Christchurch has taken the trophy more most innovative recovery effort after their devastating 2011 earthquake. Taking only 6 months to build, and opening in October 2011, when the downtown area was still completely inaccessible due to the danger of falling masonry from heavily damaged skyscrapers, the Re:START Mall was launched, featuring 29 stores and a cafe, all built from shipping containers – making it one of the world’s only pop-up malls. This structure was so unique at the time, for using only re-purposed and refurbished shipping containers, modified to suit the retail sector.
Breathing new life into the city, the aptly named Re:START Mall was the brain child of the Christchurch Property and Building Owners group, who thought that the rebuild of new buildings would take too long, and the community needed to be encouraged back to the CBD as soon as it was safe. Made possible by an interest free loan from the Christchurch Earthquake appeal trust and a sponsorship from ASB, the Re:START Mall has been a permanent fixture in the tourist industry, and helped put Christchurch on number six in the Lonely Planet guide to the ‘must visit’ places in the world.
At a time when shipping containers still weren’t regularly used, this was a wild idea to create an entire mall in a no-go zone of a natural disaster area. However, it’s success meant that the retail area of Christchurch was established well before regular buildings, so the industry didn’t suffer, which was yet another reason Christchurch were able to rebuild the city so quickly. The mall unintentionally became a famous symbol and icon for disaster relief innovation, and even though the temporary solution’s doors closed in 2017, the shipping containers will live on as a farmer’s market takes place inside the mall area that used to house fashion shops, book shops, restaurants, cafes and even banks.
