Down a quiet, tree-lined lane

5/47 Shelly Beach Rd, Herne Bay. Photo / Getty Images

5/47 SHELLY BEACH RD, ST MARYS BAY

3

2

2

SIZE: Land 343sq m, house 238sq m.

PRICE INDICATION: Similar homes in the area have sold for between $1.8m and $2.2m. Tenders close August 25.

INSPECT: Sat/Sun 12-1pm.

ON THE WEB: www.barfoot.co.nz/502852

SCHOOL ZONES: Ponsonby Primary, Ponsonby Intermediate, Western Springs College.

CONTACT: Ashley Tait or Chris Batchelor, Barfoot. Phone Ashley 021 325 009 or Chris 021 217 7026.

FEATURES: Freehold home, one of eight. Reclad concrete block and weatherboard with cavities, has Oct 2009 Code of Compliance certificate. Slate roof, timber and aluminium joinery, solid timber floors. Garage with extensive storage. Two bathrooms plus guest powder room.

The pleasing form of a beautiful silhouette has always been something to appreciate, according to Lesley and John Vincent. They named one of their early catamarans Silhouette and this favourite yacht became the motivation for their house shift from Titirangi just so they could be closer to her berth at nearby Westhaven Marina.

The day, 15 years ago, that they saw this newly completed home in the Shelly Lane development, seeing the city's high-rise silhouette from the top floor living area helped sell them on its own three-storey form.

As the other eight homes in the development homes took shape behind theirs, Lesley and John watched a textural, European-style silhouette unfold. It grew to become a picture of individually designed homes, pitched slate roofs, two-tone brick chimneys and exterior claddings and basalt stone walls softened with mature trees.

Collectively, Shelly Lane is a neighbourhood of freehold homes whose owners make up the Shelly Lane Residents' Association and whose sociable sense of community has appealed to the Vincents. By its freehold status, this group of homes does need a body corporate, Lesley explains.

The comparatively few matters of common interest that include the driveway and gate maintenance require only a twice-yearly meeting of committee members.

For Lesley and John, everything else about life behind the automatic gates that swing into this private, tree-lined driveway off Shelly Beach Rd is theirs for the living.

Lesley has made every corner of their private grounds something of an optimal enhancement of their home's top floor and ground floor living areas and mid-level and ground floor bedrooms.

In summer she grows scarlet runner beans in the crucible pots flanking the front porch, training them up across wires that John puts up and takes down each season.

Timber stairs indoors connect the mid-level entrance, garage, guest bathroom and master bedroom suite with the upstairs living area and deck and downstairs rooms that all open to the outdoors.

Here, the backdrop is a silhouette of mature native trees, naturalised open cedar fencing, a weathered copper fence and a water feature. Within, a decorative pebbled courtyard leads to a large vegetable garden at one end and a shade garden with a discreet worm farm and compost bin at the other.

Inside, the choice of materials includes solid timber floors, copper balcony capping. The form of the cathedral ceilings and dormer-style bedroom windows appeals to this couple's English heritage.

"I love lying in bed on a Sunday morning looking out to the trees and listening to the church bells," says Lesley. "That really does remind me of England."

In the kitchen with its dark, glossy cabinetry and timber trim, Lesley and John installed a skylight above the sink to bring in more light and the textured beauty of the native rimu, kahikatea and totara trees that are home to wood pigeons and other native birds.

As for their own abode, Lesley and John chose to have the original plaster exterior replaced with weatherboard with a cavity system and plaster over concrete block to eliminate leaky home stigma. Other homeowners here reclad their homes, too, having agreed on a palette of muted colours to maintain the aesthetic of Shelly Lane as a valued entity.

All this is about to change for Lesley and John as they trade this cityscape for life at Pataua North, in Northland, near where they manage the Tahi honey production business.