This quirky property on Lake Taupō has its own chairlift, aviary, and phone box

This story is from the team at NZ House & Garden magazine.

Alive with birdsong and the sound of water trickling over rocks into sleepy, inky ponds, this lush garden feels many miles from suburbia.

It has peaceful country views and not a neighbour in sight, yet it’s at the edge of a busy subdivision in Motuoapa on the southern edge of Lake Taupō.

Englishman John Mack and husband Zane Cozens came to live here 27 years ago – by default. They met in Britain while Zane was on his OE and when he couldn’t get a relationship status visa to stay, they returned to New Zealand to be near Zane’s parents who live in nearby Tūrangi.

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Zane, a chef, borrowed money from his parents to develop a fast food business while John worked at Farmers in Taupō. They were surprised at how the community welcomed them. “We never thought we’d stay,” says John. “But people were so nice.”

Seduced by the friendliness, they bought a house. Zane switched careers to become a real estate agent and eventually bought the company; he’s now retired. John worked for ANZ bank and has since become a local councillor.

After owning a few properties, in 2004 they bought a large paddock with the aim of building a home and creating a large garden.

Although Zane spent three years studying horticulture, his passion wasn’t the garden but rather the local memorabilia dotted around the property – there’s a parking meter, a red phone box and a seat from a ski chairlift. John, however, has always loved plants and laughs as he recalls that he was the only fifth former at boarding school to arrange the flowers with the housemaster’s wife and who would visit the garden centre every Saturday.

Apart from its extravagant proportions, the site’s most redeeming feature is the 5m-wide driveway – perfect for an avenue of flowering cherry trees that John has underplanted with agapanthus, his favourite flower.

“Coming from the UK, I consider them very exotic. They’re beautiful and hardy. There is so much variety. You can put them where nothing else grows, cut them back and they’ll always return. They also create a beautiful edge that doesn’t look man-made,” he says.

At first, John’s main concern was creating privacy. Neighbours were building around them so he invited them to dump their dirt on the site, which he used to create planted mounds around the perimeter.

But, he asserts, he’s a plantsman not a designer, and had no grand vision for what came next. “If I started thinking about the whole thing, I would have given up. I just worked through different garden rooms until I came to the end.”

John thought the land was flat but when they bulldozed a platform to position the house, they were left sitting in a hole. So John developed a low retaining wall that follows the flow of the land from front to back. Painted black with hedging in front, it gave a neat, orderly structure with level lawn above the driveway, plenty of space for a procession of flamboyant gleditsia and a bushy backdrop of shrubbery.

The natural contour of the land led to the property’s most striking feature – a man-made stream and a series of ponds, made with a rubber liner that weighed 400kg and took five men to unroll.

Leftover liner was used for the river stone walkways to stop weeds. “We have always loved water. It’s calming looking over it,” John says. “When I built the ponds, I wanted people to get out of their cars and hear the sounds of the stream from the car park.

“It adds a wow factor, beckoning visitors to follow the stream along the boardwalk to arrive at the big pond.”

A bridge across water at the entry to the house also leads the eye through the foyer to a formal pond overlooking a larger more natural pond, then to a view of Lake Taupō in the distance.

“Visitors are inspired to go home and add their own water feature to their garden. At the last Tūrangi Garden Club Ramble, a guy approached me and said he had built a few ponds but this was the most natural he had seen and he couldn’t believe we had built it ourselves, as their construction and maintenance are complex.”

To create the burbling water effect and to keep the ponds fresh, pumps recirculate 26,000 litres of water every hour. The ponds are just 400mm deep (to avoid having to be fenced), so it’s easy to add aquatic plants but also means that the water warms up in summer, producing algae. To prevent this, John adds a harmless dark blue dye to stop UV rays penetrating the water. The goldfish aren’t affected and the water movement doesn’t disturb the 20 or so frogs who have taken up residence.

The deep hue also provides a striking contrast to the russet tones of the tussock and jointed reeds that grow alongside, as well as the water lilies they acquired from the local golf course, for free. In a garden this size, he says, you need to look out for those opportunities.

He further developed the stream area with large boulders from a local quarry, flaxes, grasses, and cabbage trees which add height to frame the view.

Close to the house, the planting is more formal. The last area to be finished was a sheltered circular outdoor dining spot, planted with herbs for Zane’s cooking, as well as fruit trees.

Trimming the trees low encourages the goodness to go into the fruit and keeps them to a manageable height. The couple are rewarded with an abundance of apples, cherries, peaches, plums and nashi pears each summer.

There is a large aviary on the property. Zane has always kept birds and is sentimental about his 28-year-old cockatiel Charlie who belonged to his grandfather. “He found a girlfriend last year and they’ve had babies.” They also breed bantams which are hidden in a strip of land beyond the perimeter shrubbery.

Now, the garden is almost self-sustaining, says John, with just lawns to mow and a bit of weeding. When they go away there’s no shortage of volunteers. Friends are happy to stay and look after this magical wonderland, eagerly patrolled by the couple’s boisterous chocolate labradors, Fletcher and Mo.

The pair are excited about their next project – developing the piece of land they bought to protect their view over the fence, which they cannot wait to fill with a canvas of native plants.

Q&A with John Mack and Zane Cozens

Most significant plant in the garden: Agapanthus is everywhere; hostas, grasses, jointed reeds around the pond and native irises. There are lots of different grasses. (Zane)

Favourite new plant: Artichoke. We bought it from the Hawke’s Bay Farmers’ Market because I love the look of it. We don’t do vegetables. They’re messy. (John)

The thing I’ve learned about gardening is: If the tag says a small plant grows to 5m, believe it. It really does. I always check how big a plant grows. (John)

Plants that grow well here: Natives – they grow here naturally. (Zane)

Biggest gardening mistake: Planting 200 hebes along the retaining wall which went woody. (Zane)

We love this part of New Zealand because: My connections here remind me of being a kid and having an extended family. (Zane)

It’s a hidden gem. We get to live the dream of rural life while still being able to enjoy town life only eight minutes away. We can also get to an airport in 35 minutes if we want to travel. (John)

Watering the garden: I use a hose normally because I find it therapeutic. In summer we have hose bans but normally we’re lucky if we put on the hoses once a week. The garden doesn’t need it. (John)

A tip for other gardeners: Do what’s right for you. If it’s wrong, just start again. (John)