THE PROJECT
With Barry Condon of Condon Scott Architects, nurse Laura Christie and her builder husband Brad renovated this four-bedroom home in Wānaka's Minaret Ridge for themselves and their children Ted (4) and Charlie (2).
Laura and Brad Christie admit to feeling a little guilty when they spent their first day of possession taking to their new home's walls with a sledgehammer, jimmying up the floor and stripping out the kitchen and bathroom cabinetry. The typical T-shaped gabled dwelling they'd just bought in Minaret Ridge, Wānaka was only a few years old — a perfectly nice holiday house in pristine condition — but their vision for grand rather than bland spurred them
