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Herd Street Post Office, cnr Herd & Chaffers Streets

Herd Street Post Office, at dusk, in the 1950s.
Herd Street Post Office, at dusk, in the 1950s

This controversial building has dominated this area of the waterfront since 1939.

An imposing structure, it was originally five storeys high, but a tennis court on top of the building was removed and replaced with another floor.

Designed by Edmund Anscombe, the building is almost without decoration but for a surprising Moderne flourish on the south-western corner, repeated, slightly less grandly, on the eastern end.

The ground- floor foyer features some typical Art Deco chromium and plaster effects.

As part of a conversion into flats that started in 2004, major alterations were planned for the building, including considerable changes to windows on the seaside elevations. 

Image reference: Duncan Winder Collection, Alexander Turnbull Library

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