CASE STUDY: Urenui
WHO: Hazel Kidner & Derek Stevens
WHAT: building platform, drainage, shelter
LAND: 4ha (10 acres)
WHERE: Urenui, 30km east of New Plymouth
DESIGN: GreenBridge, www.GreenBridge.co.nz
IMAGES: Mark Dwyer
When Hazel Kidner and Derek Stevens bought a bare block in Urenui five years ago, it had a lot of upsides: a 25-minute commute to their jobs in New Plymouth, good grazing for their horses, water on site (their boundary runs through the middle of a lake), and the steep contour meant they got it at a discounted price, compared to flat land.
It also had some challenges. When it rained, heavy torrents of water would sheet across the road above and fall onto their land, water-logging the soil. The best house site was on a 25-degree slope. The bitter southerly wind shrivelled small trees.
Fast forward nearly five years, and you wouldn’t recognise the sheltered oasis that is now home to the couple and a menagerie of pets. It’s a testament to the value of brilliant designers and a great digger driver.
It took three weeks (and a lot of money)
to reshape the land for their home, shed, edible gardens, orchards, and animal enclosures.
It also took steely nerves. Hazel admits to reservations.
“It was terrifying and looked awful initially, like one of those open cast mines in Australia,” she says. “But we understood the vision and knew how fast things grow in Taranaki.”
Sustainable design consultancy, GreenBridge prepared the concept for the house and gardens.
“They turned out to be a great find,” says Hazel.
The GreenBridge design called for two ‘benches.’ The driveway enters onto the top bench where there’s a shed that’s almost as large as the house.
The house sits on the second bench, facing north, nestled back into a smooth batter that protects it from prevailing winds.
High berms were constructed from topsoil excavated from the benches to create instant shelter, enabling fruit trees and vegetable gardens to get growing straight away.
“It has created a huge range of living and planting spaces,” says Hazel. “The swales work fantastically to capture water and manage its flow through the land, (even) in a heavy downpour. We now have a variety of micro-climates on the property, which suits the different growing conditions needed by various trees and veggies.”
GreenBridge co-director and landscape designer Bena Denton says it was important to cover the bare ground straight away. She designed a detailed planting plan, and Hazel and Derek planted everything themselves.
“We roughly estimated how many plants we needed and ordered them through the council’s riparian scheme,” says Hazel. “We then marked out the lines and planting pattern and dug the holes, even before collecting the trees. It was a shock when we picked them up and saw how many we actually had to plant! We planted progressively as areas became accessible; the main bulk of the planting was done in four months.”