Repurposing is the in phrase these days and a good example in Dannevirke was the uplifting of a large Edwardian house from Cole St.

The new owner Rachel Cowan bought the house to fulfil the need to accommodate her family who currently reside in Australia. Rachel, who is a Kiwi, moved to Australia to live and was there for some time before deciding to return to her roots with her family’s agreement.

Initially looking for a villa, she saw the Cole St home online and loved it so much she bought it without even finding land on which to “plant it”. A lengthy search resulted in the purchase of a site, a lifestyle subdivision in Woodville, and a contract with Brittons House Movers to transport it there.

The house is twice the size of a normal home at 260 square metres so it had to be cut in half lengthways and the roof peak taken off before the movers assessed it could make the tortuous route out of Dannevirke.

It left on two trucks driving down Cole St to High St, turning left onto Denmark and Waterloo streets, rejoining High St on Stanley St to travel south on State Highway 2 to Woodville.

The house has four bedrooms and two sunrooms, a modernised kitchen and bathroom, a stucco exterior which made it very heavy, but beautiful rimu interior linings and leadlight glass on the cupboards.

Built about 1900, it was owned for most of its life by the Bullick family, the patriarch FR Bullick owning probably the third oldest business on High St, a men’s and boys’ outfitters. It was the home of four boys and a girl.

It is understood the huge site of 5000 square metres is planned by the developer to hold six units to help Dannevirke’s shortage of accommodation.

Dave Murdoch is a part-time photo-journalist working for the Bush Telegraph and based at Dannevirke. He has covered any community story telling good news about the district for the last ten years.