Māori Settlement of Te Whanganui-a-Tara (Wellington) and the Establishment of Te Aro Pā The Māori history and settlement of Te Whanganui-a-Tara reflects many changes and waves of migration over hundreds of years. Before the arrival of Māori from Taranaki in the 1820s and 1830s , Te Whanganui-a-Tara was populated primarily by people of Kurahaupō waka descent, including Ngāi Tara, Rangitāne, Muaūpoko, Ngāti Apa and Ngāti Ira. These people have been referred to as ‘Whatonga-descent peoples’ since all claimed descent from Whatonga, an early Māori explorer who named the harbour Te Whanganui-a-Tara, for his son Tara. Hannah Playhouse is located very near to the site of one of the largest pā in Te Whanganui-a-Tara – Te Aro Pā. Te Aro Pā was established in 1824 by Ngāti Mutunga near the former shoreline in what is now part of the Wellington central business district, in the vicinity of lower Taranaki, Manners and Cuba Streets. When Ngāti Mutunga migrated to Rēkohu/ Wharekauri/the Chatham Islands in 1835, they left their lands ‘from Waitangi Stream to Ngauranga’ in the possession of Taranaki iwi and Te Aro Pā was subsequently inhabited by whānau and hapū of Ngāti Ruanui, Taranaki iwi and Te Āti Awa. Te Aro Pā was surrounded by extensive cultivations totalling approximately 60-80 acres, including on Puke Ahu/Mount Cook and extending in pockets to the south coast at Paekawakawa/Island Bay. The nearby bush, Waitangi Lagoon and harbour itself were also rich in resources, as were the numerous waterways that are largely unseen today, such as the nearby Waimapihi Stream (also known as Te Aro Stream) and the Waitangi Stream, bounding the Te Aro flats to the west and east respectively. Present-day Cambridge Terrace follows Waitangi Stream, which flowed from Newtown along Adelaide Road to the Basin Reserve (originally a significant wetland known as Hauwai), and then along what is now Kent Terrace, feeding into the expansive Waitangi Lagoon which provided Māori with eels, fish and shellfish, flax, fresh water and was also used for launching waka. The New Zealand Company bought land in the Wellington Harbour (Port Nicholson) area in 1839 in preparation for emigration from England. The area was soon colonised with the Pākehā settlement growing steadily and attracting many immigrants. Te Aro Pā was reserved for Māori in the 1844 deeds of release along with other traditional pā such as Pipitea, but the pressures of Pākehā colonisation, including the loss of cultivations or their transfer by government to less desirable and more remote land, and the effects of the Taranaki wars caused the population of Te Aro Pā to rapidly decline. The 1855 earthquake also resulted in dramatic change to the Wellington landscape and the availability of natural resources – a new shoreline was created and the Te Aro flats were raised by around 1.5 to 2 metres. The inhabitants of Te Aro Pā dwindled from 186 in 1850 to 28 in 1881, and by the 1890s the pā was unoccupied. Remains of the pā were uncovered in 2005 during construction of a multi-storey apartment building, and are now preserved for display at Te Aro Pā Visitor Centre. The Waitangi Stream was culverted as part of the underground storm-water system (original plans to turn it into a canal were abandoned after the earthquake) and it was once again exposed to daylight again as a key element of the Waitangi Park development which opened in 2006. Development of Courtenay Place and ‘Cording’s Corner’ The Courtenay Place area was slow to develop following Pākehā settlement – its early development exemplifying ‘the gulf between the New Zealand Company’s vision of a utopian settlement and the grim Victorian reality that eventuated in parts of Wellington’. It was initially an industrial area surrounded by ‘slum’ housing but by the mid-1920s it was shaping into the ‘civilised concourse’ originally envisaged with a number of imposing two-storey masonry buildings including picture theatres, restaurants, coffee lounges and shops. One such masonry building was located on the prominent site at the corner of Courtenay Place and Cambridge Terrace, known locally as ‘Cording’s Corner’ (after Cording’s bookshop which operated out of the downstairs corner shop in the early twentieth century). ‘Cording’s Corner’ was originally part of Town Section 225, one of the one-acre town sections created as part of the Port Nicholson settlement. Town Section 225 was one of several sections purchased by Pākehā settler Harry Hughlings who arrived in Wellington on the Bombay in 1842. It was later subdivided in 1876, with the land parcel at the corner of Courtenay Place and Cambridge Terrace becoming Lot 4 Deed 52. Deed Plan 52 shows a building on this land parcel – this would have been an earlier timber building subsequently replaced by the two-storey masonry (brick) building which dates to the late 1880s. A number of businesses occupied the masonry building throughout its history. In addition to the bookshop there was a tobacconist shop, chemist, florist, and beauty salon, and it later housed the Walkabout Coffee Bar and Restaurant (upstairs). A New Theatre for Wellington – the Sheilah Winn Donation In 1964 Sheilah Winn (1917-2001) donated $300,000 to build a small and intimate theatre in Wellington after