Over the course of last week, the apprentices were tasked with each painting a room at the old Sisters of Mercy home, which is now the new Mōkihi Hauora home for mental health support.
The four apprentices competing were Turoa Adams, of Whangarei (McNabb Decorating Ltd), Lucas Santos Mendonca, of Hamilton (Unlock Painters Ltd), Kahu Carleton-Heta, of Nelson (Pro Colour Painting Ltd) and India Garden-Young, of Christchurch (Armagh Decorators Ltd).
Master Painters New Zealand chief executive Paul Hallahan said it was a no-brainer to hold this year’s competition in Timaru.
"The regional master painters branch had previously done some charity work here [Mōkihi Hauora] free of charge, so that sort of opened up the conversation for us to come here and hold the competition.
"We’ve got some skills that can help people and put back into the community so that’s what we wanted them to do, rather than paint little cubby houses," Mr Hallahan said.
"It can help improve people’s lifestyle and comfort, so it’s been all about giving back and we’ve got the opportunity to that while we’ve got these four young people who have given up a week of their time to come and do this."
He was pleased to have been able to offer support to an important local service, he said.
"It’s just a privilege for us to give something back to the community.
"We have 13 regions across the country and we don’t show favouritism to any of them, but it is nice to give some love to the people outside the main centres.
"Our mentality is to do it for, not necessarily the bigger, but less recognised charities because the big ones get lots of funding anyway, so we look for the smaller community projects we can help with."
The Master Painters New Zealand Apprentice of the