The anniversary, known as Suffrage Day, was marked at the Kate Sheppard National Memorial on Oxford Tce in Christchurch on Thursday.
Deputy Mayor Pauline Cotter and Minister for Women, Selwyn MP Nicola Grigg, were among the speakers at the noon ceremony.
The annual event was run by the National Council of Women's Christchurch branch.
The Kate Sheppard National Memorial was unveiled in 1993, exactly 100 years after the groundbreaking day women won the right to vote in New Zealand on September 19, 1893.
It features life-sized bronze sculptures of Sheppard and five other suffrage leaders carrying their petition to Parliament in a wooden cart.
Several large petitions were organised and presented to Parliament in 1891 and 1892. In 1893, a petition gathered nearly 32,000 signatures, which equated to almost a quarter of all adult women in New Zealand at the time.
At 270 metres long, the petition was unrolled across the Chamber of the House during the debate on the proposed Electoral Bill.
The bill, which made New Zealand the first self-governing country in the world to extend this right to all women, passed in the House by 20 votes to 18.
Now Suffrage Day not only celebrates the right to vote but also acts as a reminder of the ongoing issue of women's equality.
- By Geoff Sloan, made with the support of NZ On Air
