No other city in the southern hemisphere has been remade so radically in living memory. The 2011 earthquake tore out the heart of Christchurch's Victorian and Edwardian city centre, and what has grown back is something genuinely strange and interesting — a city still mid-sentence, where a neoclassical stone church might stand next to a vacant lot that became a community garden that became a car park that became a boutique hotel. The rebuilding is ongoing and that is part of the appeal.
The old survivors are worth seeking out precisely because they survived. Cathedral Square still holds its ruined Anglican cathedral and Neil Dawson's Chalice sculpture. The Botanic Gardens escaped unscathed. Canterbury Museum has some of the best Antarctic material anywhere. And scattered through the gaps where buildings used to stand are the creative, often temporary interventions that made Christchurch famous in urban design circles: street art, pop-up installations, dance floors in parking lots. Use the filters below to find what you want.