the style of those she had experienced in London. Her generous donation stemmed from her passion for her hometown and from her interest in theatre. Sheilah Winn was the granddaughter of Irish immigrant Robert Hannah (1845-1930) who moved to Wellington in 1874 where he opened a boot shop and a factory five years later. R. Hannah and Co. Ltd. grew rapidly, becoming a major manufacturing and retail enterprise. With stores nationwide Hannahs remains a household name in New Zealand to this day, while Winn went onto sponsor the high-profile Sheilah Winn Shakespeare Festival (1992-present). The Winn Theatre Group committee was subsequently formed by the Queen Elizabeth II Arts Council and it convened over a four-year period with little progress. The frustrations Winn experienced in the years of deliberation over location, design, and performance type for the theatre meant that she vowed never again to give money for a building project. Founding of the Downstage Theatre company (1964) In 1968 Wellington City Council pushed for Winn’s donation to be channelled into a civic theatre for wide-ranging performing arts. The Arts Council resisted this, arguing that it deviated from the donor’s intention. It was at this point that the Downstage Theatre Society became involved. In 1964, the same year that Winn made her donation, the Downstage Theatre Society had been founded at a public meeting instigated by a dissatisfaction with the New Zealand theatre scene. The objective was to create an exciting small, local, and professional theatre. On 20 November 1964 Downstage opened in its first home in the former home of the Walkabout Coffee Bar and Restaurant on the upper floor of the building at the corner of Cambridge Terrace and Courtenay Place, where the Hannah Playhouse was later to be built. The society aimed to provide permanent employment for actors with performances throughout the week. Graeme Kerr, the well-known television chef, cooked dinner for patrons on opening night. The provision for meals and coffee before shows was popular with theatre patrons. A precedent was set during this period for informal seating arrangements and flexibility in stage location. Later, when the Hannah Playhouse was being built, the society relocated to the Star Boating Club in Jervois Quay where dining remained integral to performances. This tradition of use was to become a defining feature in the design of the Hannah Playhouse. The idea of combining a theatre with a restaurant remained controversial though, with some purist actors opposed to the distraction from the art form caused by dining. In contrast, supporters appreciated the resultant breaking down of barriers and increased accessibility of theatre to the public, along with the sense of social occasion afforded by a relaxed and informal atmosphere. Hannah Playhouse Design Brief and Construction In 1968 the Hannah Playhouse Trust was formed to build a new theatre on the site occupied by the Walkabout Coffee Bar and Restaurant building, to be named after Sheilah Winn’s maternal grandfather Robert Hannah. From this point the Trust Board became responsible for the Hannah Playhouse project. Raymond Boyce, set designer and chairman of the newly-formed Downstage Theatre Company, and other members of Downstage developed a design brief and sketch plans for the Hannah Playhouse with Auckland architect Ron Parker, who was experienced in the small theatre movement. An additional $192,000 necessary for construction, equipment, and furnishings was raised. Practicalities dictated the commissioning of a Wellington-based architect to realise the project and James Beard, of Gabites and Beard Registered Architects and Town Planning Consultants, was chosen. Boyce remained as theatre consultant. Basic development plans were already completed, and it was Beard’s task to comply with them as closely as possible. Beard is now recognised as a significant Wellington architect, town planner, and landscape architect. The Hannah Playhouse was to become one of his most notable architectural projects. Its realisation demonstrated a range of his design ideas including an appreciation of context and a reverence for natural materials, structural integrity, and function. The theatre was opened on 15 October 1973 with a production of As You Like It. It was considered by most people to be a very positive addition to the city’s ‘sparse cultural amenities’. For a minority though, the makeshift and casual premises that Downstage had occupied before the purpose-built new building better represented the informal, supportive, and pioneering team spirit of the group. They criticised the newly imposed delineation between diners and non-diners as anti-egalitarian. While these people were less accepting of the new premises the majority agreed that the building was a successful outcome. By 1974 Downstage had been in continuous operation for ten years and was presenting performances six nights a week at Hannah Playhouse, along with occasional lunchtime, late evening, and children’s theatre. The company maintained its policy of showcasing New Zealand writers, though the proportion of New Zealand plays varied from year to year. In 1974, under the artistic directorship of Sunny Amey, seven of the ten mainbill