Historic Wellington

Written and illustrated by John Alexander, this small volume of beautifully reproduced pen-wash drawings with accompanying descriptive texts, is an early example of a work that helped increase awareness of Wellingtonians to the heritage buildings within their city. Published at a time when many in NZ were was focused on looking towards the future with little regard to the past, some people found it difficult to consider that anything 'old' could be regarded as having any great value. A reflection of this is the number of the historic buildings included in this book (including several dating from the early 1840s to the late 1860s) which were demolished within a decade of its publication. Thankfully, several others were restored and survive to this day.

Note that the first page (in colour) depicting early colonial Wellington  is a combination of the obverse and reverse of the book's jacket which have been stitched together to recreate the single image that the artist originally painted. It is loosely based on illustrations by William Mein Smith and Charles Heaphy dating from the early 1840s. We suggest clicking on the "Zoom to 100%" icon to see it in full detail.