STREET ARCHITECTURE.

New Zealand Times, Volume XXX, Issue 4338, 13 February 1875, Page 7

STREET ARCHITECTURE.

In no manner is the progress of the Empire City so aptly chronicled, as in the number of buildings recently erected, and in tho aesthetic, taste displayed in this direction by the citizens. From the time of the erection of tho Provincial Buildings, which seem to have given character to the structures which mark tho period of Wellington’s greatest prosperity, building seems to have gone on in ceaseless continuance. Nathan’s store, Johnston’s store, the National Bank, tho establishment of Edmondson and Sellars, and more substantial than them all, it less neat, the brick store for Messrs, Jacob, Joseph, and Co., erected at a cost of £IO,OOO, all speak of a public spirit and an unshaken confidence in the prospects of the province, which are creditable to tho commercial clashes and to the city in which they live, for these buildings, from an architectural point of view, cannot be surpassed by those of

any . other province in the colony. Sites for private residences are now not to be had except at rates approaching fancy prices. These fictitious values cannot, of course, be maintained for any length of time, but they serve to show the height of our prosperity and the change that has come over the once dreary slow-going Wellington. Acres of land which two years ago could have been bought, and were bought, for £SO cannot now be purchased under £250 and £3OO, according to situation. Every available spot of land in the city is now built upon, and so metamorphosed is the aspect, that a resident who returns after a few years’ absence enjoys all the sensations of a modem Rip Van Winkle. Additions and extensions to stores are daily made to meet the growing trade, and not the least remarkable circumstance in our history is the fact that a great many firms have relinquished their connections in other provinces to establish themselves in the go-ahead city in the Strait. This latter point is the secret of the whole. * Her central position, her splendid port, and her facilities for conducting commerce, have made Wellington what her sanguine settlers believed from the first she would be—the emporium of the colony.