Early history of the site:
Prior to the establishment of Auckland as a colonial settlement in 1840, a track known as Te Ara o Karangahape was used by food-gathering parties travelling between the Waitemata and Manukau Harbours. Te Iringaorauru, near the current Karangahape Road and Symonds Street intersection, commemorates a place where the body of Rauru (a member of Ngati Whatua) was hung in a tree by Waiohua, an event said to have been a contributory cause of the Ngati Whatua conquest of Tamaki Makarau. After Auckland was established, the ridge along which Karangahape Road runs marked the formal southern extent of the colonial town. Karangahape Road itself was created in the 1840s. Its western end formed part of a route connecting the centre of commercial activity in the Queen Street gully with a major road heading north from the settlement - the Great North Road.
Early colonial activity on the ridge included the construction of a prestigious stone house by Auckland merchant David Nathan. The town cemetery was also laid out at its western end, near Partington's Flour Mill. Prior to 1851, land along the full length of the northern side of Karangahape Road was subdivided for sale by the Crown. Located on the corner between Karangahape Road and Pitt Street, the site on which the Naval and Family Hotel was later built was originally part of a Crown Grant of about 3,000 m² (three-quarters of an acre) made in 1855 to Thomas Henry a baker by trade. In April 1858 Henry conveyed his holding to Auckland solicitor Thomas Russell who after subdividing it sold two adjoining lots to innkeeper Patrick Darby (1833?-1910) in January 1861.
Construction of the first hotel:
A timber building later described as being of two storeys with a shingled roof was erected soon after Darby's purchase. In April 1862, the site was licensed to George Pearson as the Naval Hotel, by which time a structure was probably in place. A petition against the granting of a licence attracted the signatures of 90 local residents. Opposition from religious and other groups to licensed premises was a common feature of early colonial New Zealand, possibly partly due to uncommonly high levels of alcohol consumption among certain sectors of society. Pearson's public house (as it appeared in a sketch in 1865) was of a simple Georgian style with hipped roof. It had a centrally located arch-headed entrance from Pitt Street, square-headed windows, and a return balcony on the upper storey. A verandah on the upper storey of the north elevation offered views over the city and harbour.
Pearson purchased the property which included 'a dwelling house and buildings... known as the Naval Hotel', from Darby in May 1863. Prominently positioned to cater for travellers on Great North Road which commenced a short distance to the southwest, the Naval Hotel was the first hotel to be established in Karangahape Road. By 1866 it was just one of several licensed establishments located along the thoroughfare. In 1865 Pearson was advertising 'first-class accommodation and private apartments for families and single gentlemen'.
In 1867 the Naval Hotel was bought by Denis Markham following Pearson's default on the mortgage. During the 1870s and 1880s more intensive urban settlement moved towards Upper Queen Street and Pitt Street, spreading along the Karangahape Road and Newton ridges. In the early 1880s numerous blocks of new shops were crammed together on Karangahape Road, 'so that the utmost farthing could be wrung from the land'. Capitalising on the demand for retail sites, Markham subdivided his property in 1882. That part occupied by the hotel, by this time known as the Naval and Family, was sold to Coromandel hotelkeeper Patrick Brodie (?-1897). This commenced an eight-decade association between the establishment and the well-known Auckland family.
A survey plan prepared in 1882 shows the hotel as a T-shaped building aligned to Pitt Street with a separate structure facing Karangahape Road. On the same plot are two timber structures fronting Pitt Street to the north of the hotel. From 1884, newly introduced horse trams passed the hotel's Pitt Street and Karangahape Road frontages en route to Ponsonby. A decade later the configuration of buildings on the hotel site appears to have changed little. Structures to the west and north of the hotel are identified as 'shops'. On 21 December 1894, the Pitt Street shops were burnt down and the greater part of the hotel destroyed. Contemporary accounts described the hotel as being a timber building with a brick section, the latter presumably being added after 1882. Estimated damage to the hotel was £2,000 there being insufficient water available to extinguish the blaze.
Construction of the current hotel:
A replacement structure appears to have been erected on the prominent corner site between February 1895 and February 1896. Unlike the previous structure, the new building was constructed of brick.
At least two alternative blueprints for the new building were drawn up by prolific Auckland architect Arthur Wilson (1851-1937). Wilson had arrived from London in 1880 and was to design many commercial buildings in the heart of Auckland in the three decades commencing from the late 1880s. Both his preliminary drawings were for a three-storeyed structure with a corner bay and turret. During the 1880s Auckland experienced a hotel construction boom, fuelled in part by the stringent requirements of liquor licensing committees administering the Licensing Act 1881. It was not unknown for entrepreneurs to include a feature such as a tower in building plans for their hotels, even if such focal points were not actually built. As constructed, the Naval and Family did not adopt the turret and the overall design was more Italianate than that originally conceived by Wilson. It was nevertheless built in a highly decorative and visually impressive style, reflecting the prevailing desire of hotel owners to display their premises as useful additions to the streetscape at a time when supporters of alcohol prohibition held strong public backing.
