HOBBITS ON THE MOVE

Hobbits on the move.

 The Como Gardens biannual open house week end is a major event on the local calendar these days. Every Autumn and Spring George and Pat Hetrel open up their unique property to raise monies for various emergency services. It is an act of kindness usually rewarded with huge crowds attending every event. It’s a wonderful place that has something for every age group and all are catered for. Along with the beautiful gardens and walking tracks, there is a miniature railway, a lake and activities including live bands and plays, a visit to the Como Gardens web site reveals how complete a day out it is. I, of course, have been there almost religiously every year and while sitting in my own back garden sipping a cup of tea admiring my newly mowed lawns I got to thinking how much of a nightmare it must be keeping the gardens at Como so perfect.

As I was pondering this train of thought I was staring at the Hobbit house sitting in a shady spot in a private corner of my yard and it occurred to me. “That lovely little piece of architecture is being wasted here”. If you aren’t aware of what I’m talking about you can read about it in the BBCN Issue 229 December 2014.
In a nut shell, the house was originally started by a friend and completed by me in 2014 to much media madness before quietly going back to a little monument to a quieter gentler place. I made a decision there and then that after I finished that cup of tea that I would ask someone if they were willing to take the Hobbit house and give it a new home where it could be enjoyed by much more than I was ever willing to allow in my back yard.
So I emailed George and Pat Hetrel of Como Gardens and asked if they would be interested in putting it in their garden ( mind you after all my visits I already had the perfect spot picked out) and awaited their answer. I only had to wait a couple of days with George emailed back accepting the offer and thanking me for the generous donation. He didn’t realise how excited I was they would graciously take the house and put it in their amazing garden.

The little Hobbit house had come a full circle, its original purpose was to be installed beside a creek bank in Belgrave as part of the Jamin Swaneveld’s WillowWoods property, which sadly no longer exists. I always hoped that the house would eventually find a home where it could be enjoyed as it was originally intended.
Moving the unit to Como Gardens meant arranging transport and a little bit of maintenance before it could be shifted. The main aim was to be completely installed and operating before the Spring Open Day which was the week end of 15th and 16th of October.
As anyone who has a pulse and lives in Melbourne will know that this spring has been very wet and while that is great for the dams and the flowers it made moving large rectangular objects that weight just shy of 150 kilos a bit difficult.
Our original date was abandoned when a week’s worth of rain had saturated the lawns at Como. Pat Hetrel- who was co-ordinating the move- was worried any attempt to move the structure from the driveway to the where its new home was would severely damage the lawns.
Of course, her concerns were warranted any vehicle would rip divots so deep and in the process eventually get bogged. So all we could do was wait. As we come to the end of September there was a brief period of mild weather but it was forecast that it would be followed by a longer run of inclement weather including rain, so Pat moved another scheduled planned move forward and hustled up some man power for the move to happen Saturday morning.

The Long Haul

New Interiors

Construction Time

ME and Pat Hetrel

I organised my end roping in a couple of my sons to transport all the fascia, fittings and furniture that bolt onto the unit that makes it a Hobbit house. Luckily Saturday, like the preceding Friday was a glorious sunny day with warm winds, hopes were high for an easy shift. It was a sight to behold when the transport arrived, Petite Pat with two burly guys in a Mercedes Sports pulling a 6x3 trailer. I felt guilt filling the boot with 15 inch pavers that we were using as a foundation. The load up went smoothly and it was off for the short drive to Como Gardens.
Pat had told us not to get too excited about an easy move, though the lawns look green, short and luscious underneath was a river of water and when you walked on the grass you could feel it shift under your weight as your foot sunk. Pat revealed the area she planned to put the Hobbit House. It was perfect, a little shady grotto that had the creek banks as its backdrop. The only problem was it was a good 200 metres from the trailer and the most direct route was across the lawn. We would have to carry the unit by hand. Even a trolley would get us a fraction of the way, so lucky there were five of us, we all grabbed a hand hold and lugged it while trying not to sink too far into the ground. I’m happy to say we did it with little fuss and in one quick albeit unsteady shuffle, the added bonus of the grotto being virtually dry was a welcome relief and we could move all the ancillary parts and begin reconstructing of the Hobbit house.
It was satisfying setting up and knowing the house was going to be enjoyed by much more people than sitting in my yard. After we had completed the initial build Pat gave us a quick peek around the gardens and some of the projects she was setting up for the Open Day.
You have to love a garden where one of the problems you have is that the foliage of some of your plants is being eaten by wild deer.
I believe the little Hobbit house had found a wonderful new resting place.

