Darren Jessop designed New Zealand's first passive house based on principles prevalent in Germany in the 1980's. For more...Read the blog (describing the construction) here. Read the Building Design article here. See a newspaper article with video on the house here, and an article in Architecture Now.
Below is a video summarising the "passive" home principles:
Passive House Explained in 90 Seconds from Hans-Jörn Eich on Vimeo.
From this experience, Jessop has now created Cool House, a collection of "modern" or contemporary factory-built or modular home kitsets. But obviously still giving the option for a fully customised "architectural" home also. See Jessop's "cool house" collection below:
Via Jessop Architects and Cool House.
And here is a great podcast at Homestyle Green with Elron Burrell from Architype (expat NZ'er) about "passivehausing" and the importance on investing in quality construction from the outset.