The building featured imposing facades to both street frontages. The prominently-located corner entrance to the public bar was balanced by the guest entrance on Karangahape Road and a formal entrance on Pitt Street. There also appears to have been a subsidiary entrance on Karangahape Road, and a narrow, service entrance at the east end of the Pitt Street façade. Apart from the public bar, the ground floor is likely to have accommodated a dining room, lounges and a more intimate parlour bar. Guest accommodation would have been provided on the upper floors.
The contractor for the project was Yorkshire-born builder Thomas Julian (1843-1921). Actively involved in local body politics as a councillor and later as chair of the Auckland Harbour Board, Julian had arrived in Auckland in 1883 and was to develop a sizeable construction firm.
Subsequent use and development:
In 1895, the year of owner Patrick Brodie's death, the land formerly occupied by the hotel and two shops facing Pitt Street was subdivided leaving the southern portion of the holding as the hotel site. The Naval and Family Hotel was leased to Ehrenfried Brothers, a firm that merged shortly after with John Logan Campbell's enterprise to form the largest brewery concern in the colony. At this time brewers were increasingly buying hotels and taking over the leases of others to secure outlets in a competitive market. The Naval and Family underwent alteration less than three years after its completion with the installation of a large circular bar to better accommodate customers and enhance the appearance of rooms connected with it.
Brodie's son, also named Patrick (1868?-1941), subleased the hotel back from Campbell and Ehrenfried for eleven years from 1915, the first of two consecutive leases he took of the establishment. In 1924, the freehold of the property was transferred to the younger Brodie and his siblings Matthew (the Bishop of Christchurch and the Roman Catholic Church's first New Zealand-born bishop) and Mary Darby. Two years later the Naval and Family was transferred to Brodie Properties.
Patrick Brodie was a prominent figure in the local liquor trade and an office-holder in the United Licensed Victuallers Association which is now the Hospitality Association of New Zealand. The Association had formed in 1902 as a voluntary trade organisation for the hospitality sector during a period of comprehensive regulation of the liquor trade when triennial local options polls came close to achieving national prohibition. Brodie stepped down from the national presidency of the Association in 1922 when the Auckland branch seceded from the national body concerned at the latter's perceived lack of effort in ensuring that prohibition did not resurface as a major issue in the elections of 1925. Brodie retired from the industry early in the 1930s following the difficult depression years during which many hoteliers reduced their beer prices in bars in an effort to keep customers and remain in business.
In 1936 the Naval and Family Hotel was leased to New Zealand Breweries, who later bought the property in 1962. Conversion of a network of rooms and connecting corridors at ground floor level to two large rooms, a public and a private bar, was proposed - probably in the 1930s. The public bar was served by a large island-shaped counter and the private bar by a smaller, horseshoe counter. The alterations designed by the architect Daniel B. Patterson were probably built before January 1937, when floor traps in the public bar were inserted. Changes also appear to have been made to the ground floor toilets, and additional ablution and toilet facilities were added at first floor level. The guests' entrance appears to have been relocated to the west end of the Karangahape Road façade and the public bar's distinctive corner entrance converted to a window by this time. Some time before 1940, a verandah with pressed metal ceiling was added along the footpaths on both frontages.
In 1960, commencing a decade which brought far-reaching changes to an industry facing increasing competition from chartered clubs and restaurants, application was made to 'carry out alterations to Lounge Bar' of the Naval and Family to the value of ₤1945. The building's staircase appears to have been replaced around this time. By 1964, the first floor area of the hotel was being used as a lounge bar, and mostly comprised a large open space. This facility may have been created or enlarged as part of the work done four years earlier. Changes undertaken in 1964 appear to have included provision of downstairs women's toilets for the first time. These were accessed from a passage between the public and private bars, and their small size contrasts with the two larger male facilities accessed directly from each bar area. The second floor still retained guest rooms. By 1972, however, the establishment had become the Naval and Family Tavern, Licensing Control Commission requirements that city hotels provide a prescribed minimum of 10 rooms for guest accommodation having eventually given way as taverns increasingly gained acceptance. A narrow area towards the western end of the hotel's Karangahape Road frontage providing for 'bottle sales' in 1978 may have served this function from 1964 or earlier. While the building's external appearance above verandah level remained little altered, the lower storey of the Karangahape Road and Pitt Street facades was modernised with the introduction of large metal framed windows, modern doors and tiling to the exterior.
In 1995 the Naval and Family, one of a dwindling number of Victorian-era corner hotels in Auckland's Central Business District (CBD), was purchased from Lion Nathan (the successor to New Zealand Breweries) by private individuals. By 2005, the division between pubic and private bars had been removed and a single space created. Alterations in 2006 prior to renaming of the establishment as 'The Crest Hotel' included a re-facing of main facades at ground floor level and reintroduction of sash windows. Ground floor toilets were relocated westward to make room for a kitchen which served bars on the ground and first floors via new rear stairway. On the first floor a small deck was developed over the former toilet area to accommodate alfresco drinking and an outdoor area for smoking.
