Antigua Boat Sheds
The Antigua Boat Sheds are wooden boat houses on the Avon River in the center of Christchurch city on New Zealand's South Island . They are on the left bank of the river at 2 Cambridge Terrace.
After the building was registered as a category II cultural monument by the New Zealand Historic Places Trust on September 10, 2004 under number 1825, it was upgraded to category I on February 19, 2010 after a review. In addition, it has been protected since July 2006 by a Full Conservation Covenant under Section 77 of the Reserves Act 1977 , an agreement between owners and Christchurch City Council.
The property is part of a public recreation area managed by Christchurch City Council, the Lawns Ornamental Gardens and Ornamental Buildings .
The originally one-story shed was built in several stages in 1882 and 1883 by two boat builders from Lyttelton , Albert Shaw and JT Tidd, as a boathouse for a commercial boat rental company. In 1885 a tourist guide reported on an established boathouse with 38 boats for one to 15 people and 16 canoes.
In 1887 the partnership broke up and Shaw became the sole owner. He sold it in November 1896 to Samuel Anstey from Fendalton . He set up a photo studio in the boat shed. Numerous glass plates from this period remain in the attic of the shed and are now in the Canterbury Public Library .
The eastern half of the complex burned at 6 a.m. on May 14, 1907, and half of the approximately 70 boats were destroyed. The starting point of the fire was possibly a stove used to steam the planks required for boat building. The building was rebuilt and the easternmost part was raised.
In the 1920s, a shop was installed at the west end. Nearby there was another boat rental shop on the same side of the river, downstream from Montreal Street Bridge, since 1875. On August 3, 1929 it burned down after arson.
WS Dini was the owner for over 30 years from 1948 to 1978. In 1960 the rental company owned 77 canoes made of glass fiber reinforced plastic, which were manufactured in the boathouse itself.
A move by the city council in May 1964 to change the layout of Antigua Street and to build a road bridge near the boathouse met with little approval from the population and was abandoned.
A wooden boat deck was added on the river side from the late 1970s, in 1983 a café with river terrace was integrated, and in 1997 toilets were installed. In 2006 part of the pile foundation was replaced and the structure reinforced.
The green and white striped sheds are an "institution" in Christchurch that relates the English identity of Christchurch to the boating tradition in England, especially Oxford and Cambridge . They are possibly the only 19th century boathouses built for commercial boat hire on a river, and in any case the only ones that have been in continuous use for that purpose for about 130 years.
The earthquakes in 2010 and 2011 left only minor damage to the wooden structure; in the Christchurch earthquake in February 2011 , part of the boat deck gave way. The rental was closed until the end of March due to static investigations.
Today kayaks , canoes , rowing boats and pleasure boats as well as bicycles are rented out in boat rental . Part of the building is used for gastronomy.
literature
- S. Eldred-Grigg: A New History of Canterbury. Dunedin, 1982.
- R. Lamb: From the Banks of the Avon: the Story of a River. Reed, Wellington 1981
- To Encyclopedia of New Zealand , Government Printer, Wellington, 1966
- M Mosley: Illustrated Guide to Christchurch and Neighborhood. JT Smith & Co 1885
- J. Wilson: Lost Christchurch. Te Waihora Press, Springston 1984
- John Wilson et al .: Contextual historical overview for Christchurch City. Christchurch City Council, Christchurch 2005
- John Wilson: City and Peninsula: the Historic Places of Christchurch and Banks Peninsula. Christchurch 2007
Individual evidence
Antigua Boat Sheds (English). Register of Historic Places. New Zealand Historic Places Trust.
- ↑ a b c d e f g h historical summary on the website of the Antigua Boat Sheds
- ↑ Christchurch attractions are getting back to business, www.stuff.co.nz of March 30, 2011
Web links
Coordinates: 43 ° 32 ′ 2.1 ″ S , 172 ° 37 ′ 40.9 ″ E