Brevet Club Plans Striking Building

Press, Volume XCVI, Issue 28447, 29 November 1957, Page 24

Brevet Club Plans Striking Building

Undoubtedly the most striking building in Christchurch will be started early next year at the Brevet Club’s memorial centre on 75 acres of parkland at the south-east corner of Memorial avenue and Woolridge road, approaching the Christchurch Airport. The hyperbolic paraboloid roof is believed to be only the third of this construction in the world. Sometimes described as a “warped skin roof,” this design will give the building all-glass walls 21ft high at the front corner, 14ft high at the back corner, and only 4ft high at the others, where there will be reinforced concrete buttresses. The building will cost £lO,OOO.

Inquiries yesterday indicated that a warped-skin roof has been used before only once in the United States and once on a carpet factory building in England, although the principle has been widely discussed. To strengthen this curving roof design, there will be a bottom layer of tongue-and-groove timber, an intermediate layer of 4in x 2in timber running at right angles, and then another tongue-and-groove layer covered with flat sheet aluminium.

The kite-shaped building will be 130 ft long and 78ft wide, virtually the whole forming a spacious hall with the service sections concealed in the low side corners. Moveable screens will convert the building into a lounge, supper room, buffet, kitchen and store.

The “diamond’’ of the building will be eccentrically superimposed upon a “diamond” terrace and this futuristic effect will be heightened on the north-west side by a pool of free design reflecting the unusual lines and a memorial sculpture of an airman with supporters symbolising flight. Christchurch Designers

The building has been designed by Mr W. Lovell-Smith, a consulting engineer and a member of the club, with Mr Peter Beaven as consulting architect. Mr T. Taylor, who has already completed a model of the sculpture which will be nine feet high and in moulded white concrete, has also made a model of the building which will be displayed next week in a Christchurch shop window.

The Brevet Club (Canterbury) Incorporated wanted clubrooms and it also wanted to build a practical memorial to fellow air-crew members of the' Royal New Zealand Air Force—pilots, navigators, air gunners, wireless operators, and flight engineers—who lost their lives in World War II in Europe, the Middle East, Far East, and in the Pacific. Many received their initial training at Harewood. The Brevet Club in Canterbury began only five years ago but it now has 500 of the 2250 members in the 11 such clubs in New Zealand.

Negotiations have now been completed with the Waimairi County Council for the 75 acres at the proposed site to be made available free of charge and this

will be developed with lawns, shrubs, and gardens. There will be plenty of room for off-street parking and eventually there will be tennis, basketball, and other sports courts. The Memorial Avenue Committee and local residents have approved the siting of the building off the proposed highway. Memorial Avenue Feature Christchurch will thus have a < building of revolutionary design ■ close to the start of the Memorial j avenue from the airport to the city ■ proper. Besides providing a home for itself, the Brevet Club will ; make the building available for ( hire to other approved organisa- 1 tions. ] The Brevet Club was formed to ' preserve the good fellowship and . esprit de corps which contributed < so much to the high morale and : ultimate successes of the flying men of the Commonwealth Air Forces. It also aims to assist members and families of air crew in time of need, supports such organisations as Heritage, and assists the Royal New Zealand Air Force and Air Training Corps whenever possible. By frequent lectures, films, and discussions, members also aim to keep abreast of all aeronautical and allied developments. “The Brevet Club is specially grateful to Mr Lovell-Smith and Mr Taylor for their work on the design and sculpture,” said the club’s announcement of plans.

“The chairman (Mr W. W. Laing) and members of the Memorial Avenue Committee and local residents also gave the scheme their unqualified approval. But it must be recognised that the project was brought to fruition only when the chairman (Mr W. E. Cassidy) and members of the Waimairi County Council presented the club with a perfect site for I this memorial.”