THROUGH THE LOOKING GLASS
Two transparent hideaways tucked away on Kaikoura farmland are as magical as they are modern
IT WAS JUST GONE MIDNIGHT. A thunderous roar ringing in her ears, Angela Blunt gripped the doorway and tried to spot her opportunity to surf the bucking floorboards towards her youngest son’s bedroom. In the kitchen, plates became china frisbees. A stag’s head on the living room wall flew like a poltergeist to the opposite side.
Daybreak revealed the devastation: three chimneys in the 100-year-old farmhouse lay in tumbledown disarray and a giant Italian poplar was collapsed in the creek. It was only after Tony Blunt had made his way via single-cab ute, mountain bike and ultimately a helicopter from St Arnaud in an overnight dash to ascertain that his family was okay, that the Blunts remembered the little glass cabins on two secluded hillsides of their 800-hectare Kaikoura farm.
The PurePods are the brainchild of Grant Ryan, a “multipreneur” and “hunch-cruncher” who among other start-up projects has invented the YikeBike, a sit-up straight, fully electric, fold-up model that promises urban freedom. With four glass sides, a glass floor and glass roof, the pods offer a different kind of freedom: the luxury to truly feel part of the wide New Zealand landscape in absolute comfort. “It’s like being at one with nature while not having to camp,” says Stephanie Hassall, CEO of PurePods.
Eight years in development, the 20-square-metre glazed cabins are an engineered expression of breaking down boundaries, both physically and metaphorically. “Designing a glass building to meet code and thermal regulations was a challenge,” explains Stephanie. It meant a heads-together approach for structural, environmental and electrical engineers. It worked. The 7.8 magnitude quake that uplifted the sea bed, buckled rail lines and toppled historic homes, left the pods on the Blunts’ property unscathed. When Tony and Angela finally walked the pathways through golden grasses to see how these mini homes had fared, the only indication of any untoward event was a couple of wine glasses smashed to the floor.
The Blunts have occupied this land, which stretches from the Kahutara River rising to 1000 metres above sea level, for three generations. Despite the earth moving and stock prices fluctuating, they’ll no doubt be here for a few more decades yet. “My three boys all want to be farmers,” says Tony. “So there’s a good chance we’ll go another round.” The lanky, tousled-hair former Young Farmer of the Year runs half-merinos, angus and a few murray grey cattle. Like all farmers, diversifying an income stream has been top of mind for some time.
“Farming is so fickle,” he says. “We knew we had fabulous views so tourism in some shape or form was always an option.” When Tony spotted the first PurePod at Little River on Banks Peninsula, he knew he’d found the form. Then he upped the ante. He wanted a pair. These are set about a kilometre apart, each in its own valley and Tony takes some pride in the fact he helped build PurePod’s “number two and number three”. His boys dug the holes for the concrete piles of the steel sub frame. Then he worked alongside the builder to piece together what he describes as two giant Meccano sets.
There was a five-week period when, with no road north and no main highway south, it was almost impossible for guests to get to the pods. Not that there weren’t those willing to try. In the year or so since they opened, they have operated at 90 per cent capacity. Most guests are couples and there have been a number of on-site marriage proposals. It’s an adventurous journey to the start of a commitment that is perhaps the biggest adventure of all. They make their way along the coastal highway in fits and starts of stop/go signs before turning inland onto a shingle road that fords a stream in three places and culminates in a wooden bridge, just wide enough to navigate in a deadstraight line. There is no welcome party or check-in procedure, just a gravel car park with a cubicle containing complimentary bright yellow raincoats and Redband gumboots.
Guests are encouraged to bring backpacks for the walk in to their accommodation, a 15-minute slice of South Island farm that takes in open paddock, enters the bush beneath a tapering manuka forest and heads heading up the hill through knee-high grasses. The tiny glass cabin that is home for a night or two is dwarfed by the mass of the Seaward Kaikoura Ranges. Billed as “the world’s most environmentally transparent building”, each pod has wraparound views out to the distant craggy outline, up to the sweep of sky and even down to the ground-cover species seen through the floor. The only solidity is a timber-lined service wall, which divides the ablutions from the living and sleeping area.
“We wanted the pods to be floating in the landscape and have less environmental impact than a tent,” explains Stephanie. A separate engine room alongside the main structure contains the off-grid technology – the power, water and heating systems that took close to a decade to perfect. (It also houses the cleaning products that are necessary to keep all that glass sparkling.)
With no internet, the options for connecting with anything other than the immediate surroundings are limited. Which is as it should be. “The idea is to relax and spend time with your significant other,” says Stephanie. Privacy is sacrosanct. Tony will not muster within the environs and his children are under orders not to ride their motorbikes when guests are in residence.
For the local and international couples who come to stay, this is a time to take notice. There are many hours to observe the reflected view in the glass ceiling or floor, to sit on the deck and read until drowsy, to watch the cloud creep into the valleys and birds fly past at eye level. In summer, cicadas riot by day and a plaintive cow bellows; at night dueling moreporks call in duet. Stargazing is on the list of encouraged activities, aided and abetted by a telescope, a New Zealand astronomical yearbook and a double-sided planisphere.
Tony is endearingly thrilled by the shining feedback the experience receives. Although officially he’s not part of that experience, he often designs to be in the front yard near the car park close to checkout time. “One guest from China woke up in the middle of the night and saw more stars in 10 seconds than she had seen in her whole life,” he explains. “She was so excited that she couldn’t get back to sleep.”
While throwing a snarler on the barbie is still part of our urban backyard, for international folk, the opportunity to cook a piece of meat al fresco is often another first. Guests can choose to self-cater or order a breakfast pack and pre-delivered dinner ingredients, which include salads and South Island salmon, beef or venison to be grilled on the Weber, the backdrop a spectacle in contrast to such domesticity.
It’s not just overseas visitors who lap up the landscape. Forty years ago everyone had a cousin’s place where they were despatched to spend holidays on the farm. Says Tony: “It’s sad but these days that doesn’t happen because so many farms have been gobbled up by big companies that even people from our own country get such a buzz from the rural experience.”
Delivering on the 100 per cent pure New Zealand promise was fundamental to the business plan of the brand. Delivering a close-up encounter with a genuine good bloke is just icing on the cake.