MLC Building (Former)

Not assessed

• unknown
• Not fully assessed
• 1939 - 1986
• Mutual Life and Citizens Assurance Company
• 1985 - 1988
• NZI Corporation
• unknown
• Retail (ground floor), Commercial and Rsidential (apartments)

Not assessed

Set apart from the BNZ buildings (that make up the remaining buildings on this street-block) by its scale, materials and style, the MLC building was completed in 1940 to the design of Mitchell & Mitchell. This building illustrates a unique blend of Moderne and Art Deco influences in its design and makes striking use of its corner site with its elegant vertical proportions and signature clock tower.

A distinctive central Wellington landmark, the MLC building is located on a prominent corner site abutted by the No.2 and No.4 BNZ buildings. Nine original stories tall, with modern roof-top additions, it is particularly notable for its high design quality and beautiful finishing materials, including the graded ochre colours of the faience cladding and rich grey of the Kanimbla marble base set over a structural concrete frame with load-bearing perimeter walls.

The composition of the elevations is centred about the Lambton Quay corner, each principal façade pivoting about the clock tower, which marks the retail entrance to the building. The Lambton Quay façade is divided into three principal bays, the Hunter Street façade into eight, set back from the façade line of the adjoining No. 4 BNZ building. The building is carefully composed with a strong vertical emphasis, which connects it visually with the nearby Prudential building.

The ground floor façades are essentially monolithic, broken by the square granite arches at the two principal entrances and the regular pattern of the shop windows which follows the line of the bays above, and are capped with a gently overhanging cornice. Above this the facades rise seven stories in vertical bays to an organically patterned projecting cornice; each bay has a pair of windows, set nearly flush with the façade, separated with a narrow mullion and is divided from the next bay with a wider pilaster which rises above the cornice as a stylised pinnacle. The windows and spandrel panels are set out to an absolutely regular grid. The top windows in each bay are gently arched as a pair. Above this cornice is the original top storey which is set back slightly from the face line of the building. It features large windows in gently recessed surrounds and a horizontal roofline. Above this is an untidy series of modern additions, mechanical plant and the like, all set back from the face of the building and of low visibility from the street. The centrepiece of the building is the clock tower, a carefully sculpted rectangular prism that rises a further two stories above the original building with a clock face on each side.

Much original heritage fabric was lost when the interior was converted to serviced apartments in 1996, including the clock mechanism. The clock hands are now only operated by the whim of the occupants of the apartment in the clock tower. However the exterior substantially retains its authentic form and materials (save for the windows and street corner entrance, which are modern replacements). The MLC makes a significant contribution to the quality of the streetscape value along both streets.

The construction is a load-bearing system of cast in situ reinforced concrete used for floating foundations, external walls, floors and roof. The building is faced with terracotta tiles (faience) of a warm buff colour, graded in tone from dark at the base to light at the top. The base of the building, and the main and side entrances, are faced with rich red Kanimbla granite. The main entrance hall, and all the elevator lobbies and corridors were finished in flush panelling of selected Queensland maple.

Located at the prominent, wedge-shaped, inner city intersection of Lambton Quay, Customhouse Quay, and Hunter Street, the former MLC Building is an important element in the Lambton Quay townscape. The location, scale, and vertical design of the building combine to make it a landmark of the CBD.

The building is located in the BNZ Head Office Heritage Area and the NZHPT South Lambton Quay Heritage Area. It compliments its immediate neighbours, the former Bank of New Zealand buildings, as well as the other commercial buildings in the precinct, such as the former CBA, Prudential, and South British Insurance buildings, and the Stewart Dawson Building.

• Architectural

  Does the item have architectural or artistic value for characteristics that may include its design, style, era, form, scale, materials, colour, texture, patina of age, quality of space, craftsmanship, smells, and sounds?

  The former MLC Building is a building of high aesthetic value, and is an excellent example of an Art Deco/Moderne style interwar building. It makes striking use of its corner site with its elegant vertical proportions and signature clock tower and is notable for the high quality of its design, materials and workmanship.

• Group

  Is the item part of a group of buildings, structures, or sites that taken together have coherence because of their age, history, style, scale, materials, or use?

  The former MLC is one of a group of high-quality buildings that form the BNZ Head Office Heritage Area (and the Heritage New Zealand South Lambton Quay Historic Area). 
  
