Exquisite views from the kitchen
ALONE has a huge central point of steel supporting a ceiling of exposed wooden beams, each one 10-by-40 centimetres splaying out from the central point to the outer walls, at varying distances apart, so a huge weight is supported by steel.
“We had plans but on site what we actually did was get the garden hose and walk around with that from a central point and that was the shape of this room,” says Ian.
Each of the three rounds is a varying diameter, each roof sloping, none a uniform angle.
The house is insulated with ceiling Batts and polystyrene in the walls, the metal rib lath mesh walls are coated with plaster inside and out creating a sandwich around the insulation. The plaster is roughcoated on the exterior finish and smooth-coated inside. Like the varying shapes and rooflines the windows, too, are varied: there are perfect round portals made from large diameter concrete pipes cut to width and kidney-shaped windows fashioned on site by the builder using a plywood cutout. The roof glass at the centre point of each of the rounds is double-glazed but the aluminium joinery windows and sliders single-glazed.
“It’s very warm,” says Gloria. “The sun streams in from early morning till the last of the setting sun and warms the whole house. In fact, it gets too hot in parts.”
They have made changes, some as it was built and others as they have lived in the house. One proposed guest bedroom became an office immediately; Ian runs his business and Mainline Steam from that space. The architect planned internal walls in the master bedroom to be floor-to-ceiling but the Welchs had them reduced, leaving a gap to the ceiling in both the bathroom and dressing room.
“It makes it much less claustrophobic, lets in light. I think if the walls had gone to the ceiling, it would have made the bedroom feel quite small,” says Gloria.
The kitchen overlooks the inlet and there’s a glass breakfast area nearby where an indoor spa pool was removed. The living-dining area opens through sliders to a deck that also overlooks the inlet and, on another side, leads out to a heated swimming pool. Always looking to improve the build, Ian is installing gas heated water radiators to ensure a more ambient temperature through the winter.
“We are both getting a bit older, so we like warmth,” he explains.
A substantial part of the house is a workshop packed with lathes, presses, engineering tools, all with trains and repair in mind.
There’s a light off a train he brought in from Zimbabwe and a name off one of the trains at Plimmerton: ‘‘Nigel Bruce, named after our son and my father’’.
For train boffins it’s a tradition to name trains after loved ones. Hence Gloria is under cover in the Plimmerton workshop, as is Sharon Lee, named after the Welchs’ middle daughter. Eldest daughter Julie selected her namesake but the locomotive has yet to be restored; and youngest daughter Joanne, Jb1236, is currently being overhauled at Plimmerton.
“That’s the thing about this house,’’ says Ian, “It’s just down the road from the workshop. It’s so easy to go down and have a coffee with the boys and a chat.”
But Gloria is unconvinced. After more than two decades in the house she is ready for a new home, and has persuaded Ian.
The new house, another designed by architect Ian Burrow, is under construction at the other end of the Pauatahanui Inlet on farm land.
“It’ll be great. I’ll have a proper studio,” says Gloria, “and Ian won’t be far from his trains.” Ian is more circumspect.
“It’s about a feeling. I’ll have to live in it to see.
‘‘I won’t be making any decisions until then.’’