Nick Kortens spent many evening hours building a large replica Tardis letterbox for his family, which he installed at his Peka Peka section, north of Wellington, late last year.
Since then, the letterbox has been a source of interest, amusement and photo opportunities for many people travelling up and down Peka Peka Rd, particularly young Dr Who fans.
Now however, the iconic creation is nowhere to be seen, after it was ripped off its base and taken in the early hours of Friday April 21.
"Sadly some low life has decided it should belong to them," said Mr Kortens, who had lived on Peka Peka Rd with his family for the past six years.
"It's such a distinctive item I'm hoping someone may recognise and help the culprits to be apprehended."
Mr Kortens, who had "never been a fan of the ordinary" said his letterbox creation has stemmed from most types being "exceedingly boring".
"Having developed some woodworking skills over the years, I first built a steam train letterbox for a previous address in Waikanae, which was also sadly stolen within six months.
"This put me off doing it again for a number of years, but we needed a letterbox big enough to hold packages.
"Being significantly bigger, I hoped it would also be harder to steal."
He said, as a child growing up in the United Kingdom, before New Zealand, he always a fan of Dr Who.
"I figured the Tardis would make an ideal letterbox.
"My wife had bought one of our boys a Tardis coin box for one of their birthdays many years ago, which we still had and so using this as a model and information online, I went to it."
The frame and cross members, he said, were made from cedar and pine, cut to size and all the relevant grooves and slots hand carved and routed in.
"A suitable solar light was purchased and the relevant bits installed to make the working light on top of the box . . . and I was able to get the exact Pantone colour code for Tardis blue."
Mr Kortens said in last five or months, the letterbox had been regularly photographed and people stopped to talk to him about it.
"Sadly, like many things of value, someone else decided that they should have it all for themselves.
"This has saddened us and our neighbours, and only yesterday three kids riding by exclaimed quite loudly that there used to be a 'cool Tardis on that post'."
"Now, we've ordered a large boring steel box letterbox, which will be dyna bolted to a concrete slab."