  
  
  The Wellington and Auckland MLC have some group value as a pair of similar wedge-shaped buildings that were built to a similar design, for the use of the same investment and insurance company.

• Townscape

  Does the item have townscape value for the part it plays in defining a space or street; providing visual interest; its role as a landmark; or the contribution it makes to the character and sense of place of Wellington?

  The former MLC building is a local landmark. It has high townscape value for its prominent wedge-shaped site at the high-profile CBD intersection between Lambton Quay and Hunter Street. 
  
  
  
  The building forms the ‘prow’ or ‘leading-edge’ of the unusual and irregularly shaped street-block between Hunter Street and Customhouse and Lambton Quays. The quality of its design, its height, and its strong vertical proportions create a strong visual element, and the building acts as a foil to the BNZ related Victorian and Edwardian Classical buildings that would otherwise dominate this street-block. 
  
  
  
  The former General Post Office clock and chimes were once a prominent and well-known feature of this building – although now only clock face survives.

• Association

  Is the item associated with an important person, group, or organisation?

  The building has historic value as the New Zealand head-office of the Mutual Life and Citizens Assurance Co. The Mutual Life and Citizens Assurance Co. was an Australian-based insurance, asset management and investment company that set up offices in New Zealand, and grew to become one of the country’s largest ‘assurance’ companies. Its New Zealand operations were purchased by the NZI in 1985.
  
  The building was designed by Mitchell and Mitchell, an prominent 20th century Wellington architecture practice.

• Archaeological

  Does the item have archaeological value for its ability to provide scientific information about past human activity?

  Pre 1900 reclamation, known pre-1900 human activity on this site

• Identity Sense Of Place Continuity

  Is the item a focus of community, regional, or national identity? Does the item contribute to sense of place or continuity?

  The building contributes to a sense of place and continuity with its unaltered exterior (with the notable exception of the replacement windows & loss of clock mechanism) and continual commercial use since its construction.

• Public Esteem

  Is the item held in high public esteem?

  This high-profile building is a local landmark on Lambton Quay and as such is likely to held in high public esteem.

• Authentic

  Does the item have authenticity or integrity because it retains significant fabric from the time of its construction or from later periods when important additions or modifications were carried out?

  The building’s exterior retains very high levels of authenticity.

• Representative

  Is the item a good example of the class it represents?

  The former MLC is a very good example of an inter-war Art Deco/Moderne building.

• Importance

  Is the item important for any of the above characteristics at a local, regional, national, or international level?

  This building is important at a local level.

Not assessed

• Evening Post. 24 February 1949
• Wanganui Herald, 8 April 1907
• ‘The New MLC Building’. In Home and Building. Vol. IV, No. 4, September 1940
• Beaglehole, Diana. 'Whanganui region - Cultural life'. Te Ara - the Encyclopedia of New Zealand. Updated July 2012, accessed June 2013 at
• Kelly, Michael. “T & G Building – A Significance Assessment”. Wellington City Council. 11 November 2011.
• Miskell, Boffa, and Chris Cochran. Wellington Heritage Building Inventory. Appendix III – Wellington Architects. Wellington: Wellington City Council, 2001.
• Fill, Barbara. ‘C.H. Mitchell, 1891-1949’. Wellington: NZHPT Wellington Regional Committee, 1984
• New Zealand Historic Places Trust. ‘Mitchell and Mitchell’. NZHPT Architect’s Glossary. Accessed June 2013, at
• Submissions and Evidence on Behalf of the New Zealand Historic Places Trust, in respect of Prudential Assurance Company of New Zealand Ltd Resource Consent Application Under Section 88 of the Resource Management Act 1991 to Demolish the Facades of Three Heritage Item Buildings and Develop the Site for Office, Retail, and Commercial Activities Together with Servicing, Parking and Ancillary Facilities. Unpublished, c.1997-1998.
• Pettigrew, Wendy and Mark Southcombe. ‘The End of the Wooden Shop: Wanganui Architecture in the 1890s’. Conference paper presented at the Centre for Building Performance Research, Victoria University, Wellington. 7th December 2007: ‘“Strident Effects of Instant Sophistication”: New Zealand Architecture in the 1890s’.
• Wellington City Council. Archive File 00056:213:B18334
• ____. Heritage Team Inventory File 1041-06-LAM231
• ____. Records Building File 1041-06-LAM231

• Inventory Report
• 1938 plans

Not available