Showhomes > From Dull to Dazzling

From Dull to Dazzling

Ugly brick veneer and borer-riddled, mismatched timber weatherboards plagued the lives of these young homeowners. But then Linea™ Weatherboard came to the rescue.

In March 2007, new homeowners Andrew Meredith and Phillippa Myatt, beat hundreds of other entries to win the James Hardie Linea™ Weatherboard Makeover competition. Their prize was $10,000 worth of Linea™ Weatherboard and installation services by Renovation Masters to the value of $10,000.

"When we bought the house, it was clad in false brick sheeting over timber weatherboards," says Andrew. "The brick veneer looked very unappealing. The finish was dull and dirty and it didn't suit the style of the house. Brick sheeting was quite popular at one stage, but I was never comfortable having it over an original weatherboard home, so we couldn't wait to pull it off and reveal the weatherboards underneath."

As a graduate architect, Andrew could visualize the modern look and sharp clean lines the weatherboards would give to their 1950s, three-bedroom home on Auckland's North Shore.

However, what they found wasn't exactly what they they'd hoped. The original timber weatherboards beneath were in a very rough condition. Andrew and Phillippa knew it would require a great deal of time, effort and money to bring them up to standard.

"Some of the boards had borer and were rotten," says Andrew. "Also, a previous owner had done some extensions to the house and the newer boards didn't line up with the original ones and were of different sizes."

Recladding their home would have been the ideal solution, but financially this option was out of the young couple's reach, so they had no choice but to continue the painstaking process of restoring the home's exterior. Seeing the James Hardie Linea™ Weatherboard Makeover competition promoted on TV, they jumped at the chance to enter.

"At that point, we were slowly revealing the timber weatherboards and doing them up one side at a time. When we heard we'd made the final five in the James Hardie competition, we couldn't believe it. And when we won, it was like a dream come true. It was such a huge relief to us financially and physically. Without it, we probably would've spent the next two or more years sanding back the old weatherboards and replacing the damaged ones. We were using up all our weekends and annual leave doing this awful job, and it really wasn't our idea of a holiday."

Through his design work at an Auckland architectural practice, Andrew was well aware of the benefits of a product such as Linea™ Weatherboard.

"From a practical point of view, Linea™ was a great material to use. It gave us the weatherboard look we'd wanted, which was more in line with the original style of the home, but without the maintenance and durability hassles of timber weatherboards. We plan to be here for another five years or so and it's really great to know we don't need to worry about ongoing maintenance to the exterior cladding."

Andrew and Phillippa chose to paint the Linea™ Weatherboard in Dulux X10 White Island, with Dulux White gloss on the window frames.

"It looks fantastic and is definitely what we had visualized. We are extremely pleased with the final look and the boxed corners look excellent - they really finish it off."

With the reclad now complete and the couple delighted with the result, they're turning their attention to finishing off the bedrooms and bathroom, and landscaping the garden.