Coast becomes renovation star

Interior designer Hamish Dodd has been appearing on NZ television for 20 years, starting out on My House, My Castle in 1999. Coasties Rachel Hart and Alex Breingan knew it was worth renovating to stay in the Hibiscus Coast area.

TV personality Hamish Dodd found the perfect home for the second season of his show, The 100 Day Renovation, on the Hibiscus Coast.

The programme follows businessman Alex Breingan and blogger Rachel Hart as they attempt to extend their home within a 100-day timeframe.

Hamish, who is also the show’s presenter, says Alex and Rachel’s desire to renovate their 1930s heritage house to accommodate their growing family was “the right story” for the show, and the location was a bonus.

“As soon as I started working on the Coast I understood [Alex and Rachel’s] fight to stay,” he says.
In particular, Hamish says he loves that many beaches on the Coast don’t have footpaths, taking him back to the days when going to the family bach meant staying in remote places.

“Every time you drive around a corner here, there’s a different beach and they’re all beautiful; it is so quintessentially New Zealand.”

Hamish says there were plenty of local businesses handy and willing to help with the renovation.
“Alex and Rachel solved a lot of the problems by simply knowing the builder personally, which is the real Kiwi way to build,” Hamish says.

That builder was Kelcey Gager from Gager Builders, a Whangaparāoa-based business that has built many homes around the Manly area.

Kelcey works in the business with his father Gus Gager, who Alex describes as “a local legend”.
Hamish says viewers can expect specific renovation details and a high-quality end product despite the show’s time constraints – an approach he and the late TV builder John ‘Cocksy’ Cocks both learned to value after working on previous shows together.

“Cocksy said to me one day, ‘Hamish, we have to have a chat about this and start doing it right,’ and he was spot on.

“It has to be the ‘what, why and how’ so the public actually get an opinion.”

By not “glossing over the big picture,” Hamish believes they have created a more authentic representation of Alex and Rachel’s renovation experience.

The 100 Day Renovation started on Prime TV, last week.