productions at Downstage were New Zealand plays, including Robert Lord’s Well Hung, which went on to become a ‘kiwi retro classic’. Regional touring was added in the mid-1970s under artistic director Mervyn Thompson – this helped support the ‘permanent company’ model which continued under subsequent artistic directors. Other New Zealand plays performed during the 1970s included Joseph Musaphia’s Mother and Fathers, Bully by Frank Edwards, Craig Harrison’s Perfect Strangers and John Banas’ The Robbie Horror Show, a late-night revue which savagely portrayed the prime minister and covered ‘topical issues like nuclear warships, abortion, the Olympic boycott and the All Black’s tour of South Africa’. Downstage and Taki Rua Leading Māori theatre company Taki Rua evolved from Downstage’s side venue The Depot, which was used following a rehearsal room fire in 1981. The Depot focused on New Zealand plays and was where noted playwright Hone Kouka got his start in the late 1980s. Renamed and with a strong focus on Māori and Pasifika theatre, Taki Rua emerged as a fully-fledged company independent of Downstage, but nevertheless maintained close ties. When it transitioned to a production company and closed the bricks and mortar theatre in late 1997, Downstage's Hannah Playhouse was a regular venue for the company’s plays, including Briar Grace-Smith’s Purapurawhetu and Ngā Pou Wahine (both 1997), Victor Roger’s Sons (1998), Hone Kouka’s The Prophet (2004). Beyond Taki Rua, other notable productions of the era at Hannah Playhouse included The Naked Samoans’ Naked Samoans Talk About Their Knives (1998), Jacob Rajan’s Krishnan’s Dairy (1998) ,Toa Fraser’s No. 2 (2001), and Oscar Kightley and David Armstrong’s Nui Sila (2004). Challenges and Closure The early 1990s also saw Downstage face severe funding cuts and the collapse of the company model. Around this time, it was proposed that Downstage wind up and Taki Rua take over Hannah Playhouse. Taki Rua was not interested in acquiring the building and Downstage in any case survived. Hannah Playhouse was a presenting venue for external theatre productions by 2008. A mix of presenting and in-house productions followed the solely presenter model, though funding remained an ongoing concern. Creative New Zealand chose not to fund Downstage in 1995, though funding was reinstated in 1997. In 2009, Downstage once again received no funding from Creative New Zealand, leading to the resignation of artistic director Cathy Downes. Downstage continued to operate until 2011 when financial constraints meant that they had to cancel the remainder of the 2011 season and lay off staff. Ticket sales were down and there had also been a decrease in fundraising revenue. Downstage relaunched in 2012 following an additional $90 000 funding from Wellington City Council and continued occupy the Hannah Playhouse until late 2013, when the company made the difficult decision to cease trading after nearly 50 years of operation. Creative New Zealand had declined Downstage’s funding application for 2014 after they struggled to meet audience and financial targets. Creative New Zealand had been the company’s single biggest funder in previous years, contributing an annual amount of $325, 000. Until its closure, Downstage held the distinction of being New Zealand’s longest running regional professional theatre company. It played a significant role in enriching theatre and the cultural life of the nation in the purpose-built Hannah Playhouse, and the news that the company was winding up left Wellington’s theatre community reeling. Dame Kate Harcourt, who had been associated with the company since the 1970s, noted that it had ‘fostered the talent of many successful theatre practitioners and the opportunities it created would be missed’. Over the course of its almost 50-year history Downstage had 18 artistic directors and countless careers were ‘launched or enhanced’ by the company – many of those involved with Downstage went on to become household names in the New Zealand, from actors to playwrights and directors. In addition to Dame Kate Harcourt and Miranda Harcourt, other notable New Zealanders who ‘made their names’ acting or directing at Downstage include Jim Moriarty, Grant Tilly, Roger Hall, Rawiri Paratene, Theresa Healey and Ginette McDonald. Downstage also paved the way for other professional theatre companies to follow. Capital E and a Venue for Hire After the Downstage Theatre company wound up, Experience Wellington leased Hannah Playhouse to provide a theatre venue for Capital E, the National Theatre for Children, until 2020. The Hannah Playhouse Trust have also made the venue available for hire over recent years, with a diverse range of productions from theatre to dance, music and comedy, including a number of Māori theatre productions such as The Māori Side Steps, Cellfish by Rob Mokaraka, Miriama McDowell and Jason Te Kare, Hone Kouka’s Waiora and Bianca Hyslop and Rowan Pierce’s multi-disciplinary dance piece Pōhutu.

