Ivey West & Memorial Hall

Restoring Legacy: The Revitalisation of Ivey West & Memorial Hall

Few structures carry the weight of history quite like Category 1 heritage-listed buildings. Ivey West and Memorial Hall at Lincoln University are two such buildings and have been at the heart of the university for over a century. Unfortunately, the 2010/2011 Canterbury earthquakes left them structurally compromised and unusable. Recognising their cultural and historical significance, Lincoln University committed to their restoration and adaptive reuse – a project that would not only strengthen the buildings but also reimagine their role on campus.

The redevelopment of Ivey West and Memorial Hall was a key component of Lincoln University’s Campus Masterplan, which aims to transform existing spaces into a cohesive, people-centred environment. The restored buildings now house the Vice-Chancellor’s Office, Senior Leadership Team, Te Manutaki, Alumni and Development Office, Strategic Communications, and Project Management Office, while Memorial Hall will be a multi-use space for meetings, conferences, and events including its new use as the university’s Council Chambers. With a strong emphasis on heritage preservation, sustainability, and seismic resilience, the project represented a careful balance between honouring the past and preparing for the future.

RCP was engaged as project manager, bringing its expertise in complex heritage restoration, seismic strengthening, and adaptive reuse. The team provided leadership across procurement, demolition, construction, and close-out, ensuring the university’s vision was realised while maintaining programme certainty, cost control, and risk mitigation. Early in the project, RCP facilitated a structural design review, leveraging insights from similar seismic restoration projects to enhance structural resilience while preserving historic character. The team’s experience on previous heritage projects helped them to foster strong relationships between the design team and the structural peer reviewer and provided opportunities to implement lessons learned, such as needing the design team to provide advice and guidance to the contractor for temporary works design.