Another award for Ravenscar

Christchurch’s Ravenscar House Museum beat a $138 million concert venue in San Diego, a $450 million state-of-the-art convention centre, and a new art museum in Milan, to win a prestigious global award for best new cultural building.

The museum, designed by Patterson Associates Architects for Susan and Jim Wakefield’s Ravenscar Trust, won the best new cultural building at the World Architecture Festival                      2023 in Singapore.

Ravenscar was shortlisted alongside Te Pae Christchurch Convention Centre, an open-air venue for the San Diego Symphony, a bamboo dome built for the G20 summit in Bali, an underground art gallery in Milan, a century-old Greek vineyard, a ballet centre in Brisbane, and a new museum in Oman.

Ravenscar opened to the public in November 2021, displaying the Wakefields’ art collection. Works include paintings by Frances Hodgkins, Colin McCahon, Ralph Hotere and a wide range of other beloved New Zealand artists.

The collection was originally displayed in the Wakefields’ home in coastal Scarborough, until the house was damaged beyond repair in the 2011 Canterbury earthquakes.

The house museum comprises a foyer and four main rooms reminiscent of the principal rooms at the Scarborough House – the dining room, bedroom, living room and library – arranged around a central courtyard. A gallery overlooks a Sculpture Terrace, and a garden designed by landscape architect, Suzanne Turley.