A giant truck crawling along with a building on the back is no longer the extraordinary sight it once was, especially in Wairarapa where a number of old villas and historic hotels have suffered various indignities on their way over the Rimutakas.

But anyone who has become blasé about this process should look no further than the story of how one little country church came to rest next to Emporos on Greytown’s main street.

At 8pm on 10 March 2009, a convoy of five trucks and a 200 tonne Titan crane left the yard in Lower Hutt for the trip over the Rimutaka Hill to Greytown. Staff working on the lift had been given the day off because “we knew it was going to be a long night,” says manager Vaughan Clark. Waiting forlornly in a car-park behind the Working Men’s Club car park in Greytown was a church, dissected horizontally above its windows, and looking a long way from its previous existence in rural Fordell, near Wanganui where it had stood undisturbed since 1886.

It had already endured an eight-hour trip from Fordell to a temporary site in Masterton where some restoration was carried out, before arriving in Greytown. Also waiting nearby was Featherston arborist Henri van de Weyer, brought in to ensure the safety of the site’s towering twin English lime trees, which date back to the 1870s and are listed on the Council’s Notable Tree Register. Standing jubilantly in the dusk were Annabel and Grant Cowdery, owners of the neighbouring BNZ building, a Historic Places Category II listed building which has been home to their antiques and interiors business Emporos for 11 years. For them, this was the culmination of a labyrinthine process of submissions, permits and consents, begun in 2007.

“For this job, we needed just about every consent in the book,” says Gina Jones, of local firm Accent Architects, who has been working with the Cowderys since 2005. “For such a comparatively small project, we had a huge application process to go through, probably as much as we would have had for a multi-storey building in Wellington, if not more!”

Complicating factors were firstly that the church was being relocated in Greytown’s Heritage Precinct next to a listed building (the former BNZ) which was also having a 1940s addition remodelled in a sympathetic modern, cube-like style. Secondly, the church was being placed next to notable trees, whose roots and major limbs had to be protected.

Thirdly, the church was both leaving and arriving at sites that had been inhabited prior to 1900. The sites were therefore seen by the New Zealand Historic Places Trust as ‘urban archaeological sites’ requiring a specialist assessment under the Historic Places Trust Act.

Christine Barnett, an archaeologist based in Martinborough, was called upon for a full assessment at both sites, right down to sifting the earth that would be the base for the church.

Says Annabel: “Because the first stages of our development had gone so smoothly - renovating the former bank and adding storage and workshop areas in keeping with the heritage building – we were totally unprepared for the processes and length of time it took to get resource and building consents for the next stages.”

Among the interested parties were the New Zealand Historic Places Trust, the South Wairarapa District Council, local and Wanganui iwi, local preservation groups, neighbouring landowners and insurance companies. The task of preparing the complex submission for resource consent went to resource management expert Phillip Percy of Perception Planning in Martinborough. Says Annabel: “With Phillip’s patience and expertise we were able to get through the approval process with our sanity almost intact”.

Chris Ellis of Alpha Specialist Movers, who had to liaise with Transit NZ, Telecom, the Power Board, two crane companies, the engineers, architects, builders, the archeologist and the arborist in order to pull off the church move , remembers that as the crane and trucks rolled into Greytown that night, they were hit by huge gusts of wind and torrential rain that later proved to be the biggest storm of the year.

Annabel credits these “amazing” specialists involved for making their vision possible, starting with engineer Peter Smith of Spencer Holmes, and Alastair Bruce, of Affordable Sheds, and his team, who first worked with her on the redevelopment of the former bank building. Alastair’s team of builders “had a great attitude and just kept working all through the terrible winter.”

Henri van de Weyer, of All Seasons Tree Services, had the job of locating the roots of the lime trees and being on site during any disturbance of the ground for the protection of the tree roots, including digging of the 65 piles. Henri was commisioned to carry out the limes major prune which had to be done by an arborist under resource consent.

Annabel and Grant have invested a considerable amount of time and money on their historic premises in Greytown. “This is not just a commercial investment for us,” says Annabel, who grew up in a Georgian era house in South Shropshire and developed an early love of historic buildings. “Our overseas customers see Greytown as a unique town in New Zealand, and say our stores are world class. For us it is important to maintain the viability of our architectural heritage which in turn gives life to the town”.

“At times, we really wondered why Grant and Annabel started this project. But it’s been a labour of love and now you can see their overall vision and it’s been worth it,” says Gina Jones.

The doors on the new Emporos courtyard retail space will soon be opening. Henri has been back to carry out a major prune on the Limes to promote healthy growth and improve their shape and Carterton sculptor Brett Harman has made a spectacular chandelier which is now suspended from the 5.3m stud of the church. It’s a fitting tribute to another Greytown landmark, made possible by an ambitious vision - and the work of many.

See the move: click