This exclusive set of commemorative pencils honours the carpenters and sawyers who built Kemp House in Kerikeri - New Zealand's oldest building, completed in 1822 as the Kerikeri Mission House.

The pencils are part of a range of limited edition products released in 2022 as part of the 200th anniversary of Kemp House.

Most of the Kauri used to construct Kemp House between July 1821 and March 1822 was rafted across the bay from Kawakawa and up the Kerikeri Inlet to be hauled out and pit-sawn by Māori sawyers (acknowledged here by the name Wiremu).

Mission carpenters Bean, Fairburn, Hall and Puckey, all with the Christian name William, then dressed the timber, erected the framing, laid the boards, and fixed the cladding. 

Of simple Georgian design, the House was built for Rev. John Butler who waited for it longer than he lived in it, departing the mission in 1823.

It was home to several missionary families, before James and Charlotte Kemp moved in in 1832, their descendants remaining until 1974, when it was gifted to the people of New Zealand by Ernest Kemp, the great-grandson of James & Charlotte 

17.5cm x 7.5cm