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Wellington is New Zealand’s capital, and it is very beautifully located in the middle of the country at the southern tip of North Island and with a few hours sailing to Picton on the South Island. And it is only a short distance to many parts of the country’s magnificent scenery.
Wellington is a big city with everything that goes with it. Of museums, Wellington has a lot to offer. The city is home to the excellent National Museum Te Papa, which exhibits the country’s natural sciences, history and different cultures in a fine way. At the Museum of Wellington City & Sea you can take a closer look at the city’s development year by year with themed exhibitions.
Wellington’s large and extremely rich botanical garden is, for many, the first choice of a green oases. The best way to get to the heights of the garden is with the Wellington Cable Car, that drives up to a fantastic and famous panorama to the city. You can also see the city from above from Mount Victoria immediately east of the city center or enjoy a walk along the Oriental Parade.
In Wellington there are also several beautiful churches with Old Saint Pauls as the most attractive and modern Saint Pauls Cathedral as the largest. Churches and Christianity are parts of New Zealand history, and in the beautiful buildings you can clearly see inspiration from the European immigrants and their constructions from the old continent.
Around Wellington there are also many activities to enjoy. A boat trip to Picton brings one to a completely different landscape and to the fine wines of the Marlborough Sounds, while a trip to the north can go along the west coast.
The Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa is New Zealand’s national museum, and the prestigious building in Wellington has resulted in an incredibly exciting experience that mixes the museum’s collections with the interactive use of new technology.
The museum recreates the formation of New Zealand, and you come through fascinating exhibits of both the culture of the Maori and the European descendants. This gives you an insight into many aspects that have contributed to the development of modern New Zealand.
You can also experience the New Zealand nature at the museum. It is portrayed through magnificent exhibitions with many themes. In this part of the collections you can see, among other things, the skeleton of a 21 meter long blue whale.
The Wellington Cable Car is a charming 4.5-minute ride from the city center up to a distinguished view 120 meters above the starting point. The 628 meter long journey goes through three tunnels and over three bridges before reaching the upper terminus (Upland Road).
On the road from the lower terminus (Lambton Quay) there are three stations; Clifton, Talavera and Salamanca. The track opened in 1902 following the expansion of Wellington’s built-up area in the Kelburn district, from which quick access to the city center was to be ensured. Success did not fail, and in 1912 the number of passengers reached one million.
At the summit is a museum of the track’s history and significance for the New Zealand capital; Wellington Cable Car Museum. This area also offers excellent panoramic views of Wellington and the city’s environs, and you can also visit an observatory and the city’s botanical gardens after a short stroll.
The Botanic Garden is Wellington’s beautifully situated botanical garden, which was established in 1868 with the aim, among other things, of experimenting with imported plants that could supplement the country’s own. The 25-hectare park contains both new construction and parts of a preserved original forest. The garden is quite large and lies on hilly terrain, which helps to make a visit here a special experience.
Among the distinguished facilities are the Lady Norwood Rose Garden, which blooms from November to May, a begonia house, orchids, children’s play areas and some lakes. But can also see sculptures and other works of art by, among others, Henry Moore, Andrew Drummond and Marie-Louise Browne. In the Peace Garden area there is a Japanese lantern with fire from Hiroshima as a symbol of Wellington and New Zealand’s work against nuclear weapons.
Old Saint Paul’s is Wellington’s former Anglican cathedral. It was built as a parish church in Thorndon in the years 1865-1866, and it later became the seat of the bishop of the diocese. This status passed in 1964 to the current Saint Paul’s Cathedral.
Old Saint Paul’s is one of the country’s cozy and elegant churches, built in wood and with elegant glass mosaic work. The style was inspired by the Gothic, but at the same time with a very fine adaptation to New Zealand’s materials and the country’s New Zealand-British architecture.
In the church hang various flags from the Royal Navy, the New Zealand merchant navy and from the United States Marine Corps, which was stationed in Wellington during World War II.
Civic Square is Wellington’s modern central square. It was completed after two years of construction in 1992 in the terracotta style as a large urban space to bring the city center and Wellington’s harbor promenade together.
