Roof work at Tylee Cottage - one of Whanganui’s oldest buildings - opens window to past

During work to renew the roof on Whanganui's Tylee Cottage, rare timber shingles were exposed. Photo / Te Whare o Rehua Sarjeant Gallery

Scott Flutey is Whanganui District Council’s heritage advisor

A window to the past was opened for a very short time on one of Whanganui’s oldest surviving buildings this month. While working to renew the roof, rare timber shingles were briefly exposed.

Tylee Cottage has not always stood at its current location. It was constructed on Wilson St in 1853, for John Thomas Tylee and his wife Mary Richett. Tylee worked as a commissariat, supplier of food and equipment, for the British Army, at that time stationed in Whanganui.

Having lived briefly on a farm at Parewanui (Bulls), the Tylees had hosted Reverend Richard Taylor when he was travelling in the area and became close family friends. Taylor’s son subsequently married Tylee’s younger sister Edith.

In the 1850s, Whanganui had little housing stock. Today it is considered a cottage but when constructed it was one of the grander buildings in the settlement. Four of seven Tylee children were born at the house on Wilson St, and the surrounding area was known as Tylee’s Flat.

Tylee left Whanganui in 1865 for Napier, and later worked in roles in the Hawkes Bay provincial government and central Government.

Through 1867, the cottage was briefly used as a temporary manse for Reverend John Elmslie, the incoming minister of St Paul’s Presbyterian Church, and his family while the new church and manse were under construction.

Many tenants used the house in later years. The industrialisation of Wilson St from the 1960s on led to the house being used as a tyre storage and lunch room for owners Reidrubber.

At the time the house was built shingles were the most common form of roofing material. Photo / Te Whare o Rehua Sarjeant Gallery

With time running out for its useful life on Wilson St, the house was moved in 1982 to its current location at Pukenamu Queens Park by the city council and restored by architect Bruce Dickson and builders Norm Hubbard and M. Pepper.

Tylee Cottage has gained additional significance since 1986, when it came into use as an artist-in-residence house for Whanganui. The inaugural resident was photographer Laurence Aberhart.

At the time it was built, shingles were the most common form of roofing material before being replaced by corrugated iron.

They are likely of totara and would have been cleaved by axe to split along the grain. Totara timber is extremely hardy, although years of intense temperature variation, humidity extremes and insect attack have taken their toll and the shingles are now very fragile.

It’s unknown how many shingle roofs survive in Whanganui – some villas have a large overhanging corrugated iron roof suggesting something much older underneath. Rumours about the shingle roof at Tylee meant its discovery wasn’t a complete surprise to some.

But its age and completeness have the potential to teach us about technological changes in house building in Whanganui.

The Tylee Cottage roof work was done by Gullery Roofing. Tylee Cottage can continue hosting artists in Whanganui for decades to come following the futureproofing it deserves.