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Registration Type
Historic Place Category 1
Register Number
92
Date Registered
24-Nov-1983
Legal Description
Allot 14 Sec 13 City of Auckland (CT NA14B/1135) and Secs 2, 3 SO 374931 (NZ Gazette 2006, p.3529), North Auckland Land District
City/District Council
Auckland Council (Auckland City Council)
Region
Auckland Region
Summary
This historic place was registered under the Historic Places Act 1980. The following text is the original citation considered by the NZHPT Board at the time of registration.
This handsome building was designed by Grainger and D'Ebro, Melbourne architects who won the Auckland City Council competition for a library building in 1884.
The building was constructed in brick and plaster and completed in 1887. It is early French Renaissance in style and modulated to suit a rising corner site.
The building has three storeys, and also an attic in the steep pitched roofs. The harmonious proportioning of the building derives from the massing of parts and the sense of movement generated by alternating projected and recessed frontages. The projecting bays have pavilion roofs with dormer windows, highlighted with console brackets and pediments. Corinthian pilasters flank other windows, and corners and ground floor windows have broken pediments.
The architects utilised the one hundred and twenty degree corner site with great ingenuity to provide the building with picturesque townscape features. A curving section is used to link the parts and provides interest with an ogee roofed tower. Alongside this corner section is a six storey clock tower.
Inside the corner tower is a Palladian styled stairway. The former reference room of the library has a superb gallery supported on cast iron columns protected by cast iron balustrades.
For many years the building had a multiple function as civic offices, public library and art gallery. It was remodelled from 1969 until 1971 and the Edmiston Wing was added. In 1971 the library was transferred to a new Auckland Public Library building, and the gallery gained sole occupancy of the original building.
The Auckland City Art Gallery is of outstanding architectural importance in terms of style, originality and townscape.
Construction Professionals
- Grainger & D'Ebro - Architectural Partnership
Construction Dates
- Original Construction: 1885 (circa) - 1888 (circa)
Other Information
Received an NZ Architecture Award Medal 2012.
Information on
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