McKay & McGregor

The architecture practice of McKay & McGregor was formed by a short-term partnership between James Hector McKay and Rob Roy McGregor. It was active from 1898 and dissolved “by mutual consent” in December 1900.

James McKay was born in Scotland and moved to Australia in c.1884 where he practiced as an architect until the early 1890s. He moved to Wellington by 1896 and his partnership with Rob Roy McGregor produced over 40 houses, a few commercial buildings, and the fine timber Italianate St James’ Church in Newtown.  James McKay went on to form the prolific and longstanding partnership of Crichton and McKay. Notable examples of Crichton & McKay’s work include the Bank of New South Wales, the Bank of Australasia (now ANZ) in Hunter Street and Customhouse Quay, the Dominion (newspaper) Building and many of the later buildings at Wellington Hospital.

Rob Roy MacGregor was born in Dunedin and trained as an architect with Robert Arthur Lawson. He moved to Wellington by 1893 to start an architecture practice, and entered design competitions for the Ballance memorial in parliament grounds, and the Pahiatua and Palmerston North courthouses. His competition designs had mixed results. Although his memorial to Premier John Balance was the winning entry, members of parliament instead chose a statue by W.J. Helyer set on a plinth designed by MacGregor. His courthouse designs were placed second to Wellington architect George Stevenson, but MacGregor eventually oversaw the construction of the Pahiatua Courthouse and Post Office in 1894. Macgregor remained in business in Wellington until at least 1904 when he designed the L.T Watkins Building on the corner of Cuba and Vivian Streets. He also designed a row of four near-identical Tinakori Road houses for Thomas Joseph McCarthy in 1903. 

Sources:

Bulleyment Fortune Architects website accessed July 2015 http://www.bulleymentfortune.co.nz/BFA_archives.html

“Cyclopedia of New Zealand [Wellington Provincial District]” (Wellington: The Cyclopedia Company Ltd, 1897)

“Evening Post”, 23 May 189; 19 February 1898; 31 December 1900 

Mew, Geoff & Adrian Humphris. “Raupo to Deco: Wellington Styles and Architects 1840 – 1940” (Wellington: Steel Roberts Aotearoa, 2014) 

THE BALLANCE MEMORIAL UNVEILING OF THE STATUE IN PARLIAMENTARY GROUNDS. Evening Post, 7 April 1897

THE BALLANCE MEMORIAL. Press, 10 March 1894