- A 171-year-old New Plymouth cottage, Mace Cottage, is for sale after being saved from demolition.
- The three-bedroom property features historic elements like native timber floors and a rebricked fireplace.
- The cottage, with a $750,000 RV, is heritage protected and has a significant natural garden.
A 171-year-old cottage bought for $1 and saved from demolition in the 1970s is looking for its next guardian.
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Mace Cottage is thought to be New Plymouth’s oldest private home and was originally built on Carrington Road by William and Georgina Johnstone.
It was built in 1854, the same year as the better-known Richmond Cottage, which is publicly owned and houses the city’s colonial museum.
Mace Cottage changed hands several times before falling under the ownership of its namesake and early pioneer Captain Mace in the mid-1860s.
The three-bedroom, one-bathroom home is heritage protected. Photo / Supplied
Mace’s family sold it to the Taranaki County Council for £1800 in 1951, before reselling it some 25 years later, just before it was about to be demolished to make way for an electricity substation.
Technic Properties is rumoured to have paid $1 for it in 1976, and it was loaded onto a truck and moved to a 4921sqm site on Karina Road, in Merrilands, where it remains today.
Harcourts agent Zay Griffiths said the current owner had lived there for 20 years and was selling because of health reasons.
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Griffiths said the three-bedroom, one-bathroom property was full of history and would definitely appeal to history buffs, character lovers, or people seeking a private and peaceful setting.
“It’s pretty authentic. It’s just a fabulous one to market because obviously, you are going back in time. It feels like a fairytale house – like you are in some sort of fairytale.”
Some of the rooms still have either string lights or toggle light switches, native kauri timber features on the floors and the bathroom walls, and a working fireplace that was rebricked in the late-1970s is a cute addition in the lounge. A chandelier hangs from the ceiling in the stairwell, and patterned wallpaper covers the walls.
Native kauri features throughout the home. Photo / Supplied
The garden is also a piece of art created by the previous owners Enid and Colin Hutchinson, a retired horticulturist, who bought the house in 1989 and owned it for 15 years. The couple told NZ House and Garden Magazine in 2001 that Colin had spent years transforming the bush into an impressive garden, which they opened up to the public as part of the Rhododendron Festival in the late 1990s.
“It’s like an enchanted forest when you go in there, and at the bottom of the section is a lake,” Griffiths said. There were paths all around the garden and a park bench to sit and enjoy the scenery.
The property, also known as Foxglove cottage, is a heritage-protected Category A property, and about 40% of the garden is classified as significant natural land, which restricts what changes can be made to the property.
The property, which has an RV of $750,000, is being sold by a deadline sale. Griffiths said it was seriously for sale because the owner had no plans to return there. “It’s got to be gone.”
- 55D Karina Road, in Merrilands, New Plymouth, is for sale, tender closing August 5
