Why is this place significant?

ARCHITECTURAL DESCRIPTION: The Centenary Memorial Church at Otakou brings together the formal principles of English church design with the traditional decorative motifs of Maori art. The result is a building which evokes the appearance of a Maori meeting house and yet at the same time fulfills the Ecclesiological tenet that the different parts of a church should be distinct from one another. Thus the nave, chancel, bell and entrance tower, vestry and sanctuary are clearly articulated within an exterior composition which features the extensive use of concrete panels cast in imitation of Maori carving. The panels adorn the bargeboards, buttresses, door and window surrounds of the building and were cast from moulds which were taken from carvings held in the Otago Museum. The plaster panels which decorate the interior of the church were also created in this manner and the idea of using existing carvings to serve as the templates for the Otakou church panels can be credited to a Mr Thompson, who was a local collector and connoisseur of Maori artifacts. Designed to provide seating for one hundred and twenty people, the church is unusual not only for its extensive use of Maori decorative motifs, but also for the inclusion of a local history museum within the building. Situated at the liturgical west end of the church, directly opposite the chancel, the museum is 4.3 x 4.9 metres square and is entered through double swing doors at the rear of the nave which is four bays long and 12.5 x 6.1 metres square. Like the main body of the church the museum features painted kowhaiwhai panels which decorate the ceiling, although in the museum these panels are flat whereas those in the nave are boxed to sheath the rafters of the pitched roof. Both the nave and the museum are lit by rectangular windows and those in the former are filled with coloured leadlights which are based on Maori decorative patterns. The chancel is lit by a stained glass window designed by John Brock, a Dunedin craftsman, and the window depicts a seated Christ surrounded by three adults and three children, four of the figures wearing traditional Maori dress. In addition to the principal architectural features of the church, there are a number of objects set within the fabric of the building which commemorate different aspects of Otakou's history. For example, a brick set within the wall of the church was originally part of Reverend Watkin's manse at Karitane, which was built in 1840 from bricks imported from Sydney. Further, there is a stone set into the rear wall of the nave which came from the Venerable Bede's Monastery at Jarrow, England (862) and another which was part of the Weller Brothers' whaling store, erected in 1831 and the site of the first services held by Rev. Watkin in Otakou. The stone font beside the entrance was originally made for the first Otakou church and the bell in the tower came from the Perseverance, a Maori owned schooner which transported Bishop Selwyn to Otakou in 1844. Finally the pulpit, which repeats the tukutuku work featured on the chancel dado, contains fragments from the pulpit, carved by the Rev J F Reimenschneider of the first Otakou church. MODIFICATIONS: 1984 Flooring renewed in museum wing and in part of the nave.

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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. 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.