18 | Southland Museum T T Russell Fredric Progress at last on Southland Museum This first stage involves building a state-of-the-art, $10 million 1650 square metre storage facility that will house the museum’s entire collection at Tisbury on the south-eastern outskirts of Invercargill. Phone: 03 983 5500 waterfordpress.co.nz Your Business, Your Industry, Your News. DO OUR READERS KNOW YOU EXIST? REGIONAL DEVELOPMENT Industrial • Commercial • Residential “Quality Solutions delivered on Time” INVERCARGILL QUEENSTOWN DUNEDIN CHRISTCHURCH RES I DENT I AL & COMMERC I AL PH 03 215 9208 CELL 0274 346 012 | 0274 346 009 A/Hrs 03 2130 811 or 03 213 1575 18 Arena Avenue | Invercargill • Drainlayers • Plumbing • Roofing • Registered • Bathroom & Kitchen • Renovations SOUTHLAND 03 215 9068 1 Kinloch Street, Invercargill sam@nulooksouthland.co.nz www.nulook.co.nz Talk to us about the windows and doors that are right for your home. It has been a long and winding road, but progress is being made at pace to towards a total rebuild of the Southland Museum. During an extraordinary council meeting last November, Invercargill City Council (ICC) councillors unanimously agreed to accelerate the delivery of the museum which has been closed since 2018 due to being deemed an earthquake risk. Southland Museum manager Wayne Marriott says it has been difficult for the people of the province to have lost access to the museum and for much of its heritage to be locked up since the closure. Located at Queens Park, Invercargill, the museum was also home to Southland’s famous tuatara, among which Henry is a celebrity resident and at 120 years, certainly its oldest. The museum and its staff are guardian to a 4.5 million piece collection which tells the many stories of an incredible legacy covering the depth and breadth of history and heritage of Southland, the sub-Antarctic and Fiordland as well as New Zealand’s broader history, Wayne says. Intrinsic to this is the museum’s “incredible” long-term relationship with the Department of Conservation and its earlier iterations, he says. “It’s where the intergenerational heart and soul and legacy of the community is kept, where it’s preserved from one generation to another. It’s the story of people and of their lives and how this landscape has shaped the lives of those who’ve lived on it.” However, the museum building itself became a victim of time and decay and in 1989 a pyramid was installed over it as a temporary measure to eliminate roof leaks, with subsequent promises made that a new museum would be built. “For the past 22 years there has been a number of stops and starts on the basis of how the Southland Museum and Art Gallery could be developed.” Although it has been a long and winding road, progress towards the construction of the new museum is now being made. This first stage involves building a state-ofthe-art, $10 million 1650 square metre storage facility that will house the museum’s entire collection at Tisbury on the south-eastern outskirts of Invercargill. Construction started December last year and is expected to take 12 months, while the ICC aims to have the museum and art gallery officially opened late 2026 following final fitout and installation of the collection. The storage facility has to meet stringent specifications and will provide a highly functional, controlled environment within a robust structure that is in a resilient location. Its design provides for a public space where members of the community can view pieces of the collection for research purposes. “We assessed and considered 18 sites throughout the city and this site was identified as the most appropriate because it met the seismic, liquefaction and flooding risk requirements.” As of late March, there were still some key decisions to be made about the final size and design of the new museum as well as the need to obtain further funding, plus a decision about the exact location of the new tuatarium in Queens Park was still to be made. The tender for the museum base-build designer, which is being led by a project team, has closed and the several “high-calibre” submissions have been received. The team received interest both locally and internationally and have been assessing 11 tenders in total, “which was a high amount” with the submissions equating to more than 1000 pages of reading. Demolition of the existing museum was due to begin as soon as the collection is moved to the new storage facility.
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