$13m art museum could open in 2019

A new $13 million art museum proposed for central Christchurch has been delayed, but construction could start by the middle of next year and be finished in 2019, backers say.

When the Ravenscar House project was announced in 2015, construction was expected to start in 2016 with an opening date in 2018. The project has been delayed by design complications.

The proposal would transform a car parking site and public toilets on Rolleston Ave into a museum housing a significant collection of New Zealand art, including 110 paintings from the 19th century to the present day. This includes five paintings by Colin McCahon and 10 by Frances Hodgkins.

The collection was started by Christchurch couple Jim and Susan Wakefield in the early 1990s. They planned to use insurance funds from their former home, which was destroyed in the Canterbury earthquakes, to fund the new museum.

The couple had placed ownership of the art collection into the Ravenscar Trust with a plan to gift it to the city in the future. The museum will be jointly operated by the trust and Canterbury Museum. The $5m plot of land for the project was gifted to Canterbury Museum by the Christchurch City Council in 2015.

Family member and trustee Steve Wakefield said the project was delayed because it was a complicated building.

‘‘Things have slipped a bit, but not too much. We are focused on the getting it right part, rather than the timeline. It is a complicated building,’’ he said. ‘‘We are doing an underground car park and we decided to go with base isolation to future proof the building and its contents. That means it will be capable of protecting the art collection and hosting visiting collections in the future. We think it is the right thing to do.’’

Base isolation design was ‘‘fairly elaborate’’, he said. ‘‘It is a very unique building design.’’

Jim and Susan Wakefield have both stepped down from the trust overseeing the project due to ill health. Steve Wakefield said that had not delayed the project. ‘‘They are handing it over to the next generation to carry on their vision.’’

He said the resource consent could be submitted to the council in the next two weeks. He expected a building consent to be submitted early next year.