The prominent timber Commercial Building on the corner of 226 Kilmore Street and Barbadoes Street, in central Christchurch, has provided various goods and services to the local community ever since it was built for tobacconist and hairdresser, Charles Sycamore, and his grocer wife, Mary Sycamore, in 1899. It is a good example of a ‘living over the shop’ style of building once-common in central Christchurch. Notable for its corner bullnose verandah – also once a common feature of commercial buildings in Christchurch but now a rare sight in post-quake Christchurch - the building has aesthetic, architectural, historical and social significance or value.
The busy inner city cross roads at Kilmore and Barbadoes Streets already had buildings erected by the early 1860s, and by 1893 there was a tobacconist and hairdressing business run by Charles Sycamore in a building on the corner diagonally opposite the present building, on the north-west corner of the intersection. Sycamore and his wife wished for their own place so in 1899 they had a new timber building constructed on land diagonally opposite, at what is now 226 Kilmore Street, comprising their hairdressing and grocery shops on the ground floor and their residence above.
Now known as Commercial Building, the corner two storeyed weatherboard Victorian building has a distinctive bullnose verandah that runs around the north and part of the west sides of the exterior above the ground floor level. The corner of the building is chamfered with a small corner hip to the roof. Bracketed eaves support a hipped corrugated iron clad roof. On the ground floor of the north and west elevations are large display windows and three entrance doors. The north and corner entrance doors now both access a single ground floor shop (previously there were two shops), while the door on the west elevation leads to a lobby and staircase with decoratively turned timber balusters rising to the first floor. The south elevation has a single-storey lean-to and secondary entrance. First floor windows on each elevation are double hung sash windows, and on the east elevation there is also a double hung sash window at ground floor level and fixed smaller window at first floor level. The floor is tongue and groove.
Throughout its life, the ground floor has operated as commercial premises, generally as grocers and/or hairdressers. The first floor was residential accommodation until 2019 when the whole building was strengthened, repaired and the interior altered and refurbished. The first floor now operates as offices, the main ground floor shop being a barbers and the rear, southern part of the ground floor being psychology consulting rooms. The Commercial Building is the last survivor of a group of historic commercial buildings that had occupied the corners of the intersection up until the Canterbury Earthquakes of 2010 and 2011. While the others were lost after the major earthquake of 22 February 2011, the timber Commercial Building survived. Its retention, strengthening, refurbishment and reopening has been met with a positive response in the community.
The busy inner city cross roads at Kilmore and Barbadoes Streets already had buildings erected by the early 1860s, and by 1893 there was a tobacconist and hairdressing business run by Charles Sycamore in a building on the corner diagonally opposite the present building, on the north-west corner of the intersection. Sycamore and his wife wished for their own place so in 1899 they had a new timber building constructed on land diagonally opposite, at what is now 226 Kilmore Street, comprising their hairdressing and grocery shops on the ground floor and their residence above.
Now known as Commercial Building, the corner two storeyed weatherboard Victorian building has a distinctive bullnose verandah that runs around the north and part of the west sides of the exterior above the ground floor level. The corner of the building is chamfered with a small corner hip to the roof. Bracketed eaves support a hipped corrugated iron clad roof. On the ground floor of the north and west elevations are large display windows and three entrance doors. The north and corner entrance doors now both access a single ground floor shop (previously there were two shops), while the door on the west elevation leads to a lobby and staircase with decoratively turned timber balusters rising to the first floor. The south elevation has a single-storey lean-to and secondary entrance. First floor windows on each elevation are double hung sash windows, and on the east elevation there is also a double hung sash window at ground floor level and fixed smaller window at first floor level. The floor is tongue and groove.
Throughout its life, the ground floor has operated as commercial premises, generally as grocers and/or hairdressers. The first floor was residential accommodation until 2019 when the whole building was strengthened, repaired and the interior altered and refurbished. The first floor now operates as offices, the main ground floor shop being a barbers and the rear, southern part of the ground floor being psychology consulting rooms. The Commercial Building is the last survivor of a group of historic commercial buildings that had occupied the corners of the intersection up until the Canterbury Earthquakes of 2010 and 2011. While the others were lost after the major earthquake of 22 February 2011, the timber Commercial Building survived. Its retention, strengthening, refurbishment and reopening has been met with a positive response in the community.
