UDINZ Summer Site Tour of 159 Hereford Street

Join UDINZ for a site tour of 159 Hereford Street, a multi-tenant office space in the refurbished New Zealand Refrigeration Co. building.

Listed as one of the city’s “Dirty Thirty” buildings in the years following the 2011 Canterbury Earthquake, 159 Hereford Street fell into a state of extreme dereliction.

Home to squatters, the building was vandalised, covered in graffiti and set on fire.

Although extensively damaged, its unmistakably mid-century modern bones remained, including its mosaic tiled exterior - the first curtain wall facade constructed in the South Is.

These features, along with a desire to retain an important but under-valued piece of Christchurch’s architectural heritage, proved irresistible for developers Caleb Ballin and Dean Marshall who purchased the building in 2022 and, together with architecture firm Context, set about re imagining and refurbishing the building piece by piece.

The process presented numerous challenges and took almost three years.

Join us on site with Context Architects who will lead the tour and share insights into the project.

Following the tour, attendees are invited to continue the conversation at a post-site tour networking kindly hosted at the Context offices in this very same building.