engineering

Old Arts Building

Old Arts Building is a engineering topic covered in the lgStudy science library. This page brings together a partial reference excerpt, illustrations, worked examples, real-world applications and a short study plan, so you can understand Old Arts Building rather than just read about it. In short: The Old Arts Building, also known as The ClockTower, is a historic Perpendicular Gothic clocktower in Auckland, New Zealand, completed in 1926 for the University of Auckland. It has housed several university departments and is a landmark for the university.

Key takeaways

Old Arts Building belongs to engineering; place it in that map before memorising details.
Learn the definition first, then one example that makes the definition concrete.
Connect Old Arts Building to a quantity you can measure, compute or draw — that is where exam questions come from.
Reproduce the core statement of Old Arts Building from memory before moving on to harder problems.

Reference excerpt

The Old Arts Building, also known as The ClockTower, is a historic Perpendicular Gothic clocktower in Auckland, New Zealand, completed in 1926 for the University of Auckland. It has housed several university departments and is a landmark for the university. It is registered as a category 1 building by Heritage New Zealand.

History

The ClockTower at the University of Auckland was designed by Roy Alstan Lippincott, a Chicago-trained architect and brother-in-law of Walter Burley Griffin. In 1921, Lippincott and draughtsman Edward F. Billson won the competition for the design of the then Auckland University College Arts Building out of 44 entries. It was then constructed between 1923 and 1926 by Fletcher Construction Co. The construction was largely funded by a central government grant with additional public subscriptions.

The building has housed departments of Arts, Architecture, Law, Music and the Library as well as the University Hall, and limited student amenities in the rear wing.

Architecture The building consists of a main block with the famous clock tower that it is known by, and a connecting wing on the rear. They were carried out in "an elegant Arts and Crafts interpretation of Perpendicular Gothic" style. It was faced with stone from Mount Somers and Oamaru. The tower, which is 54 meters tall, was inspired by the Tom Tower of Christ Church, Oxford.

In the ornamentation of the building, there is representations of native flora and fauna including flax-seed pods, ponga fronds, kākā and kea. Lippincott also embraced the idea of "the University becoming 'a small botanical garden'" in landscaping the grounds around the building with multiple native plants, including manuka and kōwhai. The interior is octagonal, vaulted and there are mosaic floors and piers. The mosaic floor in the foyer underneath the tower is particularly notable.

Critique The building was radically different to existing architecture in Auckland, and was "much criticised for being insufficiently 'English'" and "out of harmony with our national character" including by the Auckland Education Board architect. A. R. D. Fairburn stated that the design "would scare old ladies in the park." The Minister of Education James Parr suggested that it might look better without the tower. The central tower was also criticised for being too ornate and the buttresses too plain.

Lippincott explained that the tower was “the culminating feature, symbolic of the spiritual aspect of university ideals”. Lippincott defended the design:“if we turn to Nature as we find her in this fascinating land…we shall produce a building and a tower —not British, surely, but one that shall belong much more intimately to us here in Auckland…and by the same token would be of much greater and more lasting interest to New Zealander and visitor alike”.

Modifications The building has been refurbished, modified and cleaned on several occasions. In the 1960s, the interior of the main building was modified after the student union building was constructed. Between 1985 and 1988, the main wing was renovated and strengthened, and the tower was braced with steel and concrete filigree replaced with fibreglass in many places to reduce weight. There was also the installation of steel shear walls and diaphragms. This work received an award from the Institute of Architects.

Recent use The ClockTower has come to symbolise the University. It now is home to the Vice-Chancellor’s Office, the Equity Office, parts of Academic Services, the Great Hall and the Council Room of the University of Auckland, along with several lecture theatres used for teaching. The TV show MasterMind New Zealand was filmed in the building in 2016.

References

Illustrations

Worked examples

Example 1 — a first encounter with Old Arts Building

Start with the simplest possible case. Write down what Old Arts Building claims or describes in one sentence, then invent the smallest concrete situation in which that sentence is true. In engineering, the smallest case is usually a single object, a single equation or a single measurement. Check that every symbol or term in your sentence has a meaning in that case.

Example 2 — changing one variable

Take the situation from Example 1 and change exactly one quantity: double it, halve it, or set it to zero. Predict what should happen to Old Arts Building before you calculate. Comparing your prediction with the result is the fastest way to find out whether you understand the idea or only the words.

Example 3 — an exam-style question

Typical questions about Old Arts Building ask you to (a) state it precisely, (b) apply it to given data, and (c) explain a limitation. Practise writing all three answers in under five minutes; the third part is what separates a full-mark answer from an average one.

Applications of Old Arts Building

In research: Old Arts Building appears in engineering research whenever the underlying quantities have to be modelled precisely. Papers usually cite it as a starting assumption and then explore where it breaks down.
In technology and industry: Engineering practice reuses Old Arts Building in design rules, simulations and safety margins. Knowing the idea lets you read a specification sheet and understand why the numbers look the way they do.
In the classroom: Old Arts Building is common in secondary-school and first-year university syllabi. It links to neighbouring topics Auckland CBD, Buildings and structures completed in 1926, Buildings and structures in Auckland, so understanding it makes those chapters shorter.
In everyday life: Look for Old Arts Building outside the textbook — in sport, cooking, traffic, electronics or the sky above you. An example you found yourself is remembered far longer than one you were given.

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How to study Old Arts Building in 20 minutes

Read the reference excerpt below once, without taking notes.
Close the page and write down what Old Arts Building means in your own words.
Compare your version with the excerpt and mark what you missed.
Work through the three examples above with pen and paper.
Explain Old Arts Building out loud to somebody else — or to Teacher Smith in the lgStudy chat.

Frequently asked questions

What is Old Arts Building in simple terms?

Why does Old Arts Building matter?

Because it connects several engineering ideas at once: it gives you a definition you can apply, a quantity you can calculate, and a way to check whether a result is plausible.

How should I study Old Arts Building?

Read the excerpt, restate it from memory, then work through the examples and applications listed on this page. The five-step study plan above takes about twenty minutes.

What does this page cover?

It gives you a compact reference excerpt plus original lgStudy explanations, examples, applications and study material on Old Arts Building.