Jeff’s house is set at the end of a long, quiet road in what feels like a rainforest sanctuary. He has an environmentalist’s eye for finding special pieces that others may otherwise demolish or discard. The garden, too, looks much older with its own sense of time and place. King palms, white oak and date palms were already well established when Jeff found them and brought them home.

‘It all started one day when I drove by the quarry in Somersby and saw a massive pile of sandstone outside the entry,’ Jeff recalls. ‘You could see the convict markings on the stone and the way it had been cut, so I asked the foreman about it, and he told me it had been dumped by someone working on the Old North Road repairs. I asked him if I could have it and I took home five tons of 200 mm thick convict-cut sandstone that went into building my walls.’

Other stone came from an old retaining wall that was demolished in East Gosford and from the Somersby quarry itself.

‘I think I split 80 per cent of the stone myself and what we didn’t need for the house I used to build retaining walls throughout the garden and the entry gate pillars.’

The beautiful mahogany decking boards had a similar story.

‘They came from an old monastery in Sydney that was being demolished,’ he says. ‘I also retrieved a 1900s gas stove, a clawfoot bathtub, a marble washbasin and two doors with leadlight panels from the same place. The stove was later replaced with a newer model though because my wife got sick of it blowing up. We put in mod-cons like a dishwasher, a Rangemaster Classic gas and electric stove, NBN and Foxtel. And I was a pool builder, so I put in a heated plunge pool that’s a family favourite.’

In Lambs Valley near Maitland, Jeff heard of an 1850s slab hut that was going to be torn down. ‘I was horrified at the thought that all that historic timber would be dumped. So I asked if I could demolish it (carefully) for them and in return I got the timber slabs and rafters that I was able to save and use in my awnings and elsewhere.’

Two original cedar doors – no doubt from locally grown cedar – were sourced from the first school built in Wyong. ‘The doors had had five or six different locks on them over their 150-year-life,’ says Jeff. ‘You can still see where they were. That history is part of their charm.’

They say the Central Coast has less history than The Rocks or Tassie. But in Holgate, Jeff McAlister sourced historic materials from convict-built roads, an early slab hut, and an old Sydney monastery to build their histories into his house.

Not everything is over 100 years old of course. After the 1989 Newcastle earthquake there was an abundance of building material begging to be recycled.

‘Building footings of stone were being ripped out and dumped in the Hexham swamp,’ says Jeff. ‘I was able to get beautiful stone there too. And hardwood floorboards from demolished buildings.’

History doesn’t stop with the building structure. The furniture, too, has tales to tell.

‘An English-crafted corner timber and glass cabinet in the master bedroom’s ensuite dates from the late 1700s,’ Jeff tells. ‘In the kitchen I restored a handmade 1830 cabinet that was made in Tasmania from English oak.’

Family reasons have dictated that Jeff and his wife have reluctantly put the property up for sale.

‘It’s a hard decision when you’ve put so much of yourself into something,’ says Jeff. ‘But it’s going to be perfect for that special person who loves a sense of history. And you couldn’t build a house like this today because you just can’t get those materials anymore.’

Want to know more, contact ingridm@gittoes.com.au gittoes.co/WTR447

WORDS CATHARINE RETTER