Civic Square is surrounded by various public buildings. Among other things, you can see the town hall Wellington Town Hall, the art museum City Gallery Wellington and the library Wellington Central Library. If you look up instead, you can see Neil Dawson’s ball of 3.4 meters in diameter. It floats and depicts a series of leaves from endemic New Zealand ferns.
Between Civic Square and Wellington’s central harbor promenade stretches the 1994 City to Sea Bridge. The bridge was built as a natural extension of Civic Square and adorned with a series of wooden sculptures created by Māori artist Paratene Matchitt.
Wellington Town Hall is the city’s town hall. It was designed by Joshua Charlesworth and built 1901-1904. The elegant building originally had a fine bell tower and a main facade to the west, thus opposite the current Civic Square. Both parts were removed after the 1931 earthquake in Hawke’s Bay. The town hall was thus more earthquake-proof.
Wellington Town Hall houses both the town council, the town’s mayor’s office and a concert hall. There are many world-famous names who have given concerts here over time. The Beatles, Rolling Stones and Kenny Rogers are some of those who have stopped by.
City Gallery Wellington is a gallery where you can experience modern art in almost all guises. You get a good impression of what the current situation is like for art in New Zealand, as many both new and established artists exhibit here.
The museum building was constructed in 1935-1940 and it opened as the Wellington Central Library Building. The building was designed in the Art Deco style of the time, and it replaced the city’s former library building from 1893.
Frank Kitts Park is a green space located on Wellington’s central waterfront. The park is named after Francis Joseph Kitts, who was the city’s mayor in the years 1956-1974.
The park opened in 1976 on an area that previously housed smaller port buildings, and it was expanded in the 1980s. Here you can enjoy green facilities and play areas, and centrally by the water stands the salvaged mast from the ferry TEV Wahine, which sank in 1968 off Wellington on a sailing trip from Lyttelton near Christchurch on the South Island.
The Old Government Buildings is a beautiful building that is the now historic parliament building of New Zealand. The building is opposite the current parliament building in Wellington. The Old Government Buildings were built in 1875-1876 as the country’s largest construction. In 1897 and again in 1907, the now former government buildings were expanded.
Originally, the construction was to have contained both concrete and wood, but concrete was then an expensive material, so they chose to build the house in the now protected kauri wood. With its size, it remains today one of the world’s largest wooden buildings. Today, the Old Government Buildings house the Faculty of Law of Victoria University of Wellington; it moved here in 1996.
The Parliamentary Library was built 1897-1899 to Thomas Turnbull’s design. Turnbull himself left the project when the government reduced the height of the building by one storey due to finances. John Campbell stepped in and completed the Parliamentary Library, a very fine example of Victorian Gothic in the city.
The Parliamentary Library was once built as part of a complex around New Zealand’s parliament buildings. The library was built of stone with fire safety built in, and it turned out to be a good idea. The Parliamentary Library was the only one of the complex that survived the great fire that destroyed the other parliament buildings in 1907.
Parliament Buildings is the seat of New Zealand’s top political administration and is housed in a series of buildings clustered in Wellington. The original part of the current Parliament Buildings was completed after nine years of construction in 1922. The building style was Edwardian Neoclassicism, and this part stands as one of the country’s finest examples of this architecture. The country’s parliament is located in this part.
The New Zealand government offices are housed in the modern beehive-like building from 1982. It is called The Beehive and was built together with the lower structure from 1922.
The Beehive was designed by British architect Basil Spence. Construction began in 1969 and The Beehive was completed in 1981. The site is historic as the early Wellington’s de facto leader William Wakefield lived in a house right here. Between 1871 and 1969, the then Government House was located here.
The Embassy Theater is one of Wellington’s well-known cinemas. Built in 1924 as a cinema, it is one of New Zealand’s oldest purpose-built cinemas still in use for film screenings.
The cinema’s original name was De Luxe, and the current name was added in 1945. On 1 December 2003, the Embassy Theater was in the world’s cinema spotlight when the world premiere of the third part of the Lord of the Rings trilogy premiered here. In the streets of the city there were 120,000 people to follow the event.
In the years leading up to the world premiere, the Embassy Theater was restored and the cinema’s beautiful interior was returned to its original 1924 style.
