The claim
A gold-rush survivor on the Crown Range road between Wānaka and Queenstown, founded in 1863 when Cardrona had four hotels. Legendary publican Jimmy Patterson rationed drinkers according to how far they had to travel home. It lay derelict after 1961 until a 1980s restoration, and now its garden bar is a favourite with skiers and road-trippers.
What the records show
Heritage New Zealand lists the Cardrona Hotel's false front, and only the false front, as a Category 2 historic place entered on 15 December 2011. Its entry says the building dates from the 1860s, when Cardrona was a busy gold-mining community, that it was originally called the Empire Hotel after a nearby claim, and that it was renamed the Cardrona Hotel only in 1926. It was one of four hotels serving the settlement, with accommodation, livery and a coaching stop. James Paterson held the licence from 1926 until he died at 91 in 1961, and the hotel then closed for a period in the 1960s and early 1970s before redevelopment. The entry is plain that the false front now conceals modern premises built behind it, so the house a visitor walks into is not the gold-rush building. Read in full, the entry gives two things more. Its own table of construction dates puts the first hotel building and its false front in the late 1860s, and 1863 — the year the hotel takes for its own — is the year the entry gives for the discovery of gold at Cardrona. And it carries a dated record of the house in trade: land title information names Rebecca Bond, widow of the early proprietor G. Bond who may have built the hotel, as its owner in 1876. She sold in 1884, and Thomas Willoughby, a blacksmith and Sunday school teacher said to have bought the place in order to keep the drinking down, held it from 1885 to 1926. That 1876, published by Heritage New Zealand, is the earliest year any record traced puts this hotel in somebody's hands, and it is thirteen years after the year on the sign.
| Year | What | Source |
|---|---|---|
| 1863 | Claimed founding | The pub |
| 1876 | First record of a drinking house here | Heritage New Zealand, on Rebecca Bond as proprietor in 1876 |
What to look for inside
- Only the false front is on the New Zealand Heritage List
- Originally the Empire Hotel, renamed Cardrona in 1926
- James Paterson held the licence from 1926 until his death at 91 in 1961
- The false front has been the backdrop for Southern Man advertising
Visiting
Cardrona Hotel is in Cardrona, New Zealand, at 2312 Cardrona Valley Road, Cardrona 9382. We do not list opening times, because they change; the pub’s own site is the place to check before you set out.
Sources
- www.cardronahotel.co.nz/history
- www.cardronahotel.co.nz/
- www.rnz.co.nz/national/programmes/afternoons/audio/2018660891/new-zealand-s-finest-historic-pubs
- www.heritage.org.nz/list-details/2239/2239
Know something we don’t?Suggest a correctionLast checked Sept 2026
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