Right now, being teleported two years down the track to a completed Wakatu Lodge renovation is a fanciful dream for Simon and Melissa Floyd, but it sure would be nice.
Restoring the grand old lady to her original glory on her new site has not been an easy road. It has been a year since the 129-year-old, two-storied villa was cut into three pieces and trucked from its Waimea Rd site in Nelson to a new view in the Moutere.
Apart from piecing it back together again, rain following the shift caused more damage and much of the renovations they had carried out on the house in Waimea Rd were damaged and needed to be redone.
“It took time to get over the trauma of moving the house,” Simon admits. “Having it exposed to the elements like that.”
But if they hadn’t moved the house, it would most likely have been bowled by developers who purchased the Waimea Rd site and Simon and Melissa loved it too much to leave it behind for that to happen. Like many challenging projects, Simon says it is probably fortunate they didn’t know how tough it would be - and the couple aren’t new to renovations.
“What sums it up for me is you go into these things with eyes wide shut and if you could see what the whole job would be, from planning to moving and weather events, I probably wouldn’t have done it.”
Injuries, Covid-19, flu, work and life in general means it has all taken longer than they had hoped. Even getting a power supply onto the site is still an ongoing dilemma when they thought it would be straightforward, which means they are relying on a generator and battery tools.
Hence the reason for Simon laughing when you ask about their first year of renovations. Even the cast iron veranda posts that now frame the entrance to the house between its two massive bay windows, have a story.
The posts originate from the old Nelson Foundry and once would have graced a shop front in the central city. They aren’t cheap and it was not until they had been sandblasted and erected that Simon and Melissa stood back to admire them and realised they didn’t match. So, they have to get another and go through the process again.
The rest of the posts around the veranda are cedar and tall because the house sits 300mm above the ground, which also proved problematic to source locally. Eventually, they were trucked from Hawke’s Bay.
But there have also been wonderful finds in the house after they stripped it all back to add building paper, insulation and still-to-come Gib.
In the entrance hall which leads to a grand staircase, mock timber panels of wallpaper in the era of the early 1900s have been revealed.
They are trying to return the house to its original floor print, as much as possible, which means removing the “ugly additions” that were added when it was owned by the Nelson Hospital Board.
Despite the setbacks this past year, Simon and Melissa, being the eternal optimists, expect to move into the house next year, and it hasn’t stopped Melissa buying period wallpaper and furniture.
“I’m notorious for buying wallpaper before the walls are done. I’ve got the chandelier and it’s all just patiently waiting for its time to shine.”
They have more than 700 followers on their Wakatu Lodge Facebook page and Melissa says they will probably hold a charity fundraiser once the renovation is completed.
That will be an opportunity for those who have had connections with the lodge or followed its progress to see it restored to its former glory and a grand view to match.
