Newspaper Article 2007 – Homestead gets a makeover

Homestead gets a makeover

KATHY WEBB

THE servants who kept the household of Stoneycroft in proper style did it all the hard way.

There was no electricity supply for the grand old Hastings homestead when it was built about 1875, so the coal range in the spacious but spartan kitchen had to provide not only family meals but hot water for the bathtub upstairs.

Fortunately, Hastings District Council has slightly more sophisticated tools at its disposal in its bid to get the homestead back into shape.

The house is now undergoing a $200,000 restoration in preparation for a new life as a public building.

Stoneycroft’s exact age is unknown, as the 1931 earthquake destroyed building records, but it is possibly the oldest homestead in the Hastings area.

Set on 2.4 hectares of lawns dominated by mature trees, the five-bedroom, Victorian, Carpenter Gothic-style Stoneycroft was built by William John Birch, who farmed a remote station on the Taihape Road, accessible only by pack horse.

Mr Birch and his wife, Lydia, used Stoneycroft as their town house.

All up, it has had only four owners, the latest being the council, which bought it 18 months ago for $493,000. Inside, it is still largely in original condition, including primitive service areas and decorative living areas with scrim and heavy-paper-lined walls.

Stoneycroft’s conservation plan stipulates that when those wall coverings are removed, they must be replaced by fresh scrim and paper rather than gib board, to maintain the house’s originality.

The only concessions to modernity so far have been the installation of fire detectors and alarms, and town water supply to feed a network of sprinklers.

Outside, the work has been structural, including repiling and reroofing. During the past six months, the kauri weatherboards upstairs have been painstakingly stripped bare with solvent and scrapers, as heat guns would have been a fire risk.

Wellington conservation architect Chris Cochran came up with a colour scheme for the new paintwork, matching the original colours of green and creamy yellow. The downstairs veranda roofs will be painted in green and cream stripes.

Project manager Dave Kite says the interior of the homestead will remain in a raw state till a decision has been made about its future use. Many ideas have been put forward, including turning it into a museum of Ngati Kahungunu and European history.

In the meantime, Dodge the household cat is the only official resident.

Photo caption – New lease: When Stoneycroft is finally restored, the Hastings house will be used as a public building. A decision has still to be made about its future use, but one idea is to turn it into a museum of Ngati Kahungunu and European history.
Picture: KATHY WEBB