Daily Photo – Old & New Buildings On Bond Street

I like photographs where two completely different buildings somehow end up having a conversation with each other. This is one of those. On the left, you have the modern building, all sharp lines, glass and those rather striking golden panels. Everything is clean and straight, almost as if someone has taken a ruler to the building and refused to let anything wander off course. Then sitting behind it is Consultancy House, which couldn’t be more different. All carved stone, arches, columns and those wonderfully industrial-looking external fire escapes climbing up the side. It belongs to another era entirely.

What I like about the photograph is the way the two buildings have ended up squeezed into the same frame. One is sleek and modern, the other slightly weathered and full of history. Yet somehow they work together. There’s also something quite satisfying about the shapes. The vertical lines of the modern building pull your eye upwards, while the older building fills in all the gaps behind it.

And then, of course, there’s that blue sky. Sometimes Dunedin does a pretty good job of providing its own backdrop.

Daily Photo – Street Art by SwiftMantis

I have to say, I do like compositions where it’s possible to build up layers of city buildings without a scrap of sky. It takes a bit of moving around, a few adjustments, and a fair amount of patience, but when everything finally lines up, it creates an interesting effect. Your eye starts jumping from one building to the next, while your brain quietly tries to work out how all the pieces fit together.

The building in the centre of the photograph once had a mural by prominent international street artist Natalia Rak, titled Love Is in the Air. Unfortunately, it disappeared when the building was scheduled for repainting in 2024.

It was replaced by Palmerston North artist SwiftMantis. The original plan was to have a British bulldog gracing the wall, but animal welfare groups apparently objected. Exactly why, I’m still not entirely sure. It seems a slightly odd hill to die on, given that the dog was going to be painted on a wall and therefore unlikely to require feeding, walking or an annual visit to the vet. Still, this is Dunedin, where you learn never to underestimate the capacity of a perfectly ordinary wall to become unexpectedly complicated.

Anyway, the bulldog never made it onto the wall, and instead we now have a rather magnificent lion watching over proceedings.

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Daily Photo – Street Art by Phlem

Today’s photo was taken about 50 metres from yesterday’s, quite literally just around the corner. Funny how that works. You can wander through a city you think you know and still find yourself looking at something you’ve walked past a dozen times without really seeing it.

This part of Dunedin was once one of the busy bits of the country. Back when much of New Zealand’s wealth and commerce seemed to flow through Dunedin, the historic precinct was packed with businesses, warehouses, offices and people who had somewhere to be. These old buildings were part of the machinery of a growing city.

These days, things are a little quieter. People now come here for rather different reasons, including the Dunedin Street Art Trail and the work of London-based muralist and artist Phlegm. His mural has given this old corner a completely different sort of life, I rather like the contrast. Historic architecture on one side, contemporary street art on the other, and a camera somewhere in the middle trying to make sense of it all. It’s also right next door to the Dunedin Musicians Club. I think they have a regular Thursday jam session, although don’t rely entirely on me for that. If you’re interested, best check with the club, I’m sure they must have a website.

And that’s probably what I like about photographing places like this. The interesting thing isn’t always the big landmark. Sometimes it’s the little corner, just around the corner from yesterday’s photograph, where old Dunedin and new Dunedin happen to bump into each other.

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Daily Photo – Princes Street in Dunedin

I seem to be doing a bit of a Dunedin street-and-building thing this week. I’m not sure it really needs a name, and it certainly wasn’t intentional, but somehow I’ve ended up with a small collection of photographs taken around Dunedin’s Exchange area. They were all taken at different times and on completely different days, but I thought it might be fun to string them together over several posts.

This one was taken near the Provincial Hotel, not far from where the old Cobb & Co coaches once departed for the goldfields. Standing here and looking back down Princes Street towards the Octagon, you can almost start to imagine what this part of the city must have been like when the Exchange was one of Dunedin’s important commercial and social hubs.

Of course, the traffic has changed, the buildings have changed and most of the people have long since disappeared. But every now and then, the right light catches an old façade, a shadow falls across the street, and for a moment the past seems to sit just beneath the surface.

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