Port Chalmers' Regional Maritime Museum

This building dates from 1889 and originally housed the Port Chalmers Town Hall, as well as the Town Clerk’s office, the Fire Brigade, the Police Station (including the Sergeant’s residence and cells), Court Rooms, Customs Office and Government Shipping Office. There was also a morgue that occupied a backroom downstairs. Today the library and service centre are housed in the area previously occupied by the fire brigade. Upstairs are various function rooms.

Originally called the Jerusalem Hotel, it was built in 1876 After the original owner had financial problems it was purchased in 1879 by George Chick and from then on it was known as Chick's. In 1903 the Port Chalmers electorate went ‘dry’ and Chick's lost its licence. Hotels at the port banded together, taking their case as far as the Privy Council, in London, before winning back their licences in May, 1905.
From 2008 until 2016 when it closed for good it was a popular music venue, which attracted national and international acts such as Steve Albini, Sharon van Etten and Kurt Vile. The building is now used as a recording studio.
The basement was once used as an overflow jail, with meals being served with the assistance of the Chick family. Now bricked up, a smuggling tunnel lead out from the basement to the dock area. Legend has it that drunk pub patrons would be taken down and ‘shanghaied’ to wake up the next day halfway out to sea.

This church was built from Port Chalmers bluestone (breccia stone) between 1871 and 1874 to the designs of prominent Dunedin architect R.A. Lawson. It is one of only a handful of New Zealand churches built in an Early English Gothic style according to the principles of the Academic Gothic Revival. The church building is constructed from and has several fine memorial stained-glass windows.

Stone church, built between 1871 and 1883. The church is built from Port Chalmers bluestone (breccia stone), with Oamaru stone piles and kauri interiors and a roof clad in slate scales. The church has a number of memorial windows including the Watkin-Creed memorial windows, placed in the Iona Union Church vestibule in 1974 when the Port Chalmers Methodist Church was demolished. They have not been permanently installed as a result of their different shape but rest in front of the existing stained-glass windows. Above the altar is a rose window.

Many buildings in Port Chalmers and Dunedin are built of Port Chalmers bluestone (brecia), which was cut from a quarry just behind the town. The quarry, which was known as the ‘Big Quarry’ opened in March 1866 and operated until it closed in the 1920. After being used or many years as overgrown rubbish dump. Lady Constance Thorn ( -1997), a former long- time mayoress of the town, came up with the idea of turning the area into a dell of rhododendrons. The Port Chalmers and District Lions Club came on board in 1998 to develop and now maintain the garden. The sheltered dell features numerous rhododendrons, along with magnolias, prunus, maples and spring flowering bulbs viewed by strolling the woodland paths. A lookout accessed by stairs features a selection of old historic photographs of Port Chalmers over the years and also offers a superb panoramic view of the town and Otago Harbour.

The former studio of noted artist Ralph Hotere (1931-2013) was on land at the tip of Observation Point, the large bluff overlooking the container terminal. When the port's facilities were expanded in 1993, part of the bluff was removed, including the area containing Hotere's studio (after strenuous objection from many of the town's residents). Part of the bluff close to the removed portion are converted by the Hotere Foundation Trust with the assistance of the Otago harbor Board into an award-winning sculpture garden in 2005 containing featuring fours works by both Hotere and other noted New Zealand modern sculptors.