Courtenay Place is Wellington’s main street for entertainment and nightlife. Restaurants and bars are lined here, and Courtenay Place is also the city’s cinema and theater quarter. For example, you can find the Saint James Theater (77-87 Courtenay Place) from 1912 and the Paramount Theater (25 Courtenay Place) from 1917 here.
You can also see the former National Bank Building (55 Courtenay Place) from 1927, which is also a notable building. The street is also named after Viscount Courtenay, who was the son of the Earl of Devon and director of the New Zealand Company.
Saint Mary of the Angels is the Catholic parish church for the congregation in central Wellington. It was built as the third church on the site and was completed in 1922. The style is inspired by French Gothic, which is seen both in the exterior design and in the church space.
The first church on the site was built by Father O’Riley in 1843 as a small chapel. The chapel was expanded over the years, but was replaced by a larger wooden church in 1874. The wooden church burned in 1918, and that was the reason why the even larger and current Saint Mary of the Angels was built.
You can see a beautiful interior in the church, which is known, among other things, for its beautiful stained glass windows, which provide light and play of color to the church space. There are also quite a few sculptures in the church, where you can also see a neo-Gothic high altar and marble tabernacle.
Queens Wharf is part of Wellington’s harbor area. It is the result of continuous expansion of the city’s harbor in the latter half of the 1800s and the beginning of the 1900s.
After the relocation of the port and the establishment of new container areas further from the city centre, the areas were no longer used from around 1990, when several of the old warehouses were converted into, among other things, restaurants and bars. Thereby new life was created in the old areas.
Saint Paul’s Cathedral is Wellington’s Anglican episcopal seat. The large church replaced the nearby Old Saint Paul’s and was planned as a brick building in the 1930s. However, the area’s many earthquakes changed the construction, so they chose to use concrete instead.
Queen Elizabeth II laid the foundation stone in 1954 for the modern and Gothic-inspired building, which measures 65×22 meters in ground plan. The bell tower is 24 meters high and was completed in 1984, while the entire cathedral was not completed until 1998.
On the outside of the church building you can see a large cross, symbolizing Christ’s crucifixion and later resurrection. When you enter the church, you can notice the artwork behind the altar. It is a large patchwork depicting the Ascension of Christ.
The Colonial Cottage Museum is a museum housed in the oldest surviving house in Wellington. It was built in period Georgian style in the years 1847-1856 as a private residence. Later, the house was converted into a bank, before it became a home again.
At the museum you can experience life in the early colonial times and for the Wallis family, who were some of the historic residents. It is both the house’s style, interior design and garden that is an experience.
Wellington Railway Station is the main railway station in Wellington, whose railway history started in 1874 when the line to the Hutt Valley was opened. Pipitea was the town’s first station, but it burned down in 1878. Two years later it was replaced by Lambton station. In 1886 the Thorndon station opened as a terminus for the private line between Wellington and Manawatu.
With two different stations, which from 1908 were both in the ownership of the government, the idea of a main railway station for all the city’s lines started. Reclamation of land for the purpose began in 1923, and the present Wellington Railway Station opened in 1937 as the first major building in the country to incorporate significant earthquake protection.
The architecture is dominated by the main entrance’s eight Doric columns, which have a height of 13 metres. Inside, the large railway station hall is adorned with typical grandiose decoration for this type of building.
Today, the station is used for a number of local trains for commuters to central Wellington, and there are daily connections with the Overlander train to Auckland, which is 681 track kilometers to the north.
The National War Memorial is a memorial that was dedicated on April 25, 1932 as a memorial to the fallen of World War I. April 25 is a day that is still commemorated every year in New Zealand and Australia as ANZAC Day. It marks the day when in 1915 members of the Australian and New Zealand Army Corps started fighting at Gallipoli in the then Ottoman Empire.
Today, the National War Memorial is also a monument to those who fought and fell during battles in South Africa, World War II, the Korean War, the Vietnam War and other acts of war for New Zealand and for freedom in the world.
The monument consists of the War Memorial Carillon bell tower, the Hall of Memories and the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier, which can be seen in front of the Hall of Memories. In 2015, the monument was expanded to include the Pukeahu National War Memorial Park to mark the centenary of Gallipoli.