Post script. 

The next week. Well, the spring rains kept on coming and with the big weekend fast approaching the Open Day had to be cancelled. The saturated grounds would need more time to drain. Going ahead would mean safety concerns and lack of mobility not to mention a few thousand people ripping up and destroying the lawns. The good news is the Open Day was not canceled only postponed until the 12th and 13th of November. Still, a great event to look forward to.
Now with added Hobbit house.
Thanks to Pat and George Hetrel of Como, Kris of All Good Electrics and Jamin of Last Frontier Tattoos and Museum for making the move possible.

In situ on the day

News go out that something special was happening. Knox Leader 2-11-2016

Originally published in the Boronia and the Basin Community News No. 250 November 2016

MY HOBBIT HOUSE

I once had a Hobbit Hole fascia on a brick wall in my backyard. It looked nice but I couldn’t open up that door and step inside. Because it was exposed thus susceptible to bad weather it eventually had to be pulled down.

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 You see I have this thing about JRR Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings, not so much the books these days. I discovered better written and more exciting sagas years ago but the movies. Their design and production impress me no end.
 So one of the items on my bucket list was to one day have a real Hobbit Hole in my back yard. Unfortunately that hasn’t happened yet but I believe I now have the next best thing a Hobbit House. It took several years and some really nice people but it happened.

 The Hobbit house frame and interior was originally built bylocal artist  Jamin Swaneveld over five years ago when he ran Willowwoods just outside of Belgrave in the Dandenongs East of Melbourne.
 Jamin planned to set the frame into the bank of the creek that ran beside the property where Willowwoods had its gardens and little hexagonal shed/store.
Willowwoods sadly folded for various reasons but providence favours the brave and talented and Jamin went onto establish Last Frontier Tattoos in Upwey and gained for himself a successful business and a reputation as a masterful inker with a waiting list of up to year.

The Framework as originally built.

The unrealised Hobbit house followed Jamin to Last Frontier with the hope of maybe completing it as a more basic version and use it as the counter for the shop.
But where Willow Woods was a gentler more whimsical place. Last Frontier –which Jamin has designed and built himself- is more steam punk with a tilt towards the strange and mythical. The shop having an atmosphere of a 19th Century Apothecary and Curio Shop, so the Hobbit house didn’t ideally fit the shop theme. So it was put out the back because Jamin really didn’t want to get rid of it with all the work he had done on it.

Jamin's original inside work.
See video

From the side.

 Around November 2013 I paid a visit to Jamin at Last Frontier to see what marvels he had added to the shelves in his shop and especially to see a new display cabinet he had made to house his lovely old medicine bottle collection. As it does talk returned to the old Willowwood days and the “what ifs” and “could’ve beens” and Jamin mentioned the Hobbit house was still around the back of the shop. Still in excellent condition hidden under a large cover and buried under other bits and pieces that needed sorting or disposal.
 It was then that he offered it to me if I was willing to take it. What would I do with an incomplete Hobbit house? Where would I put? Did I know what I was doing?

 It didn’t matter. I said “Yes and thank you.”

A couple of days before Christmas I organised with my step son Kris to hook up the trailer and pick up the frame and plonk it in my shed. I spent the next couple of weeks telling friends and family “Look what I got for Christmas”.

