Two years of planning has come to fruition with Urban Homes opening the doors to its new Hamilton headquarters.
The move reflects the rapid growth experienced by the national award-winning Master Builder, following the establishment of Urban Homes by founders Daniel and Bronwyn Klinkenberg in 2004.
“When Urban Homes was launched, we operated out of our home office,” says Daniel. “We moved into our Anglesea Street offices in 2015 but our team has grown alongside the business over the last five years, and we are excited that we are now delivering them and our clients a new space.
“We’ve worked extremely hard to develop a brand that’s recognised for quality and we’ve focused on the customer experience making sure that we deliver a really enjoyable, fun experience. We have a fantastic team, we’ve got great people in the business which make it happen.”
Urban Homes has been operating out of multiple central city locations and show homes to cater for the additional resource and people that have come on board, but with the new space now open, office-based staff are housed in the new Headquarters on the corner of Anglesea Street and London Street. “We really like the CBD; it’s close and central for our clients.”
The new space, quadruple the size of the previous HQ, has been designed by Edwards White Architects and will allow for the future growth of Urban Homes, which currently has 70 staff.
“Bronni and I were looking for an HQ building that meets our current needs and gives us the space to continue to grow and develop,” says Daniel.
“We have a dedicated team that continues to deliver quality homes across the Waikato, South Auckland, Coromandel and beyond, and we look forward to building on that.”
After taking ownership of the old AMI building in September 2018, the refurbishment commenced in May last year and despite the impact of Covid-19, made good time thanks to lead contractors Foster Construction.
“Fosters have been outstanding,” Daniel says. “One of the reasons we chose Fosters is they work like us, they communicate well, they’re transparent, they talk about issues as they arise. We wanted to have certainty around timing and costings and they’ve really delivered on that.”
The result is a new-look glass exterior, which provides a glimpse to the inside and several large steel K-braces, which give the building a raw and industrial feel. The K-braces have been installed to comply with earthquake strengthening regulations.
“We knew it had solid bones in terms of structure, and we didn’t want to hide that. We love the industrial look of concrete and steel, it’s modern and in keeping with our brand. “Edwards White have done a fantastic job.”
Their commitment to the bold new design went as far as acquiring a licence to occupy air space. That was needed because the building is right on the boundary, and the structural glazing above ground level protruded beyond the boundary. Another exciting feature is the interactive design centre, StudioU, on the building’s top floor. StudioU allows prospective clients to visualise and plan their new home like never before.
“We can bring our clients through the full journey of the build and they can select all the products that are going in their home,” Daniel says.
The state-of-the-art building and design centre are a giant leap forward for the company, but Daniel is most proud of the overall environment that the Urban Homes HQ will create for its people.
“At the heart of it, we wanted to create a space that our staff love to work in and to give our clients the ‘wow’ factor. We’re extremely happy with the final result.” He says the team are really enjoying the new spaces’ comfort and functionality. “There’s lots of room and there’s a lot of breakout spaces, which enhances collaboration between teams.”
It means staff can easily grab a coffee, sit down together and catch up. In the past, with the selections team based out of the show home, they would have to ring colleagues like sales consultants if they needed to check anything whereas now they can just walk across the room or up a floor to have a
discussion in person. With mostly open plan areas, a lot of attention was paid to designing cleverly, using an acoustic engineer and a lighting engineer to make sure the spaces work.
Clients have also been positive, Daniel says. They can enjoy a flat white from the ground-floor café on arrival, and Daniel says they love the StudioU offering. They also have the benefit of more parking, compared to the previous site. Cambridge-based Homebrew Coffee is operating the ground-floor coffee bar in partnership with Urban Homes.
“We have aligned values – great customer service and a passion for people,” says Homebrew Coffee Founder Tayler Paterson.
Daniel says Urban Homes has never been busier, with next year looking just as strong. “That’s a great problem to have.”
The company offers a full design and build service. It has a range of pre-designed floor plans to choose from, and each can be modified to suit lifestyle and budget.
“Whether you want to take a pre-design plan and then amend it, or work from scratch, we do the whole design, from the start right through.”
They take it through consenting and construction as well as doing the colours and selections. “That’s where StudioU is extremely helpful for us now. It allows clients to touch and feel all the products that are going in their home without having to visualise and without having to visit our suppliers. It’s a one-stop shop.”
As well as design and build service, Urban Homes also offers house and land packages. The key, Daniel says, is they work with clients to understand what’s important to them. “We offer a quality home, but also fantastic service, a journey.”
He says too often you hear of people commenting at the end of a build that communication was lacking or it was finished late or ran over budget.
“So absolutely, we focus on the quality of the build, but we also try and deliver a great journey as well that people love and enjoy.”
That means among other things that Urban Homes clients get fixed-price contracts and guaranteed start and finishing dates.
All homes meet the Urban Quality Standard (UQS) 197-point checklist, and come with a 10-year Registered Master Builders Guarantee. There is a 12-month maintenance period after the client has taken ownership of their home.
Urban Homes also offers free, no-obligation site appraisals and initial design discussions. The company gives back to the community by working alongside children’s charity True Colours. With each new house build, they make a donation to True Colours to help support seriously ill children and their families.
