SCHOOL ZONES:
Grey Lynn, Kowhai Intermediate, Auckland Girl’s Grammar School, Western Springs College .
CONTACT:
Keith Dowdle, Custom Residential, ph 021 877 905.
AUCTION:
Sunday, Dec 11 on site at 2pm.
Getting married and buying a new home are two big life events - so Bronwynn and Cameron Bakker decided to take them one at a time.
As Bronwynn recalls, "We were getting married in 2014 and Cam said we shouldn't look at houses until after the wedding. So I promised that I wouldn't look until after we married - then on our honeymoon I started looking."
The couple were keen to move from their Kingsland home to Grey Lynn, over the other side of the Northwestern Motorway.
And when Bronwynn found this square front, early 1900s villa in Cooper St, it felt right as soon as they walked in.
Although the home had been renovated previously and had a new kitchen, the couple began making improvements outside, first putting in a new deck off the living areas and that meant removing a pergola and some concrete from the west-facing back yard.
They also restored the veranda's floorboards to give it a traditional look in sync with the balustrades and the white picket fence.
A brick path brings you to the front door, through a formal garden of hedging and standard roses.
The layout at the front is typical of villas with bedrooms either side of the hallway, one of them having a window seat framed by built-in cupboards and shelves.
A third bedroom is up the hallway before the house opens out into the main living/kitchen/dining area.
Like much of the rest of the house, the walls here are covered in the couple's art. With an island bench with stone top and modern cabinetry and appliances, the kitchen is well set up for entertaining.
Cameron says: "The guy that had the house before the previous owner was a chef so he set the kitchen up how he liked it with things like the stainless steel splashback that apparently chefs like."
A second living space added to the rear of the house helps to form a sheltering L-shape around the deck. Both living spaces are warmed by heat pumps.
Image 1 of 9: 19 Cooper St, Grey Lynn, Auckland. Photograph/Fiona Goodall/Getty Images.
In the second lounge, the polished kauri floorboards of the main living area give way to carpet. Light floods this room from north and west, with French doors out to the deck and bifold windows to the back yard.
"Cam watches TV in here, and it's a nice place to have drinks," says Bronwynn.
She says the house has been great for hosting parties, and has also come in handy for location filming for TV3's Jono and Ben show, on which she is a producer.
As well as putting in a new deck out the back, the couple had the flat back yard landscaped to be easy-care.
Bronwynn says: "It's really private out here even though your neighbours are quite close." Behind the kitchen is their latest improvement, a modernised bathroom with tiled walk-in shower and deep, standalone bath.
As Bronwynn points out, "What we have done here is done well because we were going to stay."
But they won't get much time to enjoy their new bathroom because they have had to change their plans now that another place has caught their eye in Grey Lynn.
"We were looking around mostly because we were looking for ideas for this place," says Bronwynn. "Then Cameron sent me a link to another property and we could see we had a chance to upgrade without a massive jump."
