Historic Significance

Historical Significance or Value This historic place was registered under the Historic Places Act 1980. This report includes the text from the original Building Classification Committee report considered by the NZHPT Board at the time of registration. The first Criterion Hotel was opened on this site in March 1874. This building was destroyed in the earthquake. The present Criterion hotel building symbolises continuity and stability locally.

Physical Significance

This historic place was registered under the Historic Places Act 1980. This report includes the text from the original Building Classification Committee report considered by the NZHPT Board at the time of registration. ARCHITECTURAL SIGNIFICANCE: The Criterion Hotel is an eclectic design incorporating elements of both Spanish Mission and Art Deco styles. Spanish Mission style, a twentieth century revival of a Californian building type which was used by Spanish missionaries who, in the eighteenth century, settled in the Western Americas and began a programme of educating and caring for the indigenous American Indian populations. The first Spanish missions were built in adobe (mud brick construction) and then whitewashed to deflect the intense heat of the Californian sunshine. The form of the buildings emphasised horizontally with long low structures extending along a plateau. Decoration was minimal; arched openings and barley-twist columns and occasional bell-towers provided the only embellishment. Simplicity and sincerity in the use of indigenous materials were the keynotes of this style. The first major prototype of Spanish Mission style revival was the Californian Building at 1893 World Exposition in Chicago. The style was subsequently featured in architectural literature through to the 1930s and Williams would have been fully conversant with the major elements of the style which he employed in this building. The use of Spanish Mission and Art Deco elements by Williams and his contemporaries, was consciously based on the idea that Napier had all of the climatic and cultural advantages of the West coasts of America but in an entirely new setting. The style emphasised the normal concern of the period with creating an environment of outdoor living and sunshine which Spanish Mission represented in popular culture. It also related to the California Bungalow style which had already been in evidence for ten years before. Its use in public buildings is significant for extending the style of the domestic area with the idea of creating a city of youth and promise. TOWNSCAPE/LANDMARK SIGNIFICANCE: The Criterion occupies a large block of land in Emerson Street, the main street of Napier. It is backed by the Market Reserve Building and so the entire section through to Tennyson street is the work of Associated Architects with thematic links through the use of arched window openings. These arches also link to other Williams designs in Napier - the Central Hotel at the corner of Emerson and Dalton Streets and the work of Louis Hay, Finch and Westerholm, and other contemporary Napier architects.