Penders is a heritage-listed holiday retreat at Haighs Road (within Mimosa Rocks National Park), Tanja, Bega Valley Shire, New South Wales, Australia. It was designed by Roy Grounds and built from 1964 to 1980 by Hamish Ramsay and other local builders. It is also known as Grounds and Myer Holiday Retreat, 'The Barn' and Myers House. The property is owned by Office of Environment and Heritage (State Government). It was added to the New South Wales State Heritage Register on 29 November 2013.

History The pre-contact natural environment Ordovician deposits comprise the sedimentary nature of the land at Penders. These deposits contain veins of quartz, which is a material often used by Aboriginal people to manufacture stone tools.

Penders is situated adjacent to Bithry Inlet, leading to Wapengo Lake. These coastal lagoons are important as they increase the variety of food resources along the coast. In addition, there are increased food resources available in the places along the coast that have rock platforms present along the shoreline, as is present along the coastline at Penders. These rock platforms are important habitats for a variety of marine resources, mainly shellfish as well as providing a stable point to undertake linefishing in the deeper water.Byrne: 1983: 2CMP, 2002

Indigenous history Southeastern Australia is known to have been occupied by Aboriginal people for at least 40,000 years.Flood 1995: 284-7 Over that extensive period the Aboriginal people who camped or passed through the study area would have had some general impact on the natural environment. The most significant change that impacted on coastal landscapes was typically the application of firestick farming, which is the alteration of the vegetation cover using fire.

There is evidence of Aboriginal occupation throughout Mimosa Rocks National Park, with coastal shell middens and open camp site deposits present in the park and surrounding region.NSW NPWS: 1998: 22 The coastal land comprising Penders would have been rich in resources for the local Aboriginal people. The availability of seafood resources as well as fresh water and a variety of terrestrial resources in the coastal hinterland would have made the area an attractive place to camp.

It is known that there were distinct tribal groups present along the coast, who tended to stay within their coastal zones as opposed to settling inland, where there were tribal groups although they were smaller in population. The inland and coastal people did interact and travel to each other's tribal areas however there was an ongoing exchange of people visiting other areas and was not reflective of any migrational trend or seasonal settlement.Byrne 1983: 1

Penders lies within the boundaries of the lands of the Dyiringanj Aboriginal people. The Dyiringanj were part of a group of tribes called the Yuin, whose territory stretched from Cape Howe to the Shoalhaven River.Byrne 1984: 10 Each tribe or language group was further subdivided into several clans, the Dyiringanj being one of these clans. Members of each clan had "an historical, religious and genealogical identity" and clan territories would have been "defined by ritual and economic responsibilities".Barwick 1984: 106

Early colonial history The first records show that it was not until the 1890s that the land around the study area was surveyed into portions and sold. Early maps show Henry Ritchie as the owner of much of the land including the site. Ritchie is the first recorded owner of portions 106, 107, 142, 143 and 135 in 1899. In 1959 ownership of the land eventually passed from Ritchie's family to the Innes family, who were well known for their sawmills in the region. Mrs Daphne Innes held the land for two years before selling it to Roy Grounds in 1964. An apparent proviso on the sale from Mrs Innes to Grounds was that the land at Penders should not be developed. Roy Grounds and Ken Myer became tenants in common in equal shares in 1966.

The Grounds and Myer occupation

When Grounds purchased the property in 1965, it had extraordinary scenic and natural qualities including a 1.6 kilometre frontage to the Pacific Ocean, and a northern boundary along the serene stretch of tidal estuary called Bithry Inlet. The firm friends, Roy Grounds and Kenneth Myer subsequently became business partners with an agreement being made in 1965 regarding the partnership of Penders. This agreement predates Myer coming in as a tenant in common of the property in 1966.

At the time Grounds was well known in Victoria as the designer of the National Gallery of Victoria (1961–68) which was then under construction. Myer was a leading figure in the Victorian department store chain Myer, one of his most recent projects having been the initiator behind the vast Chadstone Shopping Centre (1961) in Melbourne's suburban south-east. After Roy Grounds purchased Penders in 1964, John and Mary Cremerius, who lived nearby were employed by Grounds to help "clean up" the site. Mary Cremerius recalls that at this time Penders was covered in rubbish as it seemed to have also been used as a bit of a local dump site for refuse. Broken bottles, tins, crockery and car body parts were removed from the site during the clean up at that time.

