This 1950s stucco house in Birkenhead is the perfect home for three

Article by Your Home and Garden

The arrival of their first baby had an Auckland couple on a frantic hunt to buy their first home

Meet & greet

Bridget Hewitt (brand manager), Kane Yee (investor and consultant) and baby Milo (17 months).

The property

A renovated three-bedroom 1950s stucco home in Birkenhead, Auckland.

Bridget Hewitt isn’t usually the type to cut it fine on deadlines, so when she was 36 weeks pregnant with her first child and hadn’t yet found a home, she was getting nervous.

“I was waking up in the middle of the night in a panic, and my partner had to talk me down, saying, ‘It’s going to be okay, it will happen, we will find our place.’”

Bridget and her partner Kane Yee were living in a studio apartment in Northcote Point, on Auckland’s North Shore, which wasn’t at all suitable for a baby. When they found out she was pregnant, they immediately started looking for their first family home but missed out on auction after auction at a “brutal” time for Auckland house hunters.

“I was so emotionally invested because I was trying to find a home for my new family – and we were on such a time frame. Every time we lost it felt like such a blow,” she says.

A fateful moment

Then one day, Kane emailed Bridget a property ad for an elevated 1950s concrete stucco home in Birkenhead that they’d often walked past and long admired. It could hardly have been more suitable, with three bedrooms and a fully fenced section that included a front lawn, back deck and glorious hedges.

“It really gave off a family vibe, and we knew this was our last chance,” Bridget says. “If we didn’t get this, we would have to regroup, because the baby was coming.”

But get it they did – and moved in just in time for their son Milo to arrive in August last year. In fact, they were so absorbed in securing the home that they didn’t even notice one of its major selling points until it was theirs: a view of the Waitematā Harbour and Rangitoto from the large living room picture windows. “That was a big bonus, for sure,” Bridget says. “It was like we’d magicked up a dream home. It felt like a huge reward after all of those auctions we had lost.”

Space and light

Fortunately, given the timing, the house had been renovated to bring out its original features: native timber floors, ceiling cornices, wooden joinery, and an elegant fireplace. A new claw-foot bath, Smeg oven and white subway tiles in the kitchen and bathroom accentuated the classic feel, and a scullery had been added.

“There wasn’t a whole lot to do with the house – just cosmetic things,” says Bridget. “That was a huge saving for us.”

Building on the sense of spaciousness was key for the 120sqm home. In the relatively small living room, they replaced large pendant lights with wall sconces and reverted a dark wallpaper feature wall to a painted white wall to match the rest of the house.

In the bedrooms, they added heavy linen blackout drapes to the existing venetian blinds to create a soft, luxe feeling conducive to daytime sleeping, as well as provide warmth at night. They also created a mudroom out of a space beside the front door.

It was both a blessing and a burden that they had only one suitable piece of furniture to bring from the little apartment – a wine rack. It meant Bridget could buy pieces she loved that perfectly fitted the spaces, but it also meant they had to stagger the bigger purchases and be judicious about where they splurged and where they saved.

Because of the delivery delays that affected the country due to Covid, there were nervous moments in which Bridget wasn’t sure if she would have any furniture to sit on once Milo arrived. Luckily, the Freedom sofa arrived just in time to give her some comfort through a long labour at home.

She paired it with a rug from Nodi, chosen because the colour blends in with the honey-toned floorboards and it was big enough to delineate the space without breaking up the room too much. An alcove beside the fireplace was the perfect spot for a rattan cabinet from Boheme Home, which provides essential storage space in a house where it’s in short supply. “That was a big thing with a baby on the way – storage options that work well with the look and feel of the home.”

Then came the “daunting” purchase – a black dining table from Bauhaus. Because the home is otherwise dominated by white and earthy tones, Bridget had the idea of anchoring and structuring the space with darker pieces. The table was the choice she second-guessed the most, but she loves the result.

Outdoors, the spaces have worked out well for the little family, with the sun on the lawn in the mornings and the deck in the afternoons and evenings. “We can sit out on the deck until late at night,” Bridget says. “We have fairy lights on the trellis, which makes it feel a little magical.”

There’s more they’d like to do with the home in future, but for now Bridget is grateful to have such an airy, comfortable space. “It’s really nice to be in our own place that feels really private. It feels like our own little sanctuary and we love being here. This is a real little oasis for us.”

Words by: Bronwyn Sell. Photography by: Kate Battersby