Homes of the year
108B SEAVIEW RD, WHANGAMATA
A huge sandy flat covered with stunted tea trees, worth maybe a few hundred pounds. That was Whangamata at the turn of the 20th century, home to settlers and gold diggers, and with no road access until the 1920s (the first road journeys to Waihi took four to five hours each way).
But when Philip Williamson bought 1000 acres (40.5ha) of "sheep farm" on the flat in 1919, he soon realised that there was other potential. He pioneered forestry in the area, and with his wife Madelaine began subdividing the land near the beach.
He donated land for the surf club reserve and built roads.
The first cottages were built in 1934. Philip added further subdivisions in the 1940s and 50s, naming streets after his family and friends, or Navy ships: Beverly for his daughter, Mary and Sylvia after nieces, the Achilles, Philomel, Tamaki.
One of the prime pieces of land, on a cul-de-sac next to the surf club, he gave to his daughter Beverly, then the principal at Diocesan School for Girls in Auckland.
Her cottage is a perfect time capsule of Kiwi beach baches (and holidays) as we always remember them: a tiny flat-roofed box built of fibrolite shingles, with two bunk rooms opening off the living room, a modest kitchen, a shower and toilet across the back porch, a cluster of trees for a shady spot for tents and hammocks. And the most breathtaking up-close views of the sand dunes, beach and offshore islands.
Miss Williamson kept her cottage immaculate, painting its solid timber windows so that it has withstood the sea and storms for more than 50 years, retaining the traditional cabinets and even the old table and chairs.
But Beverly Williamson died last year aged 88, and so her family sold one of the last remaining slices of old Whangamata.
Sold for $1.61 million.
