Ideal Home(land)
Ideal Home(land)
Sarosh Mulla and Melanie Pau
Housing is currently a fraught issue in New Zealand. Prices are increasing and
affordability is decreasing. Many pundits (often with vested interests in urban expansion)
claim the solution is to expand city limits, while others argue that this is unsustainable. At
the heart of the issue is a stubbornly persistent and nostalgic idea of the ideal Kiwi home –
the “quarter-acre dream”. Few would want the car their grandparents drove or the quality
of health care they received, but we are envious of the house they lived in. While we
voraciously consume i-phones and nano-fiber sportswear, why are ideas and
expectations of living environments so slow to change? What is the ideal home in
contemporary New Zealand?
