| Restoration - The Old Tauranga Post Office |
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| Grasshopper Properties completed the restoration of Tauranga’s Old Post Office Building in 1999. |
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| It took around 12 months to complete the $1.5 million upgrade of the old building, which had been empty since 1987 when the Ministry of Works moved out. |
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| Grasshopper’s involvement came after years of debate on the buildings fate. Built in 1905 on an elevated Willow Street site, the Post Office has a Historic Places Trust classification and is one of the most notable examples of Edwardian Baroque architecture in the country. |
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| However attractive the building might have been, its construction did not meet modern earthquake safety standards and it was in desperate need of restoration. Grasshopper bought the building from the Tauranga City Council and set about bringing the building’s exterior back to its original condition and up to safe occupation standards. |
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| Historical features such as the trusses, balustrade, stairs, stairwell and the courtroom were retained and the rest of the building was converted into modern offices. |
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| While the developers and their architects had a lot more freedom in redesigning the interior of the building to cope with modern working requirements, the exterior had to replicate exactly the building as it was in 1905. A good deal of research was needed to find out such details as its original colour scheme, which was ultimately determined with the use of paint scrapings. |
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| History |
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| When first built, the structure was known as Government Buildings and housed not only the Post Office, but also the local courts and the Lands and Survey Department. |
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| In 1903, tenders were called for two buildings to house a Post Office and a Court House. No satisfactory tender was received and on June 24 the following year tenders were called for a revised plan – a single building to house all central government departments. |
| The description of the building was reported in the Bay of Plenty Times as “..of brick with red Marseilles tiles.. which would match the dull red cement compo finish of the lower half.. and the creamy yellow upper storey.” The Postal Department was to occupy the ground floor, with its entrance on the eastern face of the clock tower. The Court and its offices would be situated upstairs. |
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| The Times report concluded, “The building standing on the commanding site overlooking the harbour will form an even more noticeable object from the waterfront than its predecessor.” |
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| That predecessor was the Mission Institute, which was built in 1862, and was at one time New Zealand’s second largest wooden building. Intended as both a focal point for Mission activities and as a boarding school for Maori students, it experienced a somewhat chequered career and by the mid 1870s was being rented as government offices. |
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| At least one local heaped blistering scorn upon its architectural qualities in a letter printed in the Bay of Plenty Times on February 25, 1873. |
| “I know not, nor do I seek to know, the name of the architect, but I should fancy it to have been the offspring of the opium-laden brain of some half inspired Mongolian. Half Moriso, half Roman, with perhaps a transient dash of early Greek church.” |
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| The Mission Institute was razed by fire in 1902 and all records generated by local and central government in Tauranga to that date burned with it. |
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| By July 14, 1905, Auckland contractor WE Hutchinson was making good progress with preparations for the new edifice’s foundations. By April 1906, it was complete, save the fittings. Interior walls were plastered light green with a dado of a darker shade – a government office colour scheme that would persist for years afterward. |
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| The completion of the interior fit-out took another two months and on June 29 of that year, the departments took occupation under the watchful eye of Lieutenant Colonel John Mackintosh Roberts, Stipendiary Magistrate. |
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| In 1874, Tauranga was home to just 579 men, women and children who occupied 143 houses and six canvas dwellings. By 1916, the town’s population had almost trebled to 1685. |
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| Tauranga Historian Jinty Rourke says it seems the paperwork generated on their behalf had also risen considerably. So much so that extensions were made to the Government Buildings, opened just 10 years before. |
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| Omanawa sawmills supplied the rimu for the interiors. The Borough Council’s Omanawa Power Scheme had opened in 1915, and the city fathers took advantage of the changes to install electric lighting throughout. |
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| The town’s people viewed the extensions as “proof of the desire of the Government to push on the development of the district by providing a permanent home for their officials.” |
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| In 1938, the Post Office became the first government building to make a move away from the building. On December 1 that year, the Post Office moved to new premises on the corner of Spring and Grey Streets. The space it had vacated was soon filled up as other departments expanded, but a slow and inevitable drift had begun. |
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| As the structure began to show its age and expectations of working comfort increased, one by one, the others left too. A new Court House was opened on Cameron Road in November 1965 and before too long, the Ministry of Works was the sole occupant of Government Buildings, which by then had come to be known “The Old Post Office.” |
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| By 1972, the once busy and much feted building stood empty, echoing only to the scuttle of mice. All that remained were faded memories – of letters and telegrams sent and received, cases heard and judgements handed down. |
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| Many Tauranga citizens, saddened by its closure, mounted an active campaign to have the building restored and reopened. Despite their best efforts, well over a decade would pass before their dreams were realised. |
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| Clock |
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| From the time tenders for the new Government Buildings were let, Tauranga townsfolk had been agitating for a new town clock. |
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| On October 20, 1905 this letter appeared in the Bay of Plenty Times. |
| “The need for a public clock that will keep better time than the whirligig which does duty for one in the present Post Office was well shown yesterday morning when the said box of cogwheels was no less than 23 minutes behind time at 8 o’clock in the morning – a time when many people like to be able to set their watches.” |
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| The Bay of Plenty Times obligingly opened a subscription fund and its proprietor, Mr GA Ward, made the first contribution. The Borough Council made a further donation of 25 pounds and the mayor wired the Post Master General and requested a pound-for-pound subsidy. |
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| At a meeting on October 1 1906, councillors agreed that the clock should be erected as a memorial to RJ Seddon, who died that year. |
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| The clock, made by celebrated clock manufacturers Messrs Dent and Co. of London, arrived on October 20. Installation was delayed until January 1907, when Mr Shepherd Smith carried out the installation of the mechanism. The clock featured a face of some five feet in diameter and a three hundred weight bell. |
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| Once the installation was complete, Mr Smith was retained to wind and maintain the clock for the princely sum of 12 shillings and sixpence a month. |
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| Click here to download a detailed article about this transition. |
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