KEY POINTS:
When Pete and Mel Gawron bought their Arrowtown cottage nine years ago, they inherited a fascinating slice of local history.
Known as Preston Cottage, the home was built in 1864 for local doctor Hogarth Preston and served for years as the town's doctor's surgery and maternity hospital.
So when the Gawrons decided to renovate, they went for a scheme that would fit in with the original building's rustic nature, rather than overshadowing it.
To make room for the new living area they excavated an entire bank, in the process unearthing and donating to the local museum many old medicine vials and tonic bottles from the home's past. Now the new extension subtly complements the original areas of the home. From the front, the tiny whitewashed cottage looks much as it did when it was built 145 years ago, but at the rear a central outdoor courtyard is finished in modern, galvanised iron.
Topping the renovation wishlist for the couple, who own Arrowtown's Saffron and Pesto restaurants and the Blue Door Bar, was an open-plan kitchen, dining and living area suitable for entertaining.
Unsurprisingly, the kitchen is the focal point of the renovated home. Here, chef Pete has gathered grunty industrial appliances, including a commercial oven, a vast extractor hood and a coffee machine that wouldn't look out of place in a Ponsonby cafe.
Pete, who is from Adelaide, and Mel, who is British, discovered Queenstown on a skiing holiday and moved there 15 years ago when their two daughters, Chelsea, now 18, and Tegan, now 15, were babies. They remain passionate travellers and evidence of their adventures is everywhere.
A silver Thai goddess graces the grand schist fireplace, and there are rugs from Rajasthan on the floor, camel saddle bags from Morocco on the window seat and a vibrant kimono on one wall. Of course it hasn't always been like this. When the couple bought the rundown cottage in 2000 it didn't have much going for it except its proximity to Saffron and the "lovely vibe" that Pete and Mel fell for.
"After seeing a thousand houses we knew it was the one," Pete says. At the time they were concentrating their energy on getting Saffron up and running, so they didn't do anything to the house for two years. "It was a pit," says Pete, recalling that the bathroom had so many holes in the wall that they stacked eight bales of hay up against it to act as insulation.
"We lived like that for two years." Even once the renovations began, things didn't get much more comfortable for the family, who remained in the house while the builders worked around them. "It was hard," says Pete. "There was a period when we were walking through the building site to get to the bathroom. It was definitely challenging at times."
Seven years later the home is still a work in progress, but these keen DIYers aren't fazed by the projects still at hand. "We never get the opportunity to complete it," says Pete who, as well as running three businesses and tinkering with the house, has found time to write a book, Saffron: Food from the Central Otago Heartland.
"There's never much of a plan - things have just evolved. But you don't have to do everything at once." After all, they're not going anywhere in a hurry. "I live in paradise," says Pete.
Kitchen confidence
Crowd pleaser: If you often cook for a large number of people, consider installing a dedicated grill plate. "It means I can feed steaks to a dozen teenagers with very little effort," says Pete.
Stand alone: An old butcher's block makes a great kitchen island. To get the real thing, ask your local butcher or keep an eye out for butchers who are closing down or renovating.
Take it outside: Complement your indoor oven with an outside stone fireplace. Pete's houses a rotisserie, where he cooks up lamb or chicken over wood pruned from local orchards.
* Leanne Moore is the editor of Your Home & Garden. See the issue on sale now for more renovation ideas.
