An Art Deco gem in Moray Pl has been home to a pioneering spirit for three-quarters of a century, writes David Murray.
One of Dunedin’s more jazzy and original expressions of the Art Deco style has been home to the Otago Pioneer Women’s Memorial Association for 75 years.
In the 19th century its Moray Pl site was part of a large coal and firewood yard. In 1909 a single-storey structure was built for the consulting engineer William James as an office, together with a shop he rented out. An extension followed in 1913.
The building gained an additional storey and its distinctive style in 1934 and 1935, through work carried out for new owners S. R. Burns & Co, by the Love Construction Co. Stanley Burns was a decorated returned soldier, who served in France in World War 1. He ran a tailoring business in Dunedin before setting up a company dealing in shares and the promotion of subsidiary companies with diverse interests in property, printing, caravans and camping equipment, cosmetics and other areas.
The architect for the work, Cecil Gardner Dunning, was the South African-born son and former practice partner of another local architect, William Henry Dunning. The younger Dunning’s other Dunedin designs include the former customhouse (now Harbourside Grill) and numerous private residences.
Bold and contrasting colours originally emphasised the angular design of the facade, possibly in warm red and gold hues like those recently revealed on the former Victoria Insurance Building in Crawford St. The interior continued the theme, with its modern fittings, bevelled glass doors, and fashionable terrazzo flooring in the foyer and on the stairs.
The top floor was fitted out as a beauty salon for the subsidiary Roxana Ltd, "in accordance with modern trend and tastefully furnished to provide the maximum comfort to clients". Much of this fit-out remains. Decorative elements included wood panelling in Pacific maple and Australian walnut ply, carnival glass windows, and black Vitrolite (an opaque pigmented glass) at the cosmetic counter and pay desk.
Sandford Sinclaire, a graduate of the Wilfred Academy of New York, managed the skin-care and make-up side of the business. From a six-by-four foot cubicle, described as his cosmetical laboratory, came Roxana Beauty Preparations, with their "special exotic properties anticipated to appeal to women of fashion throughout New Zealand". Equipment included what promoters claimed to be the country’s first Dermascope complexion analysis machine. The "coiffure section" under the direction of Miss MacDonald, previously of Melbourne and Sydney, boasted the latest in hair-waving machines.
Sinclaire was dismissed for incompetence after less than a year and the salon closed in August 1937. Cosmetics continued to be produced for a short period under a new Eudora brand. By 1941 Burns’ small empire was crumbling amid financial losses and fraud (he was imprisoned in 1943) and his building was sold to the newly-formed Otago Pioneer Women’s Memorial Association.
Dr Emily Siedeberg-McKinnon, the founding president of the association, was New Zealand’s first woman medical graduate. She worked as a general practitioner in Dunedin from 1897, and among her many other roles was Medical Superintendent of St Helen’s Maternity Hospital.
In 1928 she visited the Women’s Building in Vancouver, Canada. More than 100 women’s groups used this new and central facility, which inspired her to promote something similar for Dunedin. She did not find an opportunity until 1936, when the recently-elected Labour Government announced extensive plans and regional funding for the upcoming New Zealand Centennial celebrations. Provincial committees were established, and Siedeberg-McKinnon chaired an independent meeting to explore the idea of a memorial to Otago’s pioneer women. Proposals included a memorial arch, the cleaning up of slum areas, and a quaintly-described "home for gentlewomen of slender means", but the delegates representing 39 women’s organisations agreed they should pursue the idea of a women’s community building. The Otago Women’s Centennial Council was formed to further the project.
The Provincial Centennial Council approved the proposal in February 1938 but seven months later rescinded its decision in favour of other projects, cutting off access to the expected government subsidy. Plans for a more general community building on the Garrison Hall site between Dowling and Burlington Sts also fell through.
Dispirited, Siedeberg-McKinnon had a vivid dream in which she climbed from a walled enclosure, found her way through marshy ground, and looked up to see a large unfinished building with scaffolding around it. Encouraged, she found support to renew her efforts and led the formation of the Otago Pioneer Women’s Memorial Association on March 14, 1939. The new name was necessary as legislation reserved the word "centennial" for official projects.
Successful fundraising and a mortgage allowed the purchase of the Burns & Co building and the refurbished property opened on February 23, 1942. It was intended as temporary accommodation, but the association remains there three-quarters of a century later.
The largest room was the hall. Other spaces included a boardroom and a lounge.
A small chapel on the first floor named the Shrine of Remembrance was dedicated on Otago Anniversary Day 1946. Designed by architect Frank Sturmer, it was furnished with an oak chair made by Dunedin’s first cabinetmaker, John Hill, and a new oak refectory table by local Swedish-born cabinetmaker Alfred Gustafson.
Robert Fraser designed a memorial stained-glass window set within three gothic arches, but due to his failing health the work was taken on and executed by John Brock. The central panel shows Christ walking on water and his disciples in a rowing boat. The left-hand panel illustrates a migrant family departing Britain, and the right-hand panel depicts arrival in Otago. The arrival panel includes mother and daughter figures, the ship Philip Laing, a whare, and native ferns and cabbage trees. The shrine was later decommissioned and the window was moved to the foyer.
The hall and rooms were made available to a wide range of community groups, and not exclusively women’s organisations. Those using the building in the 1940s and ’50s included the Dunedin Kindergarten Association, Lancashire and Yorkshire Society, Rialto Bridge Club, Dunedin Burns Club, Federation of University Women, Practical Psychology Club, Sutcliffe School of Radiant Living, Musicians’ Union, Radio DX League, Otago Women’s Hockey Association, Registered Nurses’ Association, and many more. The Dunedin Spiritualist Church met in the building for nearly 50 years, from 1945 to 1994.
In 1958, the Pioneer Women’s Memorial Association bought a new property in York Pl and again entered a period of active fundraising. It appeared to be close to realising Siedeberg-McKinnon’s vision for a purpose-built building, but again fell short of its ambitious target. Instead, the unique venue it had developed was maintained and continues to provide a valuable community asset today.
For more from David Murray go to builtindunedin.com.
362 Moray Pl
Rebuilt: 1934-1935
Address: 362 Moray Pl
Architect: Cecil Gardner Dunning
Builders: Love Construction Co