Mount Victoria is a 196 meter high mountain located immediately east of central Wellington. The location offers a fantastic view of both the New Zealand capital and its surroundings, which include the airport and the Miramar Peninsula to the east and south-east, the Cook Strait to the south and the city’s large natural harbour, Wellington Harbour.
The mountain’s original Māori name is Tangi Te Keo, but it is also known as Matairangi. The first name comes from a legend where two taniwhas tried to escape from Wellington Harbour, which was then an enclosed lake. One of them ran aground and died, and its spirit became a bird named Te Keo, which flew to the top of the mountain and mourned (tangi). The second name translates as examining the sky.
Palmerston North is a city on New Zealand’s North Island. It is one of the country’s largest cities, and its history began with the purchase of an area for the establishment of a new settlement in 1866. After that, settlers from Scandinavia, among others, arrived in the area in the following years, and in the 1870s a church was built, a post office and other buildings, and later the railway came to town.
The city’s population passed 20,000 in 1930, and since then the population has grown considerably, and today there are a number of attractions in the city. You can see the Cathedral of the Holy Spirit from 1925, which today is Palmerston North’s Catholic cathedral. There are several other churches in the town such as All Saints Anglican Church from 1914.
You can also take a stroll in the central square, The Square, which is a city park that has formed the center of Palmerston North since its inception. Today you can see the War Memorial in the square, where the Hopwood Clock Tower is also located. It is a bell tower that was built in 1953.
There are also several museums in Palmerston North. Te Manawa Museum is an interesting art and science museum with various collections in a complex of buildings that includes Totaranui House, considered the city’s oldest surviving residence. In the museum complex, you can also visit the New Zealand Rugby Museum, which conveys the history of the popular sport in New Zealand.
Whanganui is a city on the west coast of the North Island in New Zealand. The city is located at the mouth of the Whanganui River, which is the country’s longest navigable river. The town’s history goes back to 1840, when The New Zealand Company started settlement of the area as the second place after Wellington.
In 1840, the settlement of Petre was established after the purchase of an area from the native people. Petre changed its name to Whanganui in 1854, and the town experienced great growth through the 1800s and the beginning of the 1900s, where a number of buildings were erected, which can still be seen today as some of the town’s sights.
You can go for a walk and enjoy the atmosphere and the old buildings in, among other things, Victoria Avenue. You can also see the Royal Whanganui Opera House from 1899, which is one of New Zealand’s only surviving Victorian theaters. Another well-known building is the Durie Hill War Memorial Tower, which was built in 1926 as a memorial to those who died during the First World War. It is also worth visiting the art museum The Sarjeant Gallery Te Whare o Rehua Whanganui.
Picton is a port city located on New Zealand’s South Island. There is a ferry between Picton and Wellington on the North Island, and the ferries cross the Cook Strait with many daily departures. Cook Strait is 22 kilometers wide at its narrowest point, but the ferry route is somewhat longer because you have to sail both from Wellington’s natural harbor and through fjords to Picton.
Cook Strait is named after James Cook, who was the first European to sail through the strait. He did so in 1770, but Dutchman Abel Tasman had already seen the strait in 1642. He named it Zeehaen Bugt, believing the strait to be a bay.
The trip across the Cook Strait is an experience in itself. It is a beautiful sailing trip, which is especially the case on the last part of the sailing into Picton. The sailing trip and the visit to Picton is an opportunity to have been to the South Island, and you can of course also use the crossing to start a longer trip on the island, which differs in many ways from the North Island.
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The area around Wellington was originally inhabited by the Maori under the name Te Upoko o te Ika a Maui, which means the head of the fish as the southernmost part of North Island. The first settler was the Kurahaupo chief Whatonga, who named Wellington Harbor Whanganui-a-Tara after his son.
Over the centuries, more people moved, and actual villages emerged along the natural harbor as well as fortified hilltops in the landscape.
In 1773, British explorers sailed into the natural harbor of the Maori inhabitants, and it was the first European presence. The real European immigration to this began in September 1839, when the first British ship arrived from London. William Wakefield negotiated a land purchase agreement in place with 16 local chieftains.
