Barewood’s history is rich and intricate, dating back to some of New Zealand’s earliest European settlers. Both the garden and the buildings it surrounds, including an original cob cottage, are testament to the love and hard work that have been poured into Barewood over the course of its history.
Barewood’s cob cottage, which is now a small gift shop within the garden, was built by early settlers to the area. With just two rooms, the cottage originally housed a family of eight!
In the 1890s Barewood was split off from the neighbouring station, Richmond Brook, and bought by the Radcliffe family. In 1908 the Radcliffes built a homestead on the property, a distinguished building that remains a proud feature today. With new and more spacious housing, the cob cottage was retired as a family home and became a dairy building, where butter and other milk products were made.
The cottage has since seen many transitions but has remained an integral part of Barewood. It showcases the history of New Zealand’s pioneering era and how some of our early settlers lived.
Barewood became part of Joe’s family when his parents bought the property in 1938. Joe’s father had come out from England on the advice of his headmaster. He’d been advised to take up a farming cadetship at Ruakura Agricultural College in Hamilton. This later led to a position with well-known pioneering farmer and early philanthropist, A.B. Williams, on a large station north of Gisborne.
Joe’s father later met his mother Biddy on a ship returning home to Britain for a period. This shipboard romance eventually brought the young couple back to Biddy’s home in Marlborough, where they came across a sheep and beef farm for sale.
Joe took over Barewood from his parents in 1969. After he and Carolyn were married, they moved into the homestead in the early 1970s. Barewood Garden was founded soon after.
In its earliest existence, Barewood Garden was close to a blank canvas, consisting of just a vegetable garden, some fruit trees, and some flower borders. At the time, large gardens were virtually non-existent as there was very little water in the valley to irrigate during the long and dry Marlborough summer months. However, advances such as the Black Birch Scheme in the 1970s and subsequent irrigation via the Awatere River opened up new opportunities for gardening.
A trained florist before she was married, Carolyn started work on Barewood Garden soon after she arrived at the property. She created the garden around the framework of its stunning 120-year old trees, which had been planted by the property’s original owners.
Carolyn also immediately fell in love with Barewood’s old homestead. Much of her focus with the garden has been around connecting it with this beautiful historic home.
Inspired by a visit to Rosemary Verey’s garden in England 30 years ago, Carolyn created one of New Zealand’s first potager gardens at Barewood. Over the years, including many hot dry summers, the potager has provided a harvest for friends and family all year round.
As Carolyn has further developed Barewood, she has aimed to incorporate more formality as well as romanticism into the garden. Aside from the avenues of trees, various structures in the garden created by Joe strongly link its different features.
Barewood is ever-changing. For Carolyn, the garden will always be a work in progress; she takes great joy in guiding the garden on its path as it continually evolves.