To add to the honour, the company also walked away from the awards ceremony in Wellington on Friday with two Special Awards of Excellence.
The company had been nominated for the Queenstown Airport landscaping and the visitor facility development at the Glenorchy end of the Routeburn Track. Both projects won a gold medal.
Philip Blakely, landscape architect and partner of Arrowtown-based Blakely Wallace Associates, was key designer for both projects, but said its successes were made possible by a great team effort.
"One of our key strengths is to plan and design developments so that they relate to their site and context, yet are visually appealing and highly functional. To have this recognised at a national level is very rewarding."
From a record total of 127 entries this year for the two-yearly awards, a panel of 10 judges selected 14 finalists in the planning category, 32 in the design category, plus 10 finalists in the student category.
Judge Jan Woodhouse said the winners showed "a real connection and response to the underlying characteristics of the site".
"To do that, a landscape architect needed to totally understand the cultural and social requirements of people using each space."
Australian judge Niall Simpson said he was impressed with how sensitive New Zealand landscape architects were to their sites.
"When travelling around, I saw real restraint of design, which requires great maturity on the part of the designer. New Zealand landscape architects can truly hold their own against their international counterparts," he said.
Blakely Wallace Associates won the Special Award of Excellence for Colour for Queenstown Airport, and the Special Award of Excellence for Sustainability for the Routeburn Track Visitor Development.
"All of us in our small team are floating on cloud nine," Mr Blakely said.
