Ewelme Cottage is named after the church of the same name. It was built mostly of kauri in 1863 and 1864 for Church of England clergyman Reverend Vicesimus Lush and family while he was vicar of All Saints Church, Howick. This was so that his sons could attend the Church of England Grammar School in Parnell.
The cottage was continuously occupied by the Lush family, among them Mary Ruddock, until 1968. Since 1969, it has been preserved as a house museum by the New Zealand Historic Places Trust as the Lush family had left it, with about 2,000 books, hundreds of pages of sheet music, original artworks and a vast array of everyday objects from their time period.
In an article published in The New Zealand Herald in 2011, Ewelme Cottage was suggested as possibly the most important of the Auckland's Historic Places Trust properties, despite being the smallest.
The drawing room, veranda and garden of Ewelme Cottage were used in the production of the 1993 Oscar-winning film The Piano.
Regarded as one of the most haunted places in the city, it is claimed to be haunted by spirits of women and children. The house is reputedly haunted in particular by a young girl who has reportedly appeared by an oak tree in the garden. A local clairvoyant claimed that this ghost may be the spirit of a young female who was insane. According to a curator of the historic home, sightings of ghosts at Ewelme Cottage date back to 1945. In 2020, Ewelme Cottage offered free entry for Waitangi Day. [source]
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