Christchurch Convention Centre

This building was New Zealand’s first purpose-built convention centre. The design concept was to focus single-mindedly on one simple idea – a concrete box fronted with glass which established a dialogue with the much-loved Christchurch Town Hall opposite.

The halls comprise over 1,850m² of pillarless, flat floor space, intended specifically for conventions, exhibitions, trade shows and various gala events. The design incorporates a glass fronted foyer, main hall with an 8m high ceiling and capacity to seat 2,200 delegates theatre style, or 1,350 for a gala dinner. Seven break-out rooms on the first floor can be configured to accommodate between 30 and 130 delegates each.

These diverse multi-use facilities could have easily become a complex jumble of spaces and connections, a hodgepodge of unrelated rooms and corridors that characterise many other buildings of this type. The overriding design concept, however, was to strip away complexity focusing single-mindedly on one simple creative idea – a concrete box fronted with glass, which established a dialogue with the much-loved Christchurch Town Hall opposite. Behind this frontage a sequence of spaces interact with the street, and leads to its interior.

Both buildings are connected by a glazed over-bridge straddling a busy inner-city thoroughfare – an aerial piazza. In its plan it seeks to challenge the lack of urban design and points towards what the city centre may one day become. The Convention Centre establishes an intentional but respectful generational differentiation to its more established counterpart. While the Town Hall hides its purpose behind concrete walls, as was usual in 1966, the Convention Centre uses glass and steel to project an openness and honesty. The play between the two buildings is through materiality. The detailing language of glass, steel and concrete of the Convention Centre is a contemporary interpretation of the concrete and timber of the Town Hall.

A flush glass wall on its public face, opposite the Town Hall, is supported by an elaborate, purpose-made structural system behind. Each sheet of glass is hung off stainless steel wires and braced against wind loading by steel pincers joined to the outriggers of the steel support trusses. Behind the glazing runs a curved concrete wall.

Design emphasis was placed on the highly glazed south facing entrance foyer that articulates the concept of layering: a highly visible public space (foyer), a semi-public space (circulation hall) and the private spaces (convention rooms).

The foyer which is clearly visible to passers-by between the concrete and glass, consciously engages with the street and generates an open connection to it. Carefully articulated it provides a light voluminous entrance contrasting with the internalised convention spaces. To the side of the foyer lies the naturally top-lit, pre-function and circulation zone running the full 90 metre length of the site. The three major convention spaces are entered directly off this. A stair ascends to the first floor circulation area beside a balcony projecting out through an opening in the concrete wall. The seven events rooms are accessed from here.

Designed to be elegant by both day and night, the entrance foyer acts as a brightly lit lantern and contemporary counterpoint to its more mature immediate neighbour.