Crowne Plaza Christchurch | |
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General information | |
Status | Completed |
Type | Office high rise |
Location | Christchurch Central City |
Address | Corner of Armagh and Colombo Street, Christchurch, New Zealand |
Coordinates | 43°31′44″S172°38′13″E / 43.529°S 172.637°E |
Completed | 1989 |
Height | |
Roof | 70 m (230 ft) |
Technical details | |
Floor count | 19 storeys |
Design and construction | |
Architect(s) | Warren and Mahoney |
Developer | Paynter Developments |
Main contractor | Fletcher Construction |
The Crowne Plaza Christchurch, formerly known as the Forsyth Barr Building, is located on the south-east corner of the Armagh and Colombo Streets intersection in Christchurch, New Zealand. Originally owned by Bob Jones and branded Robert Jones House by him, it was commonly referred to as Bob Jones Tower, but some called it Bob's Folly. In the 2011 Christchurch earthquake, its staircases collapsed, trapping the occupants. The building reopened in July 2017 as the city's Crowne Plaza hotel.
The original building on the location was the Golden Fleece Hotel, built in 1851. [1] The 1980s high-rise was a property speculation by Paynter Developments, who engaged Christchurch architecture firm Warren and Mahoney for the architectural design, and Holmes Consulting Group as structural engineers. Fletcher Construction was the contractor for the project. The building was finished in mid-1989 and sold to Robert Jones Investments (Canterbury), a company owned by Bob Jones. Jones, a property developer who had survived the 1987 stock market crash, named the building Robert Jones House and put the initials "RJI" of his investment company on the building. Jones had a high public profile, as he had set up the New Zealand Party just prior to the 1984 election to oppose Robert Muldoon, but the effect of this was that the conservative vote was split, and the Labour Party won the election, and David Lange formed the Fourth Labour Government. The building was commonly referred to as Bob Jones Tower, but some called it Bob's Folly in relation to his 1984 election interference. [2] The building was later sold and named for New Zealand investment banking firm Forsyth Barr. [3]
Built with 17 storeys, [4] the structure was at the time Christchurch's second tallest building at 70 metres (230 ft), after the 1986 Hotel Grand Chancellor at 85 metres (279 ft). Two further high rises overtook the Forsyth Barr House over time, first the PricewaterhouseCoopers building in 1990 at 76.3 metres (250 ft), and then the Pacific Tower in 2010 at 86 metres (282 ft). It was an unusual design for Warren and Mahoney, who had until then worked with exposed concrete beams that showed the structure of buildings, but chose a glass curtain wall design with aluminium panels that hid the structure. This construction system became the norm for office buildings for the next two decades based on construction techniques pioneered in Christchurch. [5] According to historian Geoffrey Rice, many architects regard this building as Warren and Mahoney's "ugly duckling", [3] and Paul Walker, professor of architecture at the University of Melbourne, asks: "Does anyone love the monolithic Forsyth Barr building on Colombo Street...?" [6]
In 2008, the Forsyth Barr Building was one of three A-grade office buildings in central Christchurch; the others were the PricewaterhouseCoopers Building, and the Clarendon Tower. [7]
After the September 11 attacks in 2001, emergency supplies for an evacuation of this high-rise were installed, including ropes, sledge hammers, and axes. [9] In the 2011 Christchurch earthquake, the staircases in Forsyth Barr House collapsed, trapping the occupants. One of the trapped occupants, a trained mountain guide with experience in mountain rescue, had windows broken and abseiled people onto an adjacent car parking building. The photo of one of the occupants being abseiled along the glass façade, taken by The Press photographer John Kirk-Anderson, is one of the enduring images of that earthquake. [9] Search of the building was technically difficult for urban search and rescue (USAR) teams, requiring the deconstruction of 4-tonne stair sets, but the building was cleared with no victims discovered. [10]
The Hotel Grand Chancellor and PricewaterhouseCoopers were both demolished subsequent to the earthquake, hence the Forsyth Barr Building is once more Christchurch's second tallest building. Until mid-2013, it was unclear whether the Forsyth Barr Building would also be demolished, or whether it was economic to repair it. [11]
Subsequent to the earthquakes, the Canterbury Earthquake Recovery Authority (CERA) developed a Christchurch Central Recovery Plan. Almost two city blocks were designated for the Performing Arts Precinct, including the land that the Forsyth Barr Building was located on. [12] [8] This meant that The Crown could have compulsorily acquired the land from its owners if it wanted to go ahead with the Performing Arts Precinct. [13] The designation was later lifted and the size of the Performing Arts Precinct designation reduced after Christchurch City Council had decided to restore the existing Christchurch Town Hall instead of building a new one within this precinct. [14]
The earthquake-damaged building was sold in an "as is, where is" state for NZ$8 million. [4] In December 2014, it was revealed that the building will be leased to the Crowne Plaza chain for a hotel, replacing the former Crowne Plaza hotel that stood diagonally opposite across Victoria Square prior to the earthquakes. [4] [15] In late 2015, new staircases were installed. [4] The new hotel opened on 1 July 2017, offering 204 rooms. [1]
TheArts Centre Te Matatiki Toi Ora is a hub for arts, culture, education, creativity and entrepreneurship in Christchurch, New Zealand. It is located in the Gothic Revival former Canterbury College, Christchurch Boys' High School and Christchurch Girls' High School buildings, many of which were designed by Benjamin Mountfort. The centre is a national landmark and taonga as it is home to New Zealand's largest collection of category one heritage buildings with 21 of the 23 buildings covered by Heritage New Zealand listings.
A major earthquake occurred in Christchurch on Tuesday 22 February 2011 at 12:51 p.m. local time. The Mw6.2 earthquake struck the Canterbury region in the South Island, centred 6.7 kilometres (4.2 mi) south-east of the central business district. It caused widespread damage across Christchurch, killing 185 people in New Zealand's fifth-deadliest disaster.
The Hotel Grand Chancellor was a major four-star hotel in the centre of Christchurch in New Zealand, one of eleven Hotel Grand Chancellor establishments across Australia and New Zealand. The hotel was located at 161 Cashel Street, close to the city's City Mall central shopping precinct.
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City Mall is the main pedestrian mall in the central city of Christchurch, New Zealand, comprising two sections of Cashel Street plus the Bridge of Remembrance and one section of High Street. It is also known colloquially as Cashel Mall. The Bridge of Remembrance was pedestrianised in 1976. The main mall was closed to traffic on 11 January 1982 and formally reopened as a pedestrian mall on 7 August, but it was not until 1992 that the entire mall was paved. The mall was redeveloped between 2006 and 2009, and track was installed for an expansion of the heritage tram network.
Warren and Mahoney is an international architectural and interior design practice - one of the few third generation architectural practices in the history of New Zealand architecture. It is a highly awarded architectural practice, with offices in New Zealand and Australia.
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Ivan Lyall Holmes was a New Zealand structural engineer whose advances in concrete masonry building methods in the 1950s and 1960s were central to the avant-garde style of modernist architecture known as New Brutalism which emerged in the 1950s. It was epitomised locally in the work of architects such as Miles Warren, Maurice Mahoney and Paul Pascoe.
The Westpac Canterbury Centre was a landmark tower on the corner of High Street and Cashel Street in the center of Christchurch, New Zealand. Prior to the February 2011 earthquake, it was considered the 9th tallest building in Christchurch, standing at 55 metres tall.
Victoria Street is a road in the central city of Christchurch, New Zealand. It runs from the intersection of Papanui Road and Bealey Avenue in the north-west, and terminates in the south-east at the corner of Kilmore and Durham Streets. One of the two diagonal roads that break the original grid plan, it was very important in the development of Christchurch.
The Crowne Plaza in Christchurch, New Zealand, originally known as the Parkroyal Hotel, was a hotel of the Crowne Plaza group. Built in 1988 in the north-west corner of Victoria Square after much public protest, as it cut off the first part of Victoria Street, its construction happened at the same time and enabled the substantial redesign of Victoria Square. The building had New Zealand's largest atrium, and was one of the city's largest hotels. The building suffered significant damage in the 2011 Christchurch earthquake and was demolished in April 2012. The Crowne Plaza group has secured a lease in the Forsyth Barr Building at the opposite end of Victoria Square.
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The Christchurch Central Recovery Plan, often referred to as the Blueprint, is the plan developed by the Fifth National Government of New Zealand for the recovery of the Christchurch Central City from a series of earthquakes, in particular the February 2011 Christchurch earthquake. The Canterbury Earthquake Response and Recovery Act 2010 required the Christchurch City Council to develop a recovery plan for the central city. The plan, known as Share an Idea, was presented to the Minister for Canterbury Earthquake Recovery, Gerry Brownlee, in December 2011. Brownlee rejected the city council's plan, established the Canterbury Earthquake Recovery Authority (CERA), and tasked that organisation with developing a plan based on the city council's draft. The Christchurch Central Recovery Plan was published in July 2012 and defined 17 anchor projects. All projects where a timeline was specified were to have been finished by 2017; none of the 17 projects have been delivered on time and some have not even been started yet.
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