Puketutu Island Estate (Auckland, NZ) | estate (manor / mansion land)

 estate (manor / mansion land)  Add category

 Upload a photo

Once the residence of Sir Henry Kelliher and Lady Kelliher, this Spanish Mission style mansion has been restored and is now run as an envents venue. Henry Joseph Kelliher (2 March 1896–29 September 1991) was a New Zealand businessman, brewer, publisher, managing director, art patron and credit reformer. He was born in Waikerikeri, near Clyde in Central Otago, New Zealand on 2 March 1896. He married Evelyn Janie McLaughlin (née Sproule) in 1917.
He founded and operated Dominion Breweries, which ran several important luxury hotels in the 1960s and 70s, including The Royal International Hotel in Victoria Street (where the Beatles stayed in 1964) and the Mon Desir in Takapuna. Lady Kelliher decorated these in an elegant fashion as she did this house. Part of the decor of these hotels included pieces from the Kelliher Art Collection; Kelliher sponsored the Kelliher Art Prize from 1956 onwards. He was knighted in 1963.
He owned and lived here on Puketutu Island from the 1950s, his wife died in 1986.