Context The Hannah Playhouse is a unique and bold form in the streetscape of Wellington city. The orientation of the site in relation to the very broad streetscapes of Courtenay Place and Cambridge Terrace allows the building to be appreciated from wide-ranging and distant viewpoints. This position has contributed to it becoming a landmark building in the city. Because adjoining buildings on both streets are no more than three storeys high and of contrastingly different styles, the Hannah Playhouse provides a dramatic corner statement that is appropriate in scale. Uniquely individual in style, it contributes positively to the variety and vitality that embodies the area. The building sits upon a small, irregular, and challenging corner site and the footprint of the building is rhomboid in plan to maximise site coverage. The constraints have been identified as a strong influence on the successful realisation of the building’s interior and exterior design. New Brutalism The Hannah Playhouse is an excellent example of Brutalist architecture. The New Brutalism movement was an international architectural approach of the 1950s, 1960s, and 1970s, and the term was coined in England in 1954. It exhibited a reverence for materials and was characterised by the honest exposure of construction fabric such as exposed raw textured concrete. Brutalism is noted for strong geometric forms and the way interior spatial design was an influence on the exterior appearance of a building. The exterior in this way revealed the function within. One of New Zealand’s best-known exponents of the style was Christchurch architect Sir Miles Warren, with work such as the Dorset Street Flats (1956-57), College House (1965-1970), and the Christchurch Town Hall (1968-72), all Category 1 historic places. Another well-known example of Brutalist architecture is the Ministry of Works’ National Library in Wellington (1974-1986). The Hannah Playhouse adheres to Brutalist characteristics in its use of materials and in the way its interior function impacts on its exterior form. The expansive asymmetrical roof volume that dominates the exterior grew from the functional requirement to house lighting and scenery in the auditorium. The strong diagonal line in concrete that crosses the building’s eastern façade reveals the form and structure of the main interior stairway leading from ground level to the auditorium. Although usually understood by its formal architectural aesthetic features of exposed materials and raw untreated surfaces, New Brutalism also has an ethical component that is frequently overlooked. It was an architectural ideal as much as an approach, with social objectives including the reform of urbanism and the total environment. Hannah Playhouse arguably conforms to the ethics of this approach given its recognised unique urban and streetscape qualities and the social and environmental philosophies of its architect James Beard. Exterior Hannah Playhouse presents to the street two boldly articulated façades and a prominent roof form comprising an expansive steel-framed asymmetrical wedge-shaped volume. Unusual and dominating, it has been a topic of controversy, with some disliking its appearance and others admiring its boldness. The exterior fabric and finish of the Hannah Playhouse remains largely intact and unaltered apart from two intrusions. The first is the addition of unsympathetic rustic-style stone cladding on the street level restaurant façade on Courtenay Place. The second is a protruding box enclosure for the lift installation evident on the second level of the Cambridge Terrace façade. This cantilevered rectilinear box is acceptable in scale, but its form, materials, and detailing do not correlate with the original, existing cantilevered features of the building. However, despite these changes the original design of the building is clearly legible allowing a strong appreciation of its architectural and streetscape qualities. The walls are constructed of reinforced concrete, concrete block, and unpainted off-form (exposed shuttered) concrete. They have been constructed independently of the floors and columns to minimise earthquake impact. The steel framed roof with timber purlins and sarking is clad in ‘Alstrip’ horizontal aluminium strip cladding with vertical jointing bands. Concrete gutters are lined in butyl sheet and the downpipes are aluminium. Window joinery is timber on the main frontage and aluminium on the theatre floor. Interior There have been limited changes to the interior layout over the years; the most significant change was the reconfiguration of the first floor during the lift installation in 2003, but otherwise, much of the interior fabric of the Hannah Playhouse in the spaces used by Downstage Theatre remains unaltered. The original raw concrete surfaces and rugged finishes are enduring characteristics that create a strong sense of the original design intent. The building comprises three main levels of ground, intermediate, and the theatre floor covering a gross area of 1360 square metres. When built, the ground floor comprised the theatre workshop, two leased shops, lobbies, and the ticket and box manager’s offices. A coffee bar with a small mezzanine level was suspended over the retail area. The main entrance lobby has undergone alterations with the ticket box office having been relocated into the space originally occupied by the coffee bar and small mezzanine area. The original brass pendant light fittings still adorn the main stairwell and