Celebration of the Christchurch Cathedral and the Square

Abstract

After series of catastrophic earthquakes that struck Christchurch, many buildings were so damaged that was said to be beyond repair, where it was also the situation of Christchurch Cathedral as initially informed. While both the cost of rebuilding and replicating the Cathedral was so overwhelming that led to the decision of demolition by which offended and angered many Canterbury citizens, forming opposition of activists and organisations towards it. As the state of the Cathedral is left undecided and unsatisfying, while arguments continues to surround the treatment of mainly two options - to restore or to demolish. Understanding the significance of the Cathedral to the city and incorporating what is symbolically of identity while observing strategies of other cities that dealt with post disaster and remaining heritage buildings contributed to my design basis for the Cathedral Square development. Disregarding the treatment of restoring or demolition, this project aims to deal with the existing Cathedral respectively and appropriately while suiting to the new context and needs. Where the building was once predominately of religious purpose, it has become the identity of the city overtime that will be integrated into the lives and active form of its surrounding. In doing so, the building is viewed as ruins to be dissected and allocated throughout the site for interaction with the city. Where the Cathedral was covered for more than a century that will be exposed to weathering in the form of ruins, a shelter hovering over the Square provide means of protection as well as strengthening the religious symbology that represents the identity of the city. This identity is echoed throughout the whole Square in various methods and also in the form of commemoration. Referencing the Gothic architecture of what formed the Cathedral style as a stepping-stone to an evolved method informing the structural parasol, while further adaptation of church typology within its principle as well as into the planning of hydrology and placement of ruins. The Square in this sense became the Cathedral where it is not necessarily of religious function, just as the symbology of Christianity repeated throughout the site as means to strengthen identity and heritage.