Tolin's 2024 World Cruise blog posts, Day 28 Feb 6, 2024, Hawke's Bay Express & Hawk's Bay Wine Tasting, Napier, NZ
Napier is a city on the eastern coast of the North Island of New Zealand and the seat of the Hawke's Bay region. It is a beachside city with a seaport, known for its sunny climate, esplanade lined with Norfolk pines, and extensive Art Deco architecture. Napier is sometimes referred to as the "Nice of the Pacific", although that is largely outdated and a more common nickname is 'The Art Deco Capital of the world'.
The population of Napier is about 67,500 as of June 2023. About 11 miles south of Napier is the inland city of Hastings. These two neighboring cities are often called "The Bay Cities" or "The Twin Cities" of New Zealand, with the two cities and the surrounding towns of Havelock North and Clive having a combined population of 136,290. The City of Napier has a land area of 41 square miles and a population density of 210 per square miles.
Napier is the nexus of the largest wool center in the Southern Hemisphere, and it has the primary export seaport for northeastern New Zealand – which is the largest producer of apples, pears, and stone fruit in New Zealand. The Hawke's Bay wine region is now the second largest in New Zealand after Marlborough, and grapes grown around Hastings and Napier are sent through the Port of Napier for export. Large amounts of sheep's wool, frozen meat, wood pulp, and timber also pass through Napier annually for export. Smaller amounts of these materials are shipped via road and railway to the large metropolitan areas of New Zealand itself, such as Auckland, Wellington and Hamilton.
Napier is a popular tourist city, with a unique concentration of 1930s Art Deco, and to a lesser extent Spanish Mission, architecture, built after much of the city was razed in the 1931 Hawke's Bay earthquake. It also has one of the most photographed tourist attractions in the country, a statue of the figure in local Ngāti Kahungunu mythology, Pania, on Marine Parade, Pania of the Reef. Thousands of people flock to Napier every February for the Tremains Art Deco Weekend event, a celebration of its Art Deco heritage and history. Other notable tourist events attracting many outsiders to the region annually include F.A.W.C! Food and Wine Classic events, and the Mission Estate Concert at Mission Estate Winery in the suburb of Taradale.
More info: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Napier,_New_Zealand
Our top priority is to make every customer’s experience one of their fondest memories! The Hawke’s Bay Express is a family-owned sightseeing tour company. With a love of Napier’s history, its vibrant character, and many myths and legends. The whole team has a huge amount of experience in travel and tourism – between us all, we have travelled to more than 50 countries but always returned home.
National Tobacco Company Building (1933)
Napier’s remarkable recovery
Not everyone suffered during the Great Depression. Gerhard Husheer’s National Tobacco Company, founded in 1922, made profits of £35,000 a year during the ’30s, coining it while killing them, so it had the money to rebuild in style after the Hawke’s Bay earthquake. This magnitude 7.8 quake, New Zealand’s most calamitous natural disaster of the 20th century, struck on 3 February 1931 with the force of 100 million tonnes of TNT. It killed 256 people and seriously injured more than 400. Much of what it failed to flatten burned down in the fires that broke out.
Husheer turned to Louis Hay, one of the architects who transformed the face of central Napier with the economical, quickly built and new art deco style. Not that there was anything cheap about this building. The tobacco tycoon sent Hay’s first set of plans back with a demand for something fancier. And here it is, an oddly successful blend with art nouveau tendrils tipped with roses adorning an art deco sunburst. Never mind: the arch in the square is pure Louis Sullivan art deco.
Art deco is now widely appreciated and the fag factory is the poster boy for the ‘Newest City on the Earth’, or as the Art Deco Trust now proclaims, ‘The Art Deco Capital of the World’. It was not always so. Until a visiting International Council on Monuments and Sites (ICOMOS) delegation sparked interest in the city’s streetscapes, Napier’s politicians and businesses had shown little interest in preservation. Long known as the Rothmans Building, it has recently been repainted in more authentic colours and renamed the National Tobacco Company Building. It is open to the public on weekdays. Enjoy the wooden doors, carved by Walter Isaac Marquand of Hastings, and the elaborate dome.
More info: https://nzhistory.govt.nz/media/photo/national-tobacco-company-building
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