The restoration of the old Kurow School building is coming together.

South Star School Charitable Trust has begun work on the 1882 heritage-listed building as it works towards opening the art school on the premise.

Interest in the restoration of the building was growing, project manager and trustee Nicole Schofield said.

The trust had raised “about half” of the $350,000 needed to complete the project, Ms Schofield said.

“The net is pretty wide as far as people interested in it.

“When there’s an old building, people want to see it preserved, particularly when it has so much public history.”

The trust has been running working bees throughout winter to kickstart the restoration.

“It’s mostly taking down so that we can build back up.”

A happy surprise was once they had removed the hardwood flooring, native timber flooring was found underneath.

The plan was to highlight that rather than cover it up.

A big money saver was the removal of a toilet block which was not part of the original building.

“A number of farmers and locals got together and that weekend saved us $15,000 in destruction works.”

Quiz nights in Kurow had been a hit.

“We like doing those because everybody benefits from nights like those.”

Another key fundraiser coming up was a black tie dinner to coincide with the unveiling of the new Richie McCaw  statue.

The trust was waiting for a date to be set for the unveiling before locking anything in.

However, Ms Schofield did confirm that Valli Wine would create 148 specially labelled bottles of wine to be sold to support the project.

Every bottle would represent a test match that McCaw played with each label including details about that particular game.

Ms Schofield and her husband Grant Taylor own the business and she said all the funds raised from selling the bottles would go towards the restoration.

“This was an idea that friends of ours came up with.

“Grant’s really keen to see this get off the ground … he’s got a big heart and loves projects.”

There were also a number grant applications in the works to help get closer to the target, she said.

While the building may not be ready until 2027, South Star School would still be active in the mean time.

It will run classes in Kurow during the Waitaki Arts Festival in October, one of which is a paint by numbers mural at the Kurow Bowling Club.

They also ran drawing classes for adults and craft classes for children throughout the winter.