Festival: Bluestone Award

Last night at the Sargood Centre and following the Lawson Lecture, Mayor-elect, Sophie Barker announced the Bluestone Award to a true heritage warrior. Stephen MacKnight was presented with the biennial award and true to the credentials needed, Stephen certainly showed why he was chosen. Congratulations Stephen. You are a worthy recipient for 2025.

Sophie has kindly provided her speaking notes to share here:

Tēnā koutou katoa e huihui mai nei E ngā mana, e ngā reo, e rau rakatira mā Tēnā koutou, tēnā koutou, tēnā koutou katoa.

The Dunedin City Council and the Southern Heritage Trust are incredibly proud to sponsor the Bluestone Award for outstanding contribution to heritage in Ōtepoti Dunedin.

The Bluestone Award honours people whose leadership and actions have significantly enhanced the heritage character of Dunedin, making a positive difference to our city, sense of place and community wellbeing.

This year’s Bluestone Awardee has changed public and industry perceptions of Dunedin’s historic character and streetscapes through their professional knowledge, experience, and willingness to act and speak out.

Their influence and expertise have led to a greater appreciation of the restoration potential, economic value and importance of our grand old buildings.

The awardee’s practical solutions for heritage buildings have been applied to such treasures as the Duke of Wellington building and substantial blocks in the Exchange and the Vogel Street Heritage Precinct, among others.

I’m delighted to present this year’s Bluestone Award to Stephen MacKnight! Stephen, I understand you were the obvious choice this year, as among your colleagues, developers and building owners, and this council, you are incredibly well respected. I don’t think there is a heritage project I know that has not had your advice or touch, at some level. You are literally the ‘go to’ structural engineer among Dunedin’s heritage community, but also to so many people striving to maintain our heritage character in the face of concerns about the safety of these buildings.

So this award has been a long time coming. Your work spans both commissioned structural work for others, and your own and wider family’s buildings where you have used your skills to rescue a fairly respectable number of our heritage yourself, and you have done so with style and innovation.

Stephen comes from a small handful of structural engineers who understand heritage buildings well. And with stability of buildings always the major concern, his skills are even more remarkable when you consider he honed them well before the Christchurch earthquake. His colleague and mentor was none other than Bluestone Award recipient, the late Lou Robinson.

Following in a family tradition of rescuing old buildings, Stephen has been actively involved in Dunedin heritage since before 1994, when he was a young design and construction supervision engineer on the Art Gallery project in Dunedin, a contract let to one Russell Lund.

Russell tells me that the project was an early victory for Stephen. It involved knitting together 5 different buildings, all on different levels, over 10,000 square metres. One of Council’s biggest ever building successes – Due to Steve and Lou Robinson’s innovative design - it cost just $1,000 per square metre, a fraction of the cost of the Te Papa complex being built at the same time - and it had more display space! 30 years on it is still the jewel in the DCC property crown.

I understand that some of his solutions were so innovative they hastened the hair loss of the builders tasked with delivering it – all in the name of making the project work, which Steve is renowned for.

Other projects where Steve made a lasting and vital contribution were the 1997 adaptation of an old cheese factory in Anzac Ave into the new Hocken Library - another fantastic success, still as good as the day it was finished 30 years on.

In 2002, Stephen worked on the Dunedin Main Court house strengthening refurbishment. This is a relevant example today because Steve and Lou designed an economical solution involving a few hundred thousand dollars to strengthen the building, mainly parapet work and tying floors and rooves to walls. After the 2011 Christchurch earthquake, the rules changed and it had to be done again at a cost of millions. Now it’s gone full circle and nationally, the rules have changed again! But more on that perhaps at a later date!

A long-time friend William Cockerill tells me that a special strength of Stephen’s is mastering how buildings perform under loads, adverse or otherwise. So his designs both reflect that, and remain sympathetic to original form.

He is especially respected among his peers for his rapport with tradespeople which is vital to making things happen. And when the inevitable problem springs up, and when others may crash and burn, Stephen is a master at keeping the dialogue going, and producing a sketch or two as a possible solution on the spot.

Skill and vision is needed for the work that Stephen has spent his career working on – and without doubt anyone who knows him would say he is just that himself – a visionary. Both in his contractual work and his own buildings, we are extremely proud to honour Stephen with this award tonight.

Thank you, Stephen, for your services to built heritage in Dunedin.