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Christchurch
is considered as the oldest city of New Zealand. There are in
Christchurch a large number of Gothic buildings designed by the
architect Benjamin Mountfort. Benjamin Woolfield Mountfort was
born in March 1825 and was an English emigre to New Zealand. He
was born in Birmingham, England and was the son of Thomas
Mountfort and Susanna Woolfield. In 1849 Benjamin Mountfort
married Emily Elizabeth Newman and they emigrated in New Zealand
in the year 1850. Benjamin Mountfort became a famous architect
in the nineteenth century. Mountfort has a very bad start when
he came in New Zealand; his first commission was in Lyttelton,
the Church of the most Holy Trinity which broke down in high
winds not long after achievement. He got a quite bad reputation
made by the newspapers at this time. After this disaster he left
architecture and started giving drawing lessons until 1857, then
came back to architecture and worked in partnership with Isaak
Luck his sister’s husband. He was the declared the official
Provincial Architect in 1864. In 1872 he designed the St
Augustine’s Church in Waimate. In 1877, he designed the
Canterbury College and the clock Tower, St Paul’s Church. He
also designed the Canterbury Musuem in a French Chateau style.
He designed as well the Canterbury Provincial Council Buildings,
Christchurch Cathedral, Avonside Church Chancel, Church of the
Good Sheperd, St Mary Church in Auckland, St John Cathedral in
Napier. |
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