Greece is the word

Boats moored at Port Nelson are a feature of the view from the front deck.

It’s this shared vision that has provided a lasting foundation for the couple’s business and romantic partnership. But the story really has its beginnings many years earlier in the 1970s when Wendy, originally from Christchurch, settled in Athens.

There she set about learning the language, raising a family with her then husband and building a successful interior design business.

“I was lucky enough to be working on magnificent 300-year-old stone villas on Greek islands, luxury apartments in Athens and newly built mansions all over Greece,” she says.

Wendy met Tim in the early 1990s after her first marriage ended. He was a metalsmith from the United Kingdom who was developing a wrought-iron furniture business in Athens and they both spent weekends on the small island of Agistri to escape the bustle of Athens.

The pair met and hit it off. Life was good and their businesses were thriving but eventually Wendy found herself thinking about a return to New Zealand. “I started craving the smell of the bush,” she says.

It took a while to convince Tim to leave behind the Mediterranean lifestyle he loved, but Nelson was a good choice – the lifestyle, climate and cuisine all made leaving Greece less of a wrench. Today, they both operate successful businesses: Wendy is co-owner of Tresson Interior Design, a furniture, fabric and interior design showroom, and Tim runs Tasman Forge where he creates distinctive wrought-iron furniture and accessories.

Over the years they have lavished attention on their Nelson home and today visitors are greeted at a pair of tall, elegant front doors reminiscent of the entrance to a Greek villa, complete with imposing beaten iron door handles designed and created by Tim.

Inside the scene is set with polished rimu floors, colourful Persian rugs and draped lengths of off-white cotton damask fabric brought from Greece by Wendy.

“I love this material,” she says. “It was milled in Prague and I discovered it in an old shop in the Plaka, which is an ancient part of Athens under the Acropolis.”

Treasures gathered during Wendy’s travels are scattered throughout the house. In the master bedroom a marble-topped bedside table and antique dressing table are both Greek flea market finds. The bathroom’s plastered walls and tumbled stone tiles surround a washbasin carved from a solid piece of white marble.

In the large walk-in shower a glass roof provides a private source of light. “Every time I walk into the bathroom I still get a great feeling of, ‘Wow, I love this space,’” says Wendy, who describes her approach to interior design as contemporary classic.

“It’s a style that’s relevant to the present but timeless and enduring. There’s warmth and a ‘curl-up-in-it’ cosiness. I don’t do sterile or trendy. I get enormous satisfaction out of knowing that rooms I designed 25 years ago are still looking great today.”

The heart of the house is the combined living and dining space. Two open fireplaces – designed by Wendy and built by Tim – face each other, their stone colouring reflecting the parchment hue of the walls which have a subtle patina paint effect. The sumptuous white sofas are classics, says Wendy. “They’re a design I had made by my sofa maker in Greece 25 years ago and are now part of the Tresson range.”

A large part of the home’s charm lies in the eclectic furnishings, such as the collection of mirrors hanging over the dining room table. “I’m a flea market junkie,” say Wendy. “Each mirror has to be different from the existing ones but balanced in relation to them.”

The kitchen was created from scratch in an area that originally contained a WC, a laundry and a corridor. The gas hob sits in a steel and concrete island bench made by Tim, who also constructed the pot hanger above which houses the extractor fan.

“Entertaining is a pleasure in this house,” say Wendy. “The layout was planned with entertaining in mind; the kitchen was designed to allow two people to cook easily in tandem. One of our greatest pleasures is inviting friends for dinner, planning and cooking the meal together and then enjoying the lively conversation that good food inspires.”

In a cool courtyard off the kitchen, wisteria cascades over Tim’s intricate ironwork. Other examples of his work are all over the house, including most of the tables, light fixtures and door handles. The keys to his craft, he says, are attention to detail and quality. “I try to create unique furniture using time-honoured methods of blacksmithing and joinery. My pieces have to withstand the test of time in terms of both style and durability.”

Past a verdant mix of cabbage trees, palms and wonga wonga vines is a steep back garden planted with manuka, lacebark, pittosporum and camellia trees. But the couple doesn’t get much time to enjoy the outdoors. “We do work long hours,” says Tim, “but we’re both passionate about our jobs so we don’t mind that much.”

Saturday mornings are usually spent wandering around Nelson’s famous market, buying fresh organic produce, chatting with stallholders and meeting friends for coffee.

“We love Nelson but during the cold winter months we sometimes miss the Mediterranean lifestyle,” says Tim. “And of course we miss the family and friends we left behind in Europe, so it would be good to visit them more often.”