Rachel Howie, director of Becroft Howie Architects, graduated from the University of Auckland in 1989.  In 1992, after gaining experience in residential design and registration with the NZIA, she ventured into sole practice as Rachel Becroft: Architect.  She has designed a number of family homes, small commercial interiors and numerous alterations and additions to existing houses.  In 2010-11 she lived in Broken Hill, Outback NSW and was the only registered NSW architect west of Wagga Wagga! In 2013, after returning to New Zealand, she established Becroft Howie Architects Ltd, based in Takapuna, on Auckland’s North Shore.

Rachel has a passion for beautiful design.  During overseas travels on an under-graduate gap-year she worked for an architectural practice in the UK.  Her BArch thesis investigated the origins of the paradise courtyard garden and its influences on Modernism.  A love of overseas travel has informed her fascination with place-making and settlement patterns. Rachel is a keen gardener and musician who also loves the textile arts. She has enjoyed renovating her 1960s home and garden on Auckland’s North Shore, which she shares with her husband and three children.

Becroft Howie Architects

is a registered NZIA Practice committed to innovative, responsive and sustainable architectural design. The practice aims to promote the Vitruvian ideals of “firmness, commodity and delight” with a pinch of Kiwi ingenuity. We seek out opportunities for sustainable design - via creative repurposing of existing construction elements, whenever possible, and by consciously promoting architecture that is an authentic response to the site, context and our clients’ brief and budget.