Winner of the 2025 WLA Awards – Award of Excellence in the Build Small Public Space category
The Karanga Plaza Jump Platform is a new piece of public infrastructure which enables and celebrates urban swimming within Auckland’s inner-city waterfront. The design approach seeks to provide a clearly legible, sculptural intervention within an existing public space, enabling safe swimming and expressing an enhanced connection to the marine environment in the form of the structure. An accompanying cluster of seats provides a place to gather and view.
Designed as part of the Karanga Plaza Harbour Pool, the platform contributes to a multi-purpose swimming area and provides a safe outlet for a range of existing useages – which included jumping into the water from surrounding infrastructure in frequently unsafe ways. The pool itself functions as a pilot project, informing the viability of providing a more permanent salt water lap pool at this location.
The Jump platform is situated at the edge of Te Waitematā Harbour, and this context imbues the platform with site specific meaning and a connection to the diversity of marine life beneath. Conceptually, this is expressed as a melding together of marine narratives, allowing the viewer to choose their own interpretation.
In defining the form of the jump platform, the design team has explored the physical parameters of a swimmer leaping into the water to drive the overall configuration of the structure. This informs the cantilevered shape of the platform and its subtle elevation above the existing plaza – both announcing its presence and providing a more appealing place to jump from. Swimmers are directed through the shaping of the platform which tapers to a narrow section at ‘the jumping off point’.
Depending on where you are standing, you might perceive the structure as gills, scales, or a mollusc attached to the face of the old sea wall. This layered concept has informed the detailing and materiality of every element within the project. The distinctive blue tone was selected for it’s dynamism under different lighting conditions, mirroring the glistening surface of Te Waitematā.
The form, consisting of 24 individual profiles was modelled using Rhinoceros and shared with the manufacturer for digital cutting from marine grade aluminium. The ‘skeleton’ was then assembled and finished by hand.
In defining the form of the jump platform, the design team has explored the physical parameters of a swimmer leaping into the water to drive the overall configuration of the structure. This informs the cantilevered shape of the platform and it’s subtle elevation above the existing plaza – both announcing it’s presence and providing a more appealing place to jump from. Swimmers are directed through the shaping of the platform which tapers to a narrow section at ‘the jumping off point’.
Designed to offer a measure of visual permeability, the platform balustrade allows swimmers to perceive the dimensions of the water space below, and spectators to see through the structure as swimmers approach the edge. Jumping and swimming represents a unique ‘water theatre’ for visitors, residents and locals alike. The Karanga Plaza Jump Platform represents direct engagement between people and water, establishing a connection with water quality which is vital to waterfront cities globally.
A cantilevered precast concrete slab forms the deck of the platform, rising above the existing plaza datum to achieve legibility outcomes – providing an appealing and intuitive place to jump from. This requires swimmers to navigate three steps before jumping to limit run-up, and reduce misuse of the platform (ie riding a Lime scooter into the sea).
The concrete precast methodology has been selected to minimise structural thickness of the platform deck and achieve an elegant cantilever over the water, while meeting lifespan requirements, minimising maintenance, and attaining performance underfoot. Structural engineers were fully inducted into the design process to achieve these objectives.
The form, consisting of 24 individual profiles was modelled using rhinocerous and shared with the manufacturer for digital cutting from marine grade aluminium. The ‘skeleton’ was then assembled and finished by hand. Ultimately, the entire platform was assembled off site and dropped in place by crane. This methodology was a direct response to coastal edge conditions and the challenges of building over water.
The project has seen a significant increase in users swimming in the harbour supporting the theatre of the urban waterfront and enhanced water-based culture in Tāmaki Makaurau / Auckland.
Karanga Plaza Jump Platform
Location: Tāmaki Makaurau, Aotearoa | Auckland, New Zealand
Landscape Architect: LandLAB
Client: Auckland Council
Collaborators/Other Consultants: Novare Structural Design, MᶜConnell Dowell
Photographer Credits: Ethan Reid