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This 1910s advertisement shows the Tonson Garlick furniture factory in Auckland. While mechanisation eroded the craft aspect of furniture making (where one or two people made a whole piece), the factory system increased demand for semi-skilled labour, where each worker handled only a small part of the production process. Accordingly, the factory was sited near the city's working-class districts of Grafton, Freemans Bay and Ponsonby. With a total staff of 148, it was a relatively large enterprise.
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Reference: Eph-B-DÉCOR-1910-01-004
Permission of the Alexander Turnbull Library, National Library of New Zealand, Te Puna Mātauranga o Aotearoa, must be obtained before any re-use of this image.