During the 1960s and 1970s, Grounds and Myer constructed a variety of buildings and structures to facilitate their enjoyment of the place, in addition to establishing several native timber plantations and a timber treatment works. Grounds in particular was looking for an escape, "a bolt-hole", a deliberate getaway from the pressures of commitments of the gallery and arts centre commission in Melbourne. Penders, in 1965, was extremely remote and thus an ideal place of seclusion for Grounds and his wife. Secondly, the site they eventually found required some restoration. A common project would be regeneration of the existing forest of Eucalyptus maculata (spotted gum) and the planting out of Eucalyptus saligna (Sydney blue gum), Syncarpia glomulifera (turpentine) and Eucalyptus grandis (flooded gum). They were ably assisted in this by noted botanist Professor Lindsay Pryor of the Australian National University in Canberra. The aim was ecological, an early and pioneering example on such a large and private scale. Thirdly, this project had the possibility of commercial potential. Grounds was interested in timber construction and he and Myer employed the Tanalith preservation process to cure timber cut from the site and resell as log poles, posts, and stakes. As the noted contemporary architectural historian Jennifer Taylor has observed, the result was a property that was "both beautiful and productive".Architecture Australia 1985: 86

Before building any structures a wire fence was erected to mark the boundary of the property. The fence was intended to keep stray cattle from wandering onto the property. The fence had a generally unpopular impact on the local community who it is understood, initially felt wary and slightly aggrieved at its appearance.Jack Burgess and Marr Grounds pers. comm, CMP, 2002 Part of the reasoning for this was that the fence prevented local people from accessing some of the land at Penders, which had been used as a common picnic ground for many years. News of Grounds and Myers purchase and fencing of the land soon spread throughout the local community and it appears that many people were curious as to what these "wealthy fellows from Melbourne" would do with the land at Penders.

The first structure built on the site was a simple timber slab bench seat overlooking the ocean. During the early stages of development of the property, Grounds and Myer and their wives Bettine Grounds and Pru Myer usually camped on the property. After numerous visits, Grounds decided it would be more useful to have some permanent tent that would not require packing and unpacking. At the same time, Grounds wanted to retain the feeling of being in the natural setting and being able to roll up the sides of the tent and allow such a permanent shelter to respond directly to the sun, wind and rain

Over the years Grounds and Myer constructed a number of structures and landscape features at Penders. These structures were for the most part experimental in terms of architectural form and within the context of the property and the environmental outlook of the owners. Built structures include the minimalistic shelter, called the "Barn", the geodesic dome which framed a vegetable and herb garden, a wind generator tower, a covered orchard, the Myer house, a timber mill and various seats and benches around the bushland.

The "Barn" Much of the Barn's character, its design influences and choice of materials and structure derives directly from Grounds's intent that Penders be a total escape from Melbourne and its professional ties. It was to be a literal "bolt-hole", a place where Grounds could indulge in his own tinkering, entertain friends and family in peace, and be entirely removed from the pressures of the National Gallery of Victoria and the Victorian Arts Centre commission. The property was bought with that aim in mind. Early in 1965, Grounds submitted drawings for a barn to the then Mumbulla Shire Council in Bega. The barn was a very large and substantial nine-sided teepee structure made from logs of spotted gum cut from the site and treated using the Tanalith process. As a permit application, it was essentially a ruse. When the local building inspector arrived on site after construction had been completed, he found Grounds and his wife living in it as if it were a holiday house. Furious, the building inspector was greeted with Grounds's response that there was no legal objection to someone occasionally sleeping in a barn. There was nothing the inspector could do. The "Barn", as it soon became known, was to be the Grounds's holiday house at Penders for the next sixteen years and in that time, several alterations and additions were made to it.

The Penders property of 220 hectares was donated to the NSW Government to be incorporated as part of Mimosa National Park in 1976 by the owners, Sir Roy Grounds and Mr Kenneth Myer. Part of the agreement in regard to the donation of the property was that Grounds and Myer would be granted continued private use rights by way of lease. The lease encompasses an area of 20 hectares of land that contained their holiday retreats. The lease expired in 2001, and had been extended to January 2011.CMP, 2011

Since this date, the area known as Penders has been managed by the National Parks and Wildlife Service (NPWS), part of the Office of Environment and Heritage (OEH) within the Department of Premier and Cabinet (DPC).

Aesthetic interpretations

The Barn at Penders, the geodesic dome and the Myer House can be seen, not as unusual in New South Wales, but as extreme, within the context of the history of outstanding timber wharf and bridge structures and the subsequent use of poles in holiday houses and motels. The buildings at Penders were extreme in their experiment with the return to rustic materials, finishes and construction techniques.