CATHEDRAL PLANS

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXV, Issue 23008, 8 April 1938, Page 15

CATHEDRAL PLANS

WELLINGTON BUILDING REINFORCED CONCRETE THE IMPORTANCE OF COLOUR ARCHITECT TO VISIT EUROPE [bt telegraph—OWN correspondent] WELLINGTON, Thursday Largely to inquire into the more advanced methods of treating large concrete surfaces, Mr. Cecil W. Wood, Christchurch, architect of the proposed Anglican Cathedral for Wellington, is to make a visit to the Continent and the United States of America. He is a passenger in the Rangitata for London.

Interviewed yesterday Mr. Wood said he was leaving tentative plans of the cathedral in New Zealand, taking copies of the originals for reference when abroad. The latest methods of concrete construction for buildings like the projected cathedral would be found on tho Continent rather than in England, and certainly they would bo found in Sweden and the United States.

"Colour plays an important part abroad in tho architecture of to-day," said Mr., Wood, "and recent years have seen a marked development in this direction. I hope that colour will play an equally important part both internally and externally in the decoration of the cathedral. In many instances the internal walls are also treated with mural decorations, and I am of opinion that this medium is well worth consideration. It should be appreciated that in the countries I have mentioned there is a wealth of wonderful craftsmen to choose from."

Asked if concrete was widely used in ecclesiastical buildings abroad, Mr. Wood said ho realised that in Wellington a precedent would be created by the erection of a cathedral in this medium. Recent ecclesiastical work of concrete would be found in Europe, but not on the scale of a cathedral. This fact tended to lend an added interest to what he hoped would become an important contribution to reinforced concrete construction in New Zealand, and one which he felt was a privilege with which to be associated.

"Apart from this very important factor," Mr. Wood added, "the stonework of the Gothic cathedrals .of England, with their garden setting of a peaceful countryside, would look entirely out of place in this rather raw young country of ours, which lacks the patina of old England, yet offers a wonderful site for the right design—a design in a new country for a young people. "I am not in favour, even if circumstances would permit, of transplanting fifteenth century Gothic into New Zealand," he said. "The plan, however, is orthodox and cruciform, and the great height of the walls is Gothic in proportion. There the similarity ends."