Built in 1909-1910, the two-storeyed brick dwelling called Sundrum, at 52 Rae Road in rural Woodbury, north of Geraldine, is notable as an English Domestic Revival style house designed by Timaru architect Herbert Hall for Major Archibald Spencer and his wife Harriet (née Acland). Sundrum has aesthetic, architectural, historical and social significance.
Sundrum is located close to the Waihī River, which flows southeast from its sources in the Four Peaks Range, and meanders through the town of Geraldine to reach the Ōpihi River near Te Umukaha (Temuka). During the 1879 Smith-Nairn Royal Commission of Inquiry into the Ngāi Tahu land claims, Ngāi Tahu kaumātua recorded Waihī as a kāinga mahinga kai (food-gathering place). The Woodbury (formerly ‘Waihi Bush’) area, where Sundrum is located, had been a large area of heavily timbered forest. During the 1870s and 1880s sawmilling plants operated in various parts of the forest, including at the 70-acre block where Sundrum was later established. After huge tōtara, mataī and kahikatea trees had been milled, and other trees suitable for use in posts, rails and firewood had been felled, the 70-acre block was owned successively by a Mr Somerville and a Mr Gaby, then George Evans (from July 1901), and Donald Morrison (1909). Retired Royal Irish Rifles army officer, Major Archibald Claude Douglas Spencer (1861-1929) married Harriet Acland (1866-1948) of Mount Peel Station in December 1908. In the winter of the following year, 1909, Major Spencer purchased the property at Woodbury. They engaged Herbert Hall, of the Timaru architectural firm, Hall and Marchant, to design their new house. It was named ‘Sundrum’ after Sundrum Castle in Ayrshire, Scotland, which was owned by Major Spencer’s grandfather, John Hamilton.
Accessed up a sweeping driveway, the house stands some distance away from the road within a mature garden and to its south are various outbuildings. The house is two-storeyed, with an irregular L-shaped footprint and gabled and hipped roof forms. Windows are double-hung sash, and the main entrance door on the north elevation has sidelights and fanlights. Typical of English Domestic Revival style, the house incorporates red brick and timber detailing, exposed rafters, tall chimneys, tile-roofed sun hoods and a porch. The main part of the house has tiled roofing. The interior includes panelling and triple height sash windows.
The Spencers established a garden containing numerous native and exotic tree varieties, including weeping macrocarpas, a weeping tōtara and many rare oaks. The Spencers had no children. Major Spencer died in 1929. In 1933 Sundrum was sold to William and Olive Cole, who ran it as a guest house farm until 1973. Advertisements and social pages indicate that the Sundrum guest house, in its spacious grounds with trees, birdlife and views, served as a kind of wellbeing retreat ‘for those whose nerves are jaded with the bustle of city life and who long for the freedom and the simplicity of the open spaces.’ It was during the Coles’ time that the area above the front porch was enclosed. When sold in 1973 to Timaru property developer and former North Canterbury farmer, Thomas Duncan Allan, the Sundrum Estate was described as a 60-acre farm and the house ‘a 10-bedroomed home in the style of a nineteenth century English manor house’. Allan sold to James Wallace and wife Evelyn (née Acland) in 1980, who during their nearly 40-year ownership carried out some changes to the house, including removing the enclosure above the porch and, at the start of the twenty-first century, adding a carport and workroom addition at the south side of the house. In 2024 the property was sold to Toby and Sarah How.
Sundrum is located close to the Waihī River, which flows southeast from its sources in the Four Peaks Range, and meanders through the town of Geraldine to reach the Ōpihi River near Te Umukaha (Temuka). During the 1879 Smith-Nairn Royal Commission of Inquiry into the Ngāi Tahu land claims, Ngāi Tahu kaumātua recorded Waihī as a kāinga mahinga kai (food-gathering place). The Woodbury (formerly ‘Waihi Bush’) area, where Sundrum is located, had been a large area of heavily timbered forest. During the 1870s and 1880s sawmilling plants operated in various parts of the forest, including at the 70-acre block where Sundrum was later established. After huge tōtara, mataī and kahikatea trees had been milled, and other trees suitable for use in posts, rails and firewood had been felled, the 70-acre block was owned successively by a Mr Somerville and a Mr Gaby, then George Evans (from July 1901), and Donald Morrison (1909). Retired Royal Irish Rifles army officer, Major Archibald Claude Douglas Spencer (1861-1929) married Harriet Acland (1866-1948) of Mount Peel Station in December 1908. In the winter of the following year, 1909, Major Spencer purchased the property at Woodbury. They engaged Herbert Hall, of the Timaru architectural firm, Hall and Marchant, to design their new house. It was named ‘Sundrum’ after Sundrum Castle in Ayrshire, Scotland, which was owned by Major Spencer’s grandfather, John Hamilton.
Accessed up a sweeping driveway, the house stands some distance away from the road within a mature garden and to its south are various outbuildings. The house is two-storeyed, with an irregular L-shaped footprint and gabled and hipped roof forms. Windows are double-hung sash, and the main entrance door on the north elevation has sidelights and fanlights. Typical of English Domestic Revival style, the house incorporates red brick and timber detailing, exposed rafters, tall chimneys, tile-roofed sun hoods and a porch. The main part of the house has tiled roofing. The interior includes panelling and triple height sash windows.
The Spencers established a garden containing numerous native and exotic tree varieties, including weeping macrocarpas, a weeping tōtara and many rare oaks. The Spencers had no children. Major Spencer died in 1929. In 1933 Sundrum was sold to William and Olive Cole, who ran it as a guest house farm until 1973. Advertisements and social pages indicate that the Sundrum guest house, in its spacious grounds with trees, birdlife and views, served as a kind of wellbeing retreat ‘for those whose nerves are jaded with the bustle of city life and who long for the freedom and the simplicity of the open spaces.’ It was during the Coles’ time that the area above the front porch was enclosed. When sold in 1973 to Timaru property developer and former North Canterbury farmer, Thomas Duncan Allan, the Sundrum Estate was described as a 60-acre farm and the house ‘a 10-bedroomed home in the style of a nineteenth century English manor house’. Allan sold to James Wallace and wife Evelyn (née Acland) in 1980, who during their nearly 40-year ownership carried out some changes to the house, including removing the enclosure above the porch and, at the start of the twenty-first century, adding a carport and workroom addition at the south side of the house. In 2024 the property was sold to Toby and Sarah How.
