Heritage et AL

New Zealand’s first American-style shopping centre LynnMall opened on 30 October 1963. A 110 foot tower with a flashing red beacon marked the site which had previously been a swampy, seven-acre scrub-covered paddock. LynnMall offered a relaxed, traffic-free arrangement of shops around a weather-proof courtyard with a fountain, flowers and trees. There was plenty of seating, a free children’s play area and 500 free car parks. Three of the city’s largest retailers anchored the centre - Farmers, Milne & Choyce and Woolworths - and were complemented by 43 specialty shops such as La Gonda Fashion, Kean’s, Starforme Foundations, Masco and Curtaincraft. Ref: J. T. Diamond, LynnMall from Farmers end, November 1963, Auckland Libraries Heritage Collections, JTD-11A-02070-2 In 1965 the corner-stone was laid for a second Auckland shopping mall developed by the same company – Southmall. Farmers and Woolworths were already signed up and soon joined by a Four Square supermarket. Specia...

Ref: Happy staff at Hurley Bendon, Papatoetoe, 1964, photograph reproduced courtesy of Fairfax Media, South Auckland Research Centre, Auckland Libraries, Footprints 00071. I was looking through the new publication Real modern : everyday New Zealand in the 1950s and 1960s  when I saw the tea towel. Memories came flooding back. My sister and I trapped in the small space of the dark décor in our 1970s kitchen. Doing the dishes. Who gets to dry? Who has to wash? Who decides? In 2013 our family moved into a house with no dishwasher. Great, I thought, now my teenagers can get to lead real lives, they will have to do the dishes. They will have to interact with their parents in a new and inventive way; they will have to talk to each other.  Ref: Souvenir tea towel of Mt Egmont (Mt Taranaki), c.1960, Maylin, Ireland, gift of Angela Lassig 2010. Image reproduced courtesy of Te Papa Press.  

Coffee lounges opened in Auckland in the 1950s and filled a social gap for people who weren’t attracted to other entertainments available at that time such as commercial cabaret and big bands in ballrooms. They sported glamorous European-inspired names like C’est si Bon, El Paso, La Ronde, Picasso and Piccolo and their décor was Bohemian chic. Walls were covered in murals, or posters of bull fights, and ceilings were painted black and draped in fishing nets. Tables were lit by candles stuck in Chianti bottles, and the air was usually thick with cigarette smoke. Ref: John Rykenberg, Auckland restaurant, 1959, Sir George Grey Special Collections, Auckland Libraries, 1269-A997-3.