Neil Challenger Landscape Architect / Academic

William ‘Cabbage’ Wilson – Nurseryman

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William Wilson was a pioneer nursery man in Canterbury who set a nursery in 1851 with an advert by about August of that year - which is remarkable when the First Four Ships only arrived a few months earlier.  In terms of this project what’s interesting is that he set up his second nurseries after he moved from his first site, which is around the Avon Loop area... to the area of the Sumner Road now called the High Street.  He was on the Provincial Council.  When they dissolved the provinces he became the first Mayor of the city. He was a councillor then he was a Mayor later on in the 1870s, so this is a man who not only made a huge contribution through growing plant material, which we probably look at every day we drive across the Canterbury Plains, we probably see bits of Wilson in effect, he also made a significant contribution to the political development of the city and was a statesman of his time.

Neil Challenger

  • Image: Courtesy of Neil Challenger
  • Image: Courtesy of Neil Challenger
  • Image: Courtesy of Neil Challenger
  • Image: Courtesy of Neil Challenger
  • Image: Courtesy of Neil Challenger
  • Image: Courtesy of Neil Challenger
  • Image: Courtesy of Neil Challenger
  • Image: Courtesy of Neil Challenger
  • Image: Courtesy of Neil Challenger
  • Image: Courtesy of Neil Challenger

Building information

The nursery was set up in 1851.
Block between Cashel, Lichfield, Manchester and Madras Streets
Bedford Row