adjoining public spaces. The foyer floor is finished in large multi-coloured pavers painted with ‘Tuscan-style’ imagery. The original plan provided for two separate ground-floor retail spaces fronting Courtenay Place and these have since been combined to create one restaurant tenancy. In addition to unsympathetic exterior cladding, there has been an extensive interior fit-out resulting in little original fabric remaining visible apart from structural columns and glimpses of the underside of the floor slab above. The first floor houses the patrons’ bar, actor’s green room, dressing rooms, offices, storage, and public and staff toilets. The rehearsal area originally on this level was converted into a patrons’ bar in the early 1980s. The original kitchen to service both the theatre-level restaurant above and the coffee bar below is now the green room, with the original green room now used as an office. The dressing rooms and the offices are essentially original with respect to layout, fabric, and finishes. Accessibility requirements resulted in the addition of a lift to the building in 2003. The lift has been accommodated in the space of a storeroom located inside the entrance doors by removing the set of internal lobby doors. The lift is relatively unobtrusive internally, with its major impact occurring on the Cambridge Terrace façade. The second level accommodates the theatre and a mezzanine balcony within an expansive wedge-shaped ceiling space. This level covers almost the full footprint of the site. Within this volume is a substantial gridded working floor that forms the theatre’s immediate ceiling at a height of 5.5 metres. The steel framed grid has 1.2 metres by 1.2 metres openings with 0.6 metre accessways between them. Heating and ventilating ducts are incorporated below the accessways and adjustable lighting fixture rods are installed in openings. Further above is the lighting control, lift machinery, and ventilation fan floor. The auditorium-level mezzanine balcony was extended in the late 1980s. The original square and triangular movable seating platforms have been replaced by a demountable tiered seating system. This tiered system continues to enable flexibility in the seating configuration but is notably different from the original design and has been found to be cumbersome. The extensive gridded working floor that defines the auditorium ceiling is essentially unchanged. The removable trap floor in the centre of the theatre remains in place, although the creation of the bar on the level directly below and subsequent changes to the bar’s layout and lighting have made its removal impractical. The stained diagonal timber doors, balcony fronts, walls, and large partition screens remain in place and look appropriate despite signs of wear and tear. The ground floor is concrete laid on solid ground and the first and second floors are reinforced concrete flat slabs approximately 30 centimetres deep, suspended on concrete columns. The mezzanine floors are timber framed and the stairs are reinforced concrete. Some of the interior fair-faced concrete was originally painted white and unfortunately, now some of the interior off-form concrete is painted. Flexibility The Hannah Playhouse is designed so that productions can be staged in any part of the auditorium floor area, with the audience seating arranged to suit. The innovative and creative use of platforms and seating in the auditorium produced a theatre environment with a multitude of arrangement possibilities. Performances might be in a central location, to one side, in an arena and proscenium setting, on a thrust stage, or wrapping around the audience. The original movable carpeted platforms in the form of squares and triangles enabled diners to be arranged at various levels and in various configurations. To accommodate this flexible in-the-round theatre the steel-framed ceiling grid for hanging scenery and lighting extends above the entire floor area. The grid was unique in New Zealand theatre design. Further flexibility was gained with a large ‘trap’ or removable floor area approximately 5 metres by 7 metres in the centre of the theatre to create a partial or fully sunken stage or for actors to enter from the area below as required. Finishes Beard’s aim was to create a neutral canvas as a background to the activities within. He achieved this in the auditorium through the use of grey concrete, stained timber, blue-grey carpet, deep blue curtains, and dark blue paint to the grid. Generally, concrete has been left raw but paint was applied to the walls of the theatre floor. Diagonal-stained timber features on the doors, balcony fronts in the auditorium, walls behind and below the mezzanine floor (rimu), and large partition screens (rimu). The original brass tube pendant lights with uncovered bulbs feature in the stairwell and public areas. Architecture Awards for Hannah Playhouse The Hannah Playhouse has received a string of awards over the years that highlight the building’s architectural, cultural, and social significance. • 1974: New Zealand Institute of Architects (NZIA) Merit Award (Regional) • 1977: Tourism Design Award • 1978: NZIA National Award • 2003 and 2006: NZIA Enduring Architecture Awards, Local (2003) and National (2006)