The ship was named Tory and was posted by the New Zealand Company, which allocated 10% of the land purchased to the Maoris, and 90% was to be sold to settlers, many of whom were already heading to the port now called Port Nicholson.
The first ships with settlers came to Port Nicholson in 1840. The first was Aurora, which had 150 new inhabitants aboard Aurora. They called their town Britannia, and it was to the northeast compared to today’s Wellington. Quickly, however, they moved the colony to its present location, where plots were plotted and initially distributed through lottery.
The city also quickly got a city plan laid out by New Zealand Company’s surveyor, William Main Smith, and with it also built public facilities such as roads, administration buildings and churches.
Wellington lies on several earthquake breaking lines, and it marked the European migrants after a few years. In 1848 and especially in 1855, severe earthquakes occurred, which changed the new colonized city significantly.
Thus, on January 23, 1855, the strength of the quake was 8.2 on the Richter scale, and the water line moved on that occasion several hundred feet. It originally ran on the current Lambdon Quay street, but with land elevations of up to 1.5 meters, the city gained a lot of new land that could be used positively for, for example, roads, railways and additional port facilities.
Since 1841, Auckland had been the nation’s capital. By that time, Wellington had been considered with its central location from both New Zealand’s main islands.
In the early days of the colony, however, the influence of the New Zealand Company was deemed too strong, and so it was until 1865 before Wellington was designated New Zealand’s capital.
The decision to relocate to this place on the Cook Strait was made to accommodate the inhabitants of the South Island who might otherwise be feared to form an independent nation. At that time, 4,900 residents lived in the town named after the English Duke of Wellington.
Parliament’s first meeting in the newly appointed capital occurred on July 26, 1865. That same year, the city’s first daily newspaper saw the light of day; it was Henry Blundell’s The Evening Post, which in the first issue of February 8 was on four pages. The newspaper cost a penny.
Politically, Wellington was further strengthened in 1870 when the city’s government was structured with the formation of The Wellington City Corporation, which was the city’s administration. Former City Council member Joseph Dransfield became the first elected mayor.
Throughout the 1870s, other institutions and facilities were established. Here, clean drinking water came in the taps instead of the local boreholes that were contaminated, in 1874 the railroad opened to Hutt Valley as the city’s first, in 1877 drove the first passenger trams and in 1879 the Wellington Harbor Board was established to ensure the important development of the port areas of the city.
Wellington rounded up 20,000 inhabitants in 1881, giving the capital formal status of a city. In the following years, growth continued with more than 1,000 settlers each year.
Population growth was not matched by economic growth in those years. During the period up to 1895, New Zealand and thus Wellington were also affected by an economic depression that brought unemployment and debt.
A bright spot in time was Queen Victoria’s golden government anniversary on June 20, 1887. On that day, there was a public celebration in Wellington, with thousands in the streets to mark the highlight of the series of events that had taken place in the months leading up to the anniversary.
A new parade and celebration took place on January 22, 1890. It marked the 50th anniversary of the first settlers’ arrival in New Zealand.
In 1892, Wellington, as the first city in the country, was equipped with an actual underground sewer system. It happened as a consequence of rising health and hygiene issues; in 1890 alone were 77 inhabitants of diseases caused by the lack of sewers.
The beginning of the 20th century was yet another period of growth for Wellington, when new trams began to run through the streets in 1904 after two years of construction. The trams quickly became a great success, and as early as 1910 the 42 wagons carried a total of 22 million passengers.
In 1904 the town was given a new town hall, which served as both the seat of the city council and with its auditorium as a new meeting place for Wellington’s citizens.
After decades of growth, New Zealand and the country’s capital were also hit by the economic depression of the world in 1929. This led to high unemployment and the launch of public employment programs for thousands of the unemployed in Wellington.
To mark the conclusion of the Treaty of Waitangi between the United Kingdom and the Moorish chieftains in 1840, a large national exhibition was held in Wellington 1939-1940. Despite the onset of World War II, the exhibition was conducted and with a total visitor count of more than 2.5 million people.
In February 1942, Japan bombed Australian Darwin, and by that time the acts of war had come to the region. Four months after the bombs, 20,000 American soldiers came to Wellington. Many were stationed in military camps here while traveling from combat sites in the Pacific.
