of the University of New South Wales. Background and career Pascoe was raised in and , the only child of a grazier ...

and Irene Koppel. Editors of the journal included architects

Ernst Plischke Ernst Anton Plischke (June 26, 1903 – 23 May, 1992) was an Austrian-New Zealand modernist architect, town planner and furniture designer whose work is well known throughout Europe and New Zealand. Early years Plischke was born in the town ...

, Maurice Patience, and Al Gabites, and well-known artists E. Mervyn Taylor, and Eric Lee-Johnson. The final issue of ''Design Review'' was published in 1954.

Digitisation

The entire journal has been digitised by the

New Zealand Electronic Text Centre The New Zealand Electronic Text Collection (NZETC; ) is a freely accessible online archive of New Zealand and Pacific Islands texts and heritage materials that are held by the Victoria University of Wellington Library. It was named the New Zeala ...

, a unit of the library at

Victoria University of Wellington Victoria University of Wellington (), also known by its shorter names "VUW" or "Vic", is a public university, public research university in Wellington, New Zealand. It was established in 1897 by Act of New Zealand Parliament, Parliament, and w ...

, and can b
viewed online

References

{{Authority control Mass media in Wellington Architecture in New Zealand Academic journals established in 1948 Architecture journals Bimonthly journals New Zealand design