Heritage Hotspots: Victoria Street Buildings

Keep an eye out for an interesting façade on the E H Leigh chemist building. This business was bought by Leigh from Harold Possenniskie in 1933. Possenniskie had bought from A Neilson Thomson in 1923. Thomson had bought from J F Brooks in 1917. Brooks had bought from Robert Jones Roberts in 1912. And Roberts had moved his shop from Duke Street in 1905. The shop is now part of Wrights’ Bookshop.

In 1937 Leigh had his son G Innes Leigh, of the firm Edgcumbe and White, design this  new two storey building. The contractor was D I Gate of Hamilton.. It was built of concrete with a modern shop front carried out in black vitrolite above and below the recessed display windows. It resembled many of the new buildings in Napier.

For more interesting Cambridge HIstory go to www.cambridgemuseum.org.nz

Or visit the Heritage Trail 

A mortar and pestle symbol and name is embossed on the plastered shop front.

Directly from the shop a stairway leads to the first floor which used to be a waiting lounge which served both optical and chiropody consulting rooms.

Chrome fittings were a feature throughout, a full length glass counter and a fireplace for customers in winter.

 As many of the shops in Victoria Street were built around the 1930s we are fortunate to have some of the Art Nouveau and Art Deco stained glass windows still in the buildings. The old National Hotel windows are Art Nouveau and the Masonic Hotel in Duke Street has an impressive window in their stairwell.

Art Deco windows can we seen in the Real Estate building opposite the National Hotel in Alpha Street. Also on this building, built in 1931 are symbols of bounty and beauty with garlands of fruit and leaves, shells and an impish face.

For more interesting Cambridge HIstory go to www.cambridgemuseum.org.nz