Why is this place significant?

Why is this place Category 1 / Category 2?

The Hawke's Bay Farmers' Co-operative Association was founded in 1891. It was set up to enable the region's primary producers to secure a financial interest in the marketing of their produce. Several similar cooperative associations were established in other rural districts, with coordination provided at a national level by the Farmers' Co-operative Association N.Z. Limited. The activities of the Hawke's Bay Farmers' Co-op quickly expanded and it soon operated grain and produce stores, grass-seed dressing plants, warehouses, and retail outlets for merchandise. In 1899, the Farmers Co-op erected a building on Market Street with the largest floor space in Hastings. Along with the firm of de Pelichet McLeod, the Farmers Co-op helped to generate growth in Hastings' trade, capturing much of the rural business that had previously gone to Napier and Port Ahuriri. Branches of the Hawke's Bay Farmers' Co-op were also opened in other towns, including Napier, Waipukurau, Dannevirke, Wairoa, Takapau, and Woodville. Business interests continued to broaden. In 1948, the Co-op's activities were listed as those of 'Wool Brokers, Stock Agents & Auctioneers; Insurance & Shipping Agents; Grain, Seed & General Merchants; Garage Proprietors; Land & Estate Agents'. The rising popularity of the motorcar in the early twentieth century, and the profits to be made, prompted an increasing number of firms to enter into the motor trade industry. At this time motor garages did nearly everything from constructing and selling cars, to servicing and filling them with petrol. The Hawke's Bay Farmers' Co-op was one of the earliest to enter into the trade in Hastings, along side firms such as Sullivan, Ross and Company, D.E. Davis, and S. Boyd. The Hawke's Bay Farmers' Co-op opened garages near many of its branches. The Garage on Queen Street in Hastings was constructed behind the Hawke's Bay Farmers' Co-op's main building in 1925. Plans compiled by the Vulcan Foundry indicate that the building design was completed in June 1925, and the structure was completed at the cost of £7,800 later that same year. A panoramic photograph of Hastings, taken in 1927, is the first known photograph showing the structure. The garage was first advertised that same year in Wise's Post Office Directories. Providing fuel for vehicles was originally via imported two gallon (18 litre) cans that were sold at motor garages, as well as places such as general stores and chemists. Later, cans were refillable. By the mid-1920s, government concerns over a spate of tragic accidents and property loss, caused by the mishandling and use and storage of cans, led to the decision to move to underground storage and fixed pumps, or bowsers as they were known. By the end of 1926 most motor garages had installed underground storage and bowsers. The Hawke's Bay Farmers' Co-op garage in Hastings was, at the time of its completion, likely to have been one of the first purpose-built garages with bowsers in New Zealand. From 1928 the Garage was advertised as a 'Buick Service Station Motor Garage', indicating the vehicle franchise it was then associated with, and was managed by William Alexander (Bill) Greer (1895?-1975). Greer had originally worked at the Hawke's Bay Farmers' Co-op garage in Napier before being transferred to Dannevirke to manage a new garage there. He went on to found the company Stuart Greer Motors Limited. The building was used to store cars and undertake mechanical repairs. It included a showroom at the front, a service station, and a workshop. On 3 February 1931 an earthquake measuring 7.9 on the Richter scale hit the Hawke's Bay. In the two and a half minutes that it lasted 256 people lost their lives, huge tracts of land rose out of the sea, and much of the built environment in Napier, Hastings and the wider Hawke's Bay was destroyed. The earthquake changed the face of Napier, which had been a small seaside town, with a picturesque harbour and Victorian buildings comprising the commercial centre. Many of the buildings not damaged by the earthquake were destroyed by fire. The records of the Insurance Council of New Zealand indicate that the Garage had a severe crack in one of its walls, but was otherwise undamaged. A photograph taken shortly after the disaster indicates that it remained open for business. In October 1934 a permit to alter the building was granted. This allowed for the addition of a western bay, and from that time the building has had the three-bay form that exists today. The cost of the addition was estimated at £3,980. The Hawke's Bay Farmers' Co-op underwent a number of changes in the 1980s. In 1982 it became the Hawke's Bay Farm & Finance and HBF Dalgety & Company Ltd. This company was then subsumed into Dalgety & Company Ltd and then acquired by Common Shelton Ltd. The following year, Dalgety New Zealand Ltd and Crown Consolidation merged. The Garage was closed and the building became a retail outlet, specifically Briscoes on one side and Payless Plastics on the other. The property, including the garage, was sold by the HBFCA in 1991 to Douglas Crawford and Thomas Harris. In 1996, a new front wall was built on its northern side and the retail area extended. The building is currently not tenanted.

The Hawke's Bay Farmers' Co-operative Association Garage is located on the south side of Queen Street West, near the Association's former Headquarters in Hastings' central business district. The building has an unusual vaulted form, most clearly evident on the rear elevation. Here, the reinforced concrete frame of the building is exposed, with columns, a horizontal beam at eave level, and arches above. There are two wide arches (the west is a later addition of 1934, confirmed by the details and materials being slightly different) with a small arch between. The infill material is unpainted brickwork. The front elevation has a dramatic arched parapet, of a shallower curve than the barrel-vaulted roof behind, with a short horizontal parapet on the east side. The parapet has a moulded capping, the original name of the building running around under the capping, and five blanked off windows with curved heads. An advertising hoarding now covers a large part of the elevation above verandah level. Changes below the verandah include modern doors, but the original structural layout of columns is still evident. A stark blue and yellow colour scheme, along with advertising, obliterates much of the quality of what was a handsome industrial street elevation. The main part of the facade is symmetrical, and covers the original part of the building, a wide and narrow bay. The third bay, added on to the west side and flush at the back wall, is set back from the road frontage and has a lean-to roof, rendering it subservient to the main part of the facade. Written information indicates that, inside, the original character of the building is disguised by modern finishes, the suspended ceiling in particular. Visible through holes in the ceiling are steel trusses with curved top chords (apparently shaped from steel with a profile close to that of railway line); tongue and groove boarding, and impressive skylights, which together suggest a high degree of authenticity in the roof structure of the building. The plan layout is presently two main spaces, one in the west addition, and the other the original part of the building. A row of columns in this space indicate the spans of the wide bay and the narrow central bay. The drawings of 1934 indicate the use of the whole of the ground floor which included at that time, showroom (left front), and service station (front right); offices and workshops behind, and sundry other rooms such as toilets, tyre room, car wash, battery room and 'bulk benzine store' at the rear.

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A fully referenced verion of this report is available from the NZHPT Central Region Office. Please note that entry on the New Zealand Heritage List/Rarangi Korero identifies only the heritage values of the property concerned, and should not be construed as advice on the state of the property, or as a comment of its soundness or safety, including in regard to earthquake risk, safety in the event of fire, or insanitary conditions.