Queen Elizabeth II became Queen of New Zealand in 1952 and in 1954 Wellington was visited by the new monarch. The Queen was hailed by thousands of citizens through the city’s streets, covered with a million beginnings that had grown to the occasion.
Improved transport was part of the city’s development, and in 1959 a new and well-located airport in Rongotai opened after seven years of construction. The airport was partially built on reclaimed land and ensured rapid transport to Auckland and Christchurch, among others.
In 1949, the first tram line in Wellington was closed. Like so many other places, buses took over, and in 1964, the last tram in town; it happened on the route from Thorndon to the center of Wellington. The replacements were not just buses that, among other things, spoke the country’s only trolley bus system.
The city grew, and the suburbs spread ever further from the city center. The railway lines to the station in the street of Bunny Street were a widely used means of transport, but also the motorism gained speed. In the 1950s, motorways were first talked about; in 1967 the plant started and the first part opened two years later.
On April 9, 1968, the ferry TEV Wahine set out from Lyttelton near Christchurch. It was met by a severe storm off the entrance to Wellington Harbor, crashed and lost at a loss of 51 lives. The disaster was and is one of the country’s biggest maritime accidents. In the aftermath of the sinking, the long route to Lyttelton was discontinued and replaced by the sailing between Wellington and Picton on the South Island.
The old town of Wellington continued to offer many of the larger Victorian buildings that characterized the city’s early times until the 1970s.
To counter any devastating earthquakes and their consequences, it was decided to demolish many of the houses downtown along the so-called Golden Mile. The earthquake standards were to meet, and instead of the low old settlement, the late 1970s and 1980s became a period when many glass and steel skyscrapers saw the light of day.
From the 1980s also began the city’s major investment in tourism, and through new buildings and a variety of cultural activities created the basis for a city that many consider to be one of the leaders in the region for exciting experiences.
Cultural and conference venues such as the Michael Fowler Center opened, and Civic Square was constructed as a new center, connecting the city with the harbor promenade and its parks and activities in the former warehouse and administration buildings in the area.
New Zealand’s new National Museum, the Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa was inaugurated in 1998, and two years later the Westpac Stadium sports arena was commissioned.
From 1999, Wellington was the center of an event that, if any, has strengthened New Zealand tourism in recent decades; the coordination and partial recording of the movie trilogy Lord of the Rings. For example, some scenes are recorded on Mount Victoria just east of the city center, and on December 1, 2003, the third and final film, The Return of the King, premiered at Wellington’s Embassy Theater.
Wellington, New Zealand
Overview of Wellington
Wellington is New Zealand’s capital, and it is very beautifully located in the middle of the country at the southern tip of North Island and with a few hours sailing to Picton on the South Island. And it is only a short distance to many parts of the country’s magnificent scenery.
Wellington is a big city with everything that goes with it. Of museums, Wellington has a lot to offer. The city is home to the excellent National Museum Te Papa, which exhibits the country’s natural sciences, history and different cultures in a fine way. At the Museum of Wellington City & Sea you can take a closer look at the city’s development year by year with themed exhibitions.
About the Whitehorse travel guide
Contents: Tours in the city + tours in the surrounding area
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Author: Stig Albeck
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Language: English
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Civic Square is Wellington’s modern central square. It was completed after two years of construction in 1992 in the terracotta style as a large urban space to bring the city center and Wellington’s harbor promenade together.
Civic Square is surrounded by various public buildings. Among other things, you can see the town hall Wellington Town Hall, the art museum City Gallery Wellington and the library Wellington Central Library. If you look up instead, you can see Neil Dawson’s ball of 3.4 meters in diameter. It floats and depicts a series of leaves from endemic New Zealand ferns.
Between Civic Square and Wellington’s central harbor promenade stretches the 1994 City to Sea Bridge. The bridge was built as a natural extension of Civic Square and adorned with a series of wooden sculptures created by Māori artist Paratene Matchitt.
Wellington Town Hall is the city’s town hall. It was designed by Joshua Charlesworth and built 1901-1904. The elegant building originally had a fine bell tower and a main facade to the west, thus opposite the current Civic Square. Both parts were removed after the 1931 earthquake in Hawke’s Bay. The town hall was thus more earthquake-proof.
