The only survivor of three mission houses built in 1832, Te Waimate was first occupied by the Clarke family. Its peaceful pastoral surroundings were once the busy scene of New Zealand’s first large English-style farm, with wheat fields, a water mill, and blacksmith’s shop as well as the chapel, school rooms, houses and cottages, The house became the vicarage for the adjacent church of St John the Baptist (1871).
The house is furnished with missionary period furniture and early tools.
Source: New Zealand Historic Places Trust