Lecturer Graeme Campbell said the idea emerged after he and his students were invited to the castle by the trust tasked with restoring the site.
‘‘It was a good day. We were really lucky. And they just got to spend a few hours on their sketching, drawing, feeling, really getting a sense of it.’’
Mr Campbell said each of the students were allowed a lot of freedom in their set designs, as long as they stuck to the brief.
‘‘The brief was, in a historical sense, to look at the castle and what they might do with it — understanding and appreciating its state of ruin.
‘‘So they were free to explore options. But they also had to add an additional building because it was part of the output.’’
Cargill’s Castle is one of the most significant historic structures in Dunedin and one of only two castles in New Zealand.
The Cargill’s Castle Trust had their own ideas of how they wanted the area restored, but Mr Campbell hoped the students’ efforts would inspire the trust to think even further.
‘‘So we kind of forgot the real limiting things and just said, there’s the carpark, there’s the castle.
‘‘How do we get on to it? How do we get this pathway working?
‘‘And how do we link it to the broader context of the city and drop into the city history?’’
Students Katie Child and Alexia Jones said they found the exercise exciting and overwhelming.
Miss Child tapped into the subterranean aspects of the site.
‘‘Cargill’s Castle has just already got its own big presence.
‘‘I feel like when I went there, it didn’t really need anything else on the site. It already held its own.
‘‘So, I decided to go down underground below the castle to show off the view that you wouldn’t be able to see from the site if you’re just standing in front of the castle. Because you can’t really get behind at the moment until they put the walking track across.
‘‘I wanted something that could not take away from the existing view of the castle.’’
Miss Jones had a different perspective.
‘‘I wanted to make it a community garden — like a place of shelter from the proposed walking track.
‘‘So you’d come up the path and then just have a shelter there — so my building is inspired by a glasshouse that used to be on the site.
‘‘And so the idea is you just sit in the wee glasshouse viewing the castle and viewing behind as well as the tower. So you can see the castle from all different angles. And also up the tower you can see out into the ocean.’’
Mr Campbell said he was impressed by the range of ideas.
‘‘There’s so many ideas here that when they come along there’s just going to be so many questions that are going to come out of this.
‘‘A couple of people tapped into Māori history. The fact that that was a bird-hunting ground and a pathway. So that has come through in a few projects as well.
‘‘Also, colonialism. It’s a colonial construct. How do we speak to a colonial construct in this day and age?
‘‘There’s much to think about. This show is only the beginning.’’
The designs will be on display at the OBlock atrium of the Otago Polytechnic.
