Construction of statue of Waverley's Melbourne Cup-winning horse Kiwi nearing finish line

The pieces of the statue of Waverley's Melbourne Cup-winning racehorse Kiwi are being put together. Photo / Supplied

The process of constructing a bronze statue of Waverley's Melbourne Cup-winning horse Kiwi is nearing the finish line.

Trained by Snow Lupton, Kiwi won the Melbourne Cup on November 1, 1983, and won the Wellington Cup the same year, a feat that has not been repeated before or since.

A life-size plasticine mould of Kiwi, with jockey Jim Cassidy on its back in full flight, was donated to Waverley by New Plymouth artist, the late Fridtjof Hanson.

The committee in charge of completing the statue was allocated $155,000 from Waverley's masterplan arts grant, which will cover the cost of bronzing the statue at Heavy Metals in Lower Hutt.

Brian Rook, who heads the committee, visited the statue where it is being constructed in Lower Hutt and said after a long journey it was finally coming together.

He said the statue had been constructed in pieces, and the pieces were now being welded together to form its final shape.

Almost all the pieces had been finished, except for the horse's ears and jockey's boots, which Rook said had to be constructed specially to hold the jockey's weight.

"The weight of the jockey is going to be on his boots because they're going to be welded to the side of the horse," he said.

Rook hoped the statue would be completed and installed early in the new year.

"He's quite confident that it'll be finished before Christmas, so we may be looking at something in the new year," Rook said.

He said it had been a long road to getting the statue completed, but it was nearing its end now.

"It's taken a long time, but we're hoping the end product will be worth it."

Previously, Rook thought the bronzing of the statue would be completed by July at the earliest.

He said the statue had taken so long because the builder had to put it on hold while he worked on other projects.

Once it was completed, Rook said the statue would be transported to Waverley to be put on its foundations.

Work on the foundation would need to begin soon, as he estimated it would take about a month to have the foundation made and set.

"[The foundation]'s about 2m long, a metre deep, and about a metre and a half wide, so it's a substantial piece of concrete."

They would have to make sure the bolts being used to install the statue were in the exact place.

"Hopefully ... it should be hunky dory to put up with all of those kids that will climb on top of it and have their photos taken," he said.