Construction of the building began in 1955 and was not completed until 1998, although the building had been used as a cathedral since 1964. It was built from reinforced concrete because the Hawke's Bay earthquake of 1931 ruled out other construction methods. The wooden Lady Chapel on the north side of the cathedral was moved from its original location in Paraparaumu to this location in 1990 .
The predecessor of today's cathedral was an early settler church in New Zealand behind the current location of the Beehive and the church now known as Old Saint Paul's . The main entrance to the cathedral is on Hill Street in Thorndon , and another major entrance is on Molesworth Street.
Furnishing
View of the organ
The organ was originally built for Old St. Paul's Cathedral in 1877, and was reorganized and expanded in the 1930s by the organ builder Lawton and Osborne (Auckland). In 1964 the organ was installed in the new cathedral, and there in 1976 by the organ builder George Croft and Son (Auckland) again reorganized and expanded; the pipe material required for this was imported from England and Germany. Today's instrument has 62 registers (3,531 pipes) on four manual works and a pedal.