It was during the Christmas break that I had to sit down and think exactly what my opinions were. My goal was to finish the original idea of setting up the Hobbit house in situ to the best of my abilities while showcasing the interior and enhancing its qualities.

The new site for the Hobbit House.
Originally the Whomping Willow

Though the Hobbit house looked just like a wooden crate from the outside, inside Jamin had built a lovely panelled room complete with fire place. Because the frame was being into a bank and the widest part was to support the fascia, Jamin inserted a mirror on a 45 degree angle to create the illusion that the room extended into the bank but was in fact running along the front behind the front door.
 Though Jamin had created a wonderful interior it still needed a  list of items before installation such as a viewing window, to seal off an open end that was the access to the interior, water proof the unit as well as  install lighting for illuminating and effects. All this and creating a complete fascia and roof to make the whole structure come alive. Whereas Jamin’s original idea would have become a Hobbit hole I would have to build a Hobbit house similar to what Samwise Gamgee lived in at 3 Bagshot Row.
  In other words it would be a free standing house.

Before I could start I had to remove
the rest of the tree and the trampoline.

 I didn’t have a creek running through my backyard or have a large fall on my property to cut into I did however have a spot under a nice tree that when levelled looked like the tree was  growing out of the top of the house. But before I started that there was fun to be hd with the design of the outside. Having been made redundant from my job only weeks before I was given the frame I was not in the position to throw lots of money at the project so I needed to budget and not get too carried away with plans in case I couldn’t buy food or the wife killed me. Whichever came first. Luckily I have a garage full of bits and pieces and the initial layout for materials was minimal.
It also meant a lot of pick and shovel swinging to prepare the site where the house would eventually sit.

 I spent the rest of the summer planning, building, rejecting, planning and building again until I felt I had the right feel. Jumping from inside the shed to work on the frame and outside to level and prepare the area where it would sit. This was usually interrupted by a day trip with the missus where no matter where we went I found some other little inspiring titbit to enhance the house whether it be a certain colour, texture or garden ornament. It was on one of these outing that I found brass candelabra that with a bit of modifications became the chandelier.

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The Fire Place with LEDs.

Working Lights

When I was happy with the inside arrangements I made another trip to visit Jamin to show him what I had done and how it was going to look.
It was on this trip that he reminded me of an idea he had for the end of the hallway where he had a door partially open and back lit to give the impression that there was more happening further back in the house. I had totally forgotten this and had already spent a considerable amount of time and effort making a neat little door but fixed in position. But the idea was too good to ignore and I redesigned again. The door aside Jamin was quite pleased with the progress and was impressed by the little fake flame burning away in the fireplace with the use of LED lighting. Come the start of autumn it was time to test the structure and I placed it outside to test its weatherproofing and durability.

Getting ready for winter.

Kris doing the electrics

Nice and dry

 










By August I was content it was sturdy enough after some winter storms that where so strong one took out my shed when a large tree fell through it and the shopping centre down the road flooded. The Hobbit house neither fell apart nor leaked (unlike the shed) so it was time for the final stage the electrics, window dressing and garden.

Kris , who you may remember helped me moved the frame back home also designed the lighting. Being a 4^th year apprentice electrician and working in 3 watt LEDs using a 24 Volt transformer I was confident that the house was safe and not liable to catch fire or blow out any fuses. Actually Kris’ design and installation brought the project a whole new life by using the mirror to highlight low areas and the false perspective of the door look quite realistic. The winters rain and spring sunshine had given the path and surrounding grass a chance to settle in and with the fitting of the synthetic grass, chimney and fence the house was taking shape. Ideally it would have been nice to have a larger front garden but I was restricted by the gate way that links next door house and I wasn’t quite prepared to block that off as we have a great relationship with our neighbour.

When the local newspaper rang and asked if they could send ‘round a photographer, the wife and I went into overdrive to pretty up the garden and add some wildlife to the lawn roof.

It made us work quickly and use our gut feeling about what looked best. All up I’m quite satisfied with the result.

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