Iconic Dominion Building dome restoration

WORDS: David Watt IMAGES: Howard Tong

Built in 1928, and now undergoing a significant restoration, the Dominion Building in Mercer Street is one of the capital city’s most respected historic buildings.

When first constructed, it featured as one of the tallest buildings in Wellington and its dramatic architectural composition and distinctive roofline, soon to be restored to glory, was designed to be seen widely around the city.

A broadsheet metropolitan morning daily newspaper published in Wellington, The Dominion was first published on 26 September 1907, the day Aotearoa New Zealand achieved Dominion status.

For its first 20 years the newspaper office was located on land adjoining Plimmer Steps – previously occupied by a wharf, a slaughter yard and a foundry. Following years of early success, The Dominion's ambitious new headquarters building in Mercer Street was completed in 1928.

The Category 2 heritage-listed Dominion Building is an excellent example of a Stripped Classical commercial building designed in a Chicago-inspired architectural style. It is notable for the quality of its design, materials and workmanship, particularly the Caen stone external cladding (now over-painted), marble clad interiors, pressed metal spandrel panels and steel windows.

The central tower element, capped by a dome and lantern, is a major architectural feature of the original building.

In 1972, the ownership of The Dominion merged with its afternoon rival The Evening Post to improve the efficiency of the two operations. The use of the Dominion Building for the paper was no longer required and the headquarters moved to Press House in nearby Willis Street.

The Dominion and The Evening Post would later merge, with the first issue of The Dominion Post, a morning publication, published in July 2002.

The Dominion Building’s story continues beyond its life as a newspaper headquarters, with a new contemporary steel-framed top floor added in 1986 as a commercial space. Around the same time, the first four floors of the building were stripped for use as offices.

Planning to convert the top three floors of the building into apartments began in 1994. Designs were prepared by Athfield Architects and work was completed within two years.

Howard Tong, who lives in the Dominion Building with his wife Jenny, says a major body corporate-funded re-roofing and cladding project was commenced in 2019.

“This expensive work is now nearing completion. The special dome is seen as an integral part of the roof.”

An initial non-invasive survey was completed with a drone to assess the condition of the feature and its copper cladding, and the windows that form the lantern structure that in turn supports the distinctive cupola or ‘spike.’

Tong and fellow body corporate members are grateful for guidance and funding support for the dome conservation project from Heritage New Zealand Pouhere Taonga.

“We consulted them on our options and are especially pleased to have received funding support through the National Heritage Preservation Incentive Fund, initially for a condition report on the dome and action steps needed for the extensive work that we have been required to take,” he says.

The project team have brought several consultants into the project, “We have had support from Proffitt in caption above, a certified weathertightness surveyor, Russell Murray, a heritage conservation architect, and Hartmut Reichelt, a metal cladding specialist.”

Tong has appreciated ongoing funding support from Heritage New Zealand Pouhere Taonga, “Going to our second stage, we were delighted to get a further $40,000 in a second grant from the Incentive Fund and some funding support also from the Wellington City Council Built Heritage Incentive Fund to help restore the dome.”

The entire project, including the remediation of several top floor apartments affected by roofing water ingress issues, and the dome works is expected to amount to approximately $6.5m.

In the current building configuration, the dome sits above one apartment and forms part of its roof. Work on the dome commenced early in 2023, when scaffolding was erected to allow the dome to be covered, so the severely aged copper could be removed. These sheets have been used as templates for new copper sheeting which has been obtained overseas.

“With the completion of the dome restoration, a big job, the Dominion Building will proudly support a full restored, gleaming copper dome which will be a feature of the Wellington landscape for many years to come,” says Tong. n