Whanganui artist buys historic Aramoho church to be used as a studio space

Sue Cooke and Anglican Parish of Whanganui co-vicar Caleb Rowe inside St Laurence's Church. Photo / Bevan Conley.

A historic, near-130-year-old Whanganui church has been purchased by a local artist who intends to use it as a studio space.

St Laurence’s Church on Gibson St in Aramoho was first opened on November 10, 1895.

Whanganui artist Sue Cooke bought the church and its 1500sqm site from the Anglican Parish of Whanganui.

Cooke said she had been interested in St Laurence’s as she had owned a church in Waitati, north of Dunedin in the 1980′s.

“I was very fond of that church, the only reason I sold it was that I’d met my husband-to-be at the time and wanted to stay in Whanganui to see how that went and I knew I couldn’t maintain a church in Dunedin from Whanganui,” she said.

Since living in Whanganui she’d taken notice of St Laurence’s.

“I’ve known about this building for, I don’t know, maybe 15 to 20 years.

“I’ve often looked at it as we’ve done little drives around and thought, oh that’s a cute church.”

With her current Guyton St studio bursting at the seams to the point she said it was becoming difficult to move, she realised she could use somewhere with more space.

“I thought, oh well shall I see if the Anglican Church would like to sell.”

Initially, she was only going to buy the church but in the end purchased the entire site with two extra buildings on site, which used to function as a community hall and Sunday school.

She said particular spaces had a certain feel to them which made them good spaces to create in, which was especially true of churches.

It wasn’t only the aesthetics of the church which made it an ideal studio space, with the available floor space also suiting her needs.

“As an artist, especially working on a big project, somewhere that’s just got one big space that I can move tables around or clear it completely out and work on big things on the floor and things like that are very appealing.”

St Laurence's Church from the outside. Photo / Bevan Conley

She wasn’t sure when she’d be fully moved in, as she was heading to Melbourne for an exhibition and artists’ residency until the end of July.

Her husband, Bryce Smith, thought it could be worthwhile to earthquake strengthen the building as well, and some maintenance work needed to be done on the exterior.

“It’s going to be a long to-do list, but that’s fine, that’s good,” Cooke said.

Anglican Parish of Whanganui co-vicar Caleb Rowe said the parish had been looking to raise funds for a community health hub they were building in Whanganui East.

“That included some key conversations around which buildings were necessary, which ones could we perhaps not need in this season.

“That’s partly why this site came up that aligned with conversations we were having with Sue and Bryce and it felt like it was the right time for that to go,” he said.

Part of Whanganui’s appeal, Rowe said, was it was an artistic city and Cooke was a cornerstone of the community, so it felt right to sell to her.

“We’ve started a great relationship with these guys which we feel has been mutual and caring... and that has meant that we feel that we’re passing it to friends rather than just selling it.”

The church will be deconsecrated on Thursday, June 22 at 5pm.