Queenstown house protected

Press, 28 December 1988, Page 16

Queenstown house protected

A protection notice has been issued over one of Queenstown’s oldest wooden houses, Williams Cottage. The cottage on the Lake Wakitipu waterfront, Marine Parade, has been classified “B” by the Historic Places Trust. “The cottage is a good example of a simple colonial Georgian-style cottage,” said the Minister of Conservation, Ms Clark, who gave her consent to the protection notice.

“Its wooden construction is an example of the best of New Zealand’s carpentry traditions,” she said.

The cottage was built by Mr John Williams, an early Queenstown resident; who ran one of the

first clinker-built screw steamers on Lake Wakatipu.

The deed on the land was transferred to Mr Williams in April, 1866 and it is thought the house was built soon after that.

The protection notice was necessary because the cottage’s fate was uncertain, said Ms Clark. The cottage was next door to the Tourist Hotel Corporation’s new hotel, she said. "There is concern that, due to the high development of the site, the owner may proceed with a development which is unsympathetic to the townscape and to the cottage which is a significant landmark in Queenstown,” said Ms ClaJk.