The initial brief called for a new large-scale commercial kitchen and café extension to an existing dining hall. During construction of this project in 2011 and 2012, further earthquake assessment of the existing dining hall was undertaken, which led to a replacement dining hall concept developed. The resulting building has become a hub for the university’s student body activities.  

Inherent with Lincoln University’s land-based focus the use of natural materiality was imperative in the design. As a result locally sources timber was used extensively, and, where materials of higher embodied energy are used (such as concrete panels and structural grid), they provide thermal mass for heating the building and minimal maintenance in the long term.

Since completion the building has been named Te Kete Ika, ‘The Food Basket,’ appropriate both in terms of its programme but also in its aesthetic form. The original café’s diagonal truss glulam roof structure has further evolved in the dining hall, using steel diagonal struts as a response to the increase in scale.