The legend over the main door reads: ‘Where there are riches there are people; and where there are people stories flow’. It’s typical of those high-headed shibboleths Victorians felt it necessary to promulgate to the citizenry in the days when earnest civic leaders – Ozymandiases of their day – built things to last.
The North Otago Museum began life in 1882 as the Mechanics’ Institute and Oamaru Athenaeum, a subscription library.
The architects, Forrester and Lemon must have been wildly successful financially because, as with the Athenaeum, they ‘did’ most the Oamaru stone buildings in this historic precinct. Most of their designs were variations on the Palladian theme – all very classical and quite outstandingly good.
© DON DONOVAN
donovan@ihug.co.nz
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