Wellington Town Hall houses both the town council, the town’s mayor’s office and a concert hall. There are many world-famous names who have given concerts here over time. The Beatles, Rolling Stones and Kenny Rogers are some of those who have stopped by.
City Gallery Wellington is a gallery where you can experience modern art in almost all guises. You get a good impression of what the current situation is like for art in New Zealand, as many both new and established artists exhibit here.
The museum building was constructed in 1935-1940 and it opened as the Wellington Central Library Building. The building was designed in the Art Deco style of the time, and it replaced the city’s former library building from 1893.
Frank Kitts Park is a green space located on Wellington’s central waterfront. The park is named after Francis Joseph Kitts, who was the city’s mayor in the years 1956-1974.
The park opened in 1976 on an area that previously housed smaller port buildings, and it was expanded in the 1980s. Here you can enjoy green facilities and play areas, and centrally by the water stands the salvaged mast from the ferry TEV Wahine, which sank in 1968 off Wellington on a sailing trip from Lyttelton near Christchurch on the South Island.
The Old Government Buildings is a beautiful building that is the now historic parliament building of New Zealand. The building is opposite the current parliament building in Wellington. The Old Government Buildings were built in 1875-1876 as the country’s largest construction. In 1897 and again in 1907, the now former government buildings were expanded.
Originally, the construction was to have contained both concrete and wood, but concrete was then an expensive material, so they chose to build the house in the now protected kauri wood. With its size, it remains today one of the world’s largest wooden buildings. Today, the Old Government Buildings house the Faculty of Law of Victoria University of Wellington; it moved here in 1996.
The Parliamentary Library was built 1897-1899 to Thomas Turnbull’s design. Turnbull himself left the project when the government reduced the height of the building by one storey due to finances. John Campbell stepped in and completed the Parliamentary Library, a very fine example of Victorian Gothic in the city.
The Parliamentary Library was once built as part of a complex around New Zealand’s parliament buildings. The library was built of stone with fire safety built in, and it turned out to be a good idea. The Parliamentary Library was the only one of the complex that survived the great fire that destroyed the other parliament buildings in 1907.
Parliament Buildings is the seat of New Zealand’s top political administration and is housed in a series of buildings clustered in Wellington. The original part of the current Parliament Buildings was completed after nine years of construction in 1922. The building style was Edwardian Neoclassicism, and this part stands as one of the country’s finest examples of this architecture. The country’s parliament is located in this part.
The New Zealand government offices are housed in the modern beehive-like building from 1982. It is called The Beehive and was built together with the lower structure from 1922.
The Beehive was designed by British architect Basil Spence. Construction began in 1969 and The Beehive was completed in 1981. The site is historic as the early Wellington’s de facto leader William Wakefield lived in a house right here. Between 1871 and 1969, the then Government House was located here.
The Embassy Theater is one of Wellington’s well-known cinemas. Built in 1924 as a cinema, it is one of New Zealand’s oldest purpose-built cinemas still in use for film screenings.
The cinema’s original name was De Luxe, and the current name was added in 1945. On 1 December 2003, the Embassy Theater was in the world’s cinema spotlight when the world premiere of the third part of the Lord of the Rings trilogy premiered here. In the streets of the city there were 120,000 people to follow the event.
In the years leading up to the world premiere, the Embassy Theater was restored and the cinema’s beautiful interior was returned to its original 1924 style.
Courtenay Place is Wellington’s main street for entertainment and nightlife. Restaurants and bars are lined here, and Courtenay Place is also the city’s cinema and theater quarter. For example, you can find the Saint James Theater (77-87 Courtenay Place) from 1912 and the Paramount Theater (25 Courtenay Place) from 1917 here.
You can also see the former National Bank Building (55 Courtenay Place) from 1927, which is also a notable building. The street is also named after Viscount Courtenay, who was the son of the Earl of Devon and director of the New Zealand Company.
Saint Mary of the Angels is the Catholic parish church for the congregation in central Wellington. It was built as the third church on the site and was completed in 1922. The style is inspired by French Gothic, which is seen both in the exterior design and in the church space.
The first church on the site was built by Father O’Riley in 1843 as a small chapel. The chapel was expanded over the years, but was replaced by a larger wooden church in 1874. The wooden church burned in 1918, and that was the reason why the even larger and current Saint Mary of the Angels was built.
You can see a beautiful interior in the church, which is known, among other things, for its beautiful stained glass windows, which provide light and play of color to the church space. There are also quite a few sculptures in the church, where you can also see a neo-Gothic high altar and marble tabernacle.
Queens Wharf is part of Wellington’s harbor area. It is the result of continuous expansion of the city’s harbor in the latter half of the 1800s and the beginning of the 1900s.
After the relocation of the port and the establishment of new container areas further from the city centre, the areas were no longer used from around 1990, when several of the old warehouses were converted into, among other things, restaurants and bars. Thereby new life was created in the old areas.
Saint Paul’s Cathedral is Wellington’s Anglican episcopal seat. The large church replaced the nearby Old Saint Paul’s and was planned as a brick building in the 1930s. However, the area’s many earthquakes changed the construction, so they chose to use concrete instead.
Queen Elizabeth II laid the foundation stone in 1954 for the modern and Gothic-inspired building, which measures 65×22 meters in ground plan. The bell tower is 24 meters high and was completed in 1984, while the entire cathedral was not completed until 1998.
On the outside of the church building you can see a large cross, symbolizing Christ’s crucifixion and later resurrection. When you enter the church, you can notice the artwork behind the altar. It is a large patchwork depicting the Ascension of Christ.
The Colonial Cottage Museum is a museum housed in the oldest surviving house in Wellington. It was built in period Georgian style in the years 1847-1856 as a private residence. Later, the house was converted into a bank, before it became a home again.
At the museum you can experience life in the early colonial times and for the Wallis family, who were some of the historic residents. It is both the house’s style, interior design and garden that is an experience.
Wellington Railway Station is the main railway station in Wellington, whose railway history started in 1874 when the line to the Hutt Valley was opened. Pipitea was the town’s first station, but it burned down in 1878. Two years later it was replaced by Lambton station. In 1886 the Thorndon station opened as a terminus for the private line between Wellington and Manawatu.
With two different stations, which from 1908 were both in the ownership of the government, the idea of a main railway station for all the city’s lines started. Reclamation of land for the purpose began in 1923, and the present Wellington Railway Station opened in 1937 as the first major building in the country to incorporate significant earthquake protection.
The architecture is dominated by the main entrance’s eight Doric columns, which have a height of 13 metres. Inside, the large railway station hall is adorned with typical grandiose decoration for this type of building.
Today, the station is used for a number of local trains for commuters to central Wellington, and there are daily connections with the Overlander train to Auckland, which is 681 track kilometers to the north.
The National War Memorial is a memorial that was dedicated on April 25, 1932 as a memorial to the fallen of World War I. April 25 is a day that is still commemorated every year in New Zealand and Australia as ANZAC Day. It marks the day when in 1915 members of the Australian and New Zealand Army Corps started fighting at Gallipoli in the then Ottoman Empire.
Today, the National War Memorial is also a monument to those who fought and fell during battles in South Africa, World War II, the Korean War, the Vietnam War and other acts of war for New Zealand and for freedom in the world.
The monument consists of the War Memorial Carillon bell tower, the Hall of Memories and the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier, which can be seen in front of the Hall of Memories. In 2015, the monument was expanded to include the Pukeahu National War Memorial Park to mark the centenary of Gallipoli.
Mount Victoria is a 196 meter high mountain located immediately east of central Wellington. The location offers a fantastic view of both the New Zealand capital and its surroundings, which include the airport and the Miramar Peninsula to the east and south-east, the Cook Strait to the south and the city’s large natural harbour, Wellington Harbour.
The mountain’s original Māori name is Tangi Te Keo, but it is also known as Matairangi. The first name comes from a legend where two taniwhas tried to escape from Wellington Harbour, which was then an enclosed lake. One of them ran aground and died, and its spirit became a bird named Te Keo, which flew to the top of the mountain and mourned (tangi). The second name translates as examining the sky.
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