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Originally uploaded by jaminneb
This is a photo , per Flickr, from a favourite place, Oamaru (Janet Frame's home town) which is in the South Island of New Zealand, on the east coast between Dunedin (another favourite city) and Christchurch , which I have to confess I am yet to visit. At one stage in the late 19th century it was the same size (contemporaneously) as Los Angeles, but fell on hard times, and as a consequence now has the most wonderful and large historic precinct of Victorian architecture, a taste for which I share with Evelyn Waugh ,and quite a lot of other people these days. The building on the right is the Forrester Art Gallery, a very fine venue which I have never known not to have a good showing, but worth visiting for the interior alone. It was built in 1884 as the local Bank of New South Wales and the architect was Robert Lawson, originally from Melbourne, who also built what is to me the loveliest church I know, First Church in Dunedin (1873). Lawson could never deserve the mock epitaph on Sir John Vanbrugh "Lay heavy on him ,earth, for he laid many heavy burderns on thee."Ethereal is the word, even for a bank! The particular feature of Oamaru that makes it so striking is the use of that wonderful whitestone, always noticeable in contrast to our own beautiful sandstone here in Sydney. At times, in the historic precinct it's like being in a De Chirico. Well worth the visiting for anyone into historic townscapes.
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