Take three sheds, mix in lots of vision and a little money, and the result is Gerry Thompson's house. Kim Dungey reports.
Therese Hailes went away for a week and returned home to find she was living in a "red light district".
"At least it's not one of those pulsating ones," she says, nodding at the neon sign above her door.
"The neighbours might not like that."
Husband Gerry Thompson had his hand-drawn "Eclectica" design made by a neon technician, who was happy not to be producing yet another "No vacancy" sign.
"Eclectica" seemed the perfect name for the house he had built and filled with all manner of objects.
The place is Waitati's answer to Grand Designs, the British television series that features unusual and elaborate self-build projects, Mrs Hailes says.
"You know those ones where they spend 350,000 and do up a derelict millhouse."
"I've probably spent $60,000 on the whole thing," says Mr Thompson, whose family has always been involved in DIY projects.
"I started with three sheds and joined them together at different angles and levels. There's a lot of stonework and a lot ofsecond-hand doors and windows."
The lounge was the wash house and toilet from the adjacent house in Brown St. The kitchen-dining area was a site office for Stewart Construction, until being shifted from Dunedin and having its roller door replaced with a bay window. And the main bedroom was a wheeled hut with a curved roof that once served as farm workers' sleeping quarters.
In the days when threshing mills did the work of combine harvesters, the huts were towed by traction engines from farm to farm.
"They were called stinkies because six to eight smelly blokes would have slept in them."
Mr Thompson goes on to describe how he decided at what angle he would position the first shed - his old wash house.
"I borrowed some fence posts and rolled it over here and it ended up like this."
The 95sq m house also includes a second bedroom, a loft just big enough for a double bed and a bathroom built in the space between the sheds.
Enclosed by the wooden walls of those sheds, the bathroom is like a garden.
The dirt floor has concrete paths through it, the clear roof is polycarbonate and the brick wall on the south side is covered in tomatoes, grapevines and jasmine.
"The idea is you can sit in the bath, eat grapes, watch TV and see people come up the drive."
"It's a wee bit cold in winter," says Mrs Hailes, joking the shower over the bath is extremely "energy-efficient" at this time of year.
"But in summer, it's great."
Coolstore panels that are 12cm thick line the ceiling in the north-facing lounge while glass bottles under the floor provide extra insulation. Concrete floors soak up the sun and a solar panel on the roof heats the water. An old coal range has been altered to burn wood, which comes from trees on the property or houses Mr Thompson has "deconstructed". Even in winter, power bills are only $60 to $80.
The former civil engineer re-lined and fitted out the sheds over a five-year period, as time and money allowed, and bought many of the materials at demolition yards. The tongue-and-groove ceiling in the dining area was wall panelling from a flooded Queenstown bar, while windows in the lounge were from the former Cherry Farm Hospital.
A code-of-compliance certificate from the Dunedin City Council is displayed on one wall.
Outside, there's a henhouse, a half-finished glasshouse, an upturned yacht sheltering a collection of bicycles, a fence strung with old saws and the Waitati Film Society's "itinerant hot tub".
A line of stacked bricks dubbed the "great wall of Waitati" is slowly diminishing, but appearances can be deceptive. There are building materials for future jobs and plans to build a Tudor-style house elsewhere on the section.
Mrs Hailes says when she moved into the house in 2004, there were "drop saws, hammers and boxes of nails" everywhere.
But when her husband asks what has changed, she admits the tools have simply been replaced by other things.
"You've let me fill it up with clutter."
Despite the shock of arriving home to a red neon sign, she remains his biggest supporter.
"He's good at visualising things and doing them really frugally."
