Kemp Mission House

Kemp House, in Kerikeri (Northland, North Island, NZ) is the oldest wooden building in NZ, having been built in 1821 as a mission house.

Nearby is the Stone Store, NZ's oldest stone building from 1832. The garden surrounding Kemp House was established in 1822 by the Reverend Samuel Butler who lived here for ten years. The garden is "unique in that it has been in continuous cultivation for [now] 184 years and still reflects the balanced formality of the Georgian period" (19, New Zealand Gardens Open to Visit, J. and D. Friar, 1996). The flower beds are filled "in the cottage style, proudly displaying the industriousness of the resident missionaries. This is still evident today, even to the well-stocked vegetable garden and orchard" (19). The plants include a large wisteria on the front porch, heritage roses, and many favourites from the turn of the last century, including candytuft, larkspur, nigella, poppies, violas, and alyssum, bloom in summer in beds arranged in the style of the early 19th c.. As well, old-fashioned perennials including alstromerias, lambs-ears, phlox, cannas, irises, and japanese anemones bloom beside the two more subtropical notes, a jacaranda and a Magnolia grandiflora.

This very early garden provides graphic evidence of the adherence to English garden styles and plants among NZ's earliest European settlers.