Manhole Covers, New Zealand

Sometimes it pays to look down to find beauty. Like these New Zealand manhole covers.

a deco one from Napier


and a more modern one (2005) from Wellington

Building, Napier

A nice corner Deco building from 1934 in Napier, NZ.

Halsbury Chambers, Napier

I took this photo of Halsbury Chambers (1932) in Napier, New Zealand in 1999. I was lucky to catch the vintage car out the front that gives it a bit of a timeless feel.

I was back in Napier in April this year and this time I was lucky to get a shot with no cars at all in front of the building. It seems to have faired reasonably well over the last fourteen years.

The little swing sign to the left of the entrance is gone but the arm that held it is still there so it wouldn't take much to put it back. It looks like the current occupant prefers to put its name along the bottom of the windows. It could be worse, I suppose, but I prefer they had advertised themselves in a less intrusive way, perhaps via a small swing sign just to the left of the entrance.

A House in Marewa

Wat back in 2008 I posted some photos of modernist houses in Marewa.

The beauty of Marewa is that it isn't one, two or three modernist houses scattered throughout the suburb, it is an entire suburb of modernist houses. Each one is different from the next. This one, for instance, is quite plain but has a lovely doorway.

Leadlight Windows in Napier

Yesterday I posted a selecton of Art Deco windows from Napier in New Zealand. Well we are still in Napier today but this I've got a selection of leadlight windows. Mostly they are from houses in Napier but a few are from the Rothman's Building.

Windows in Napier

A while ago I got a request to post some pictures of Art Deco windows. So when I while I was looking at my photos from Napier for Wednesday post about Harston's Building I put aside a selection of windows to show you today.

You should remember this windows from Harston's Building (1930) but around the fabulous ground floor entrance they are lovely leadlight windows.

This monogramed window comes from above the door of Tennyson Chambers.

Nearby Gladstone Chambers has this window above its door.

At 58 Tennyson St, the window looks like this.

A different style of monogramed window but I can't identify the building it comes from.

Nor this one.

I think this one is from Westerman's Building (1932).

This is from the Louis Hay designed AMP Building (1933).

The front of the Masonic Hotel (1932) and the glass canopy over the side entrance are often photographed but you don't often see this simple window on the side of the hotel.

Likewise the decorative work above the entrance to the Hawke's Bay Museum and Art Gallery (1935) but perhaps not the pairs of small windows in the annexes on either side of the entrance.

The ASB Bank (1932) is renowned for the maori style decoaration on the ceiling but here is a similar motif in the windows.

And this pattern on a small exterior window of the ASB Bank building.

Rothman's Building (1933) still has wooden slash windows but with wonderful floral leadlights in the upper portions.

The former Gaiety de Luxe Cinema (1932) provides a touch of Spain or Morroco or both.

And I don't know what Doyle's were thinking with this colour scheme.

The Hawke's Bay Chambers falls back to an old Art Deco favourite with chevrons worked into the pattern of the window panes.

And how about this Enerson St building.

Similar windows at the former Smith & Chambers Building (1932).

Masson House (1931) has plain rectangular windows but the decoration around the feature window above the main entrance makes up for it.

The Countrywide Bank Building (1931) seems to combine everything ... rectangles, triangles and wonderful decoration.

I love this weatherboard house in Marewa and isn't that a stunning window.

The Fifth World Congress on Art Deco in 1999 gave us access to several houses in Napier with wonderful leadlight windows. This is just a taster and quite plain compared to some I will show you tomorrow.

References:
Art Deco Napier: Styles of the thirties by Peter Shaw and Peter Hallett