The Circa Theatre in Wellington
Story and Photos By Diane Slawych
Why demolish a building when you can move it instead? That seems to be the guiding philosophy in New Zealand, where it’s not unusual to find a wide variety of structures that have been physically relocated from one place to another.
On a recent three-week visit to the North Island, I was surprised to discover no fewer than a dozen buildings that had been moved over the years. Many of them are tourist attractions and include churches, hotels and at least one theatre.
Details of these cumbersome relocations – which involve months of painstaking planning, considerable cost and unique obstacles that must be overcome – are often described on guided walking tours or on informational plaques at the building site itself.
Unable to find statistics on the precise number of buildings that have been relocated in the country, I resorted to querying locals at every opportunity, in an attempt to determine the reason for this moving craze.
“We like a challenge,” says James McGruer, director, Visit Devonport.
It certainly is a challenge, especially for large buildings. And one of the largest to have been moved is the Museum Art Hotel in the capital city of Wellington. The luxury boutique property is the renowned home of one of New Zealand’s finest collections of contemporary art.
The Museum Art Hotel
In 1993, the six-year-old reinforced concrete building, weighing an estimated 3,500 tons, was moved a distance of 180 metres across a major road to make way for the new Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa.
It took five months to prepare for the move. The building was turned into a gigantic railway carriage and wheeled on eight sets of parallel rails. The wheels were then turned 90 degrees and the building was pushed across the road on another set of rails to a point where it was joined to new foundations.
A hotel spokesperson told REM that during the process, the only items removed from the hotel was the bed linen. “Everything else remained in situ, even the liquor bottles in the bar. Nothing was damaged in the move and there were no signs of any stress,” says the spokesperson. The entrepreneur who undertook the project, Chris Parkin, was later awarded the title of Wellingtonian of the Year in recognition of his efforts.
A few meters from the hotel and the Te Papa museum is the Circa Theatre. Established in 1976 and considered one of New Zealand’s most innovative theatres, it also moved to a new location in 1993 along with its old Westport Coal Chambers façade, which is painted an eye-catching red with white trim and ornate embellishments. Details of the move along with photos are described on the exterior of the building.
One of the most popular places to visit in the Auckland area is Devonport. The picturesque Victorian village, with viewpoints atop volcanic cones, is just a short 12-minute ferry ride from downtown Auckland. One of the first buildings you see is the historic Esplanade Hotel, which opened in 1903. It was built on a site that once contained the Flagstaff hotel – an old wooden building that had been moved to another site (and was later demolished in 1938).
St. Mary’s church in Auckland.
On a self-guided Devonport Audio Tour, I learned of yet another relocated building, the small wooden mortuary chapel of St. Francis de Sales. In 1894 it was moved from the Symonds Street cemetery to Devonport. Prior to that, Roman Catholic services were being held in parishioners’ homes.
The chapel was loaded on to a horse-drawn wagon and transported to the Auckland waterfront, where it was then floated across the harbour on a barge and carried to the site. By 1904 the Catholic population had increased and an attractive neo-Gothic-style brick church was eventually built around the wooden one, which is what you see today at the St Francis de Sales and All Souls Roman Catholic Church.
Back on the mainland, not far from the excellent Auckland Museum is the historic neighbourhood of Parnell – full of charming renovated buildings that now house cafes, restaurants, galleries and boutique shops.
It was at the top end of Parnell Road that I found the beautiful St. Mary’s church (a former cathedral), built in 1886 and known as one of the finest wooden Gothic buildings in the world. It too had been relocated.
When the first portion of Holy Trinity Cathedral was completed in 1973, St. Mary’s became much less used and fell into disrepair. But rather than tear it down, a decision was made to move the 390-ton church to a site between Parnell Road and the new cathedral – an engineering feat that was completed in 1982.
Inside St. Mary’s are photographs and text that describe the three-month-long process. It shows how the columns were transferred from their foundations to a transverse steel beam and the stained glass windows were reinforced with plywood on both faces to prevent damage, before the structure was transferred to rollers and on to the timber “railway” constructed beneath the building.
Perhaps the most illustrious visitor to St. Mary’s over the years was Queen Elizabeth II, who attended Christmas service on her Coronation tour in 1953. If the Queen ever returns to the country, she may be pleased to know the church is still standing. Though to find it now, she’d have to be directed to its new location across the road.
