Lansdowne, also spelled Lansdown, is a locality south of

Christchurch Christchurch ( ; mi, Ōtautahi) is the largest city in the South Island of New Zealand and the seat of the Canterbury Region. Christchurch lies on the South Island's east coast, just north of Banks Peninsula on Pegasus Bay. The Avon River / ...

, New Zealand. Lansdowne is located on Old Tai Tapu Road and Early Valley Road. The roads are the boundary between two territorial authorities, with the north and east sides belonging to Christchurch City and the south and west sides to

Selwyn District Selwyn District is a predominantly rural district in central Canterbury, on the east coast of New Zealand's South Island. It is named after the Selwyn River / Waikirikiri, which is in turn named after Bishop George Selwyn, the first Anglican bis ...

. Lansdowne was the name of a sheep station given in 1851 by

Guise Brittan William Guise Brittan (3 December 1809 – 18 July 1876), mostly known as Guise Brittan and commonly referred to as W. G. Brittan, was the first Commissioner of Crown Lands for Canterbury in New Zealand. Biography Brittan was born in Gloucester, ...

, who named it after the Lansdown in

Bath, Somerset Bath () is a city in the Bath and North East Somerset unitary area in the county of Somerset, England, known for and named after its Roman-built baths. At the 2021 Census, the population was 101,557. Bath is in the valley of the River Avon, ...

. The Lansdowne Stables off Old Tai Tapu Road are registered by

Heritage New Zealand Heritage New Zealand Pouhere Taonga (initially the National Historic Places Trust and then, from 1963 to 2014, the New Zealand Historic Places Trust) ( mi, Pouhere Taonga) is a Crown entity with a membership of around 20,000 people that advocate ...

as a Category II heritage item. Brittan built his first house on the property in 1857 but it burned down the following year. Brittan then built a substantial house with stones quarried from the nearby Halswell Quarry, but went bankrupt in the process. The next owner of the property was Edward Stafford. The property was next sold after Stafford died in 1901. Lansdowne Homestead and the adjacent park were bought in 1995 by Haydn Rawstron who gifted the property to a trust founded by him (the John Robert Godley Memorial Trust, with the name commemorating the founder of Canterbury).

References

{{coord, 43, 37, 03, S, 172, 35, 20, E, type:city_region:NZ, display=title Populated places established in 1851 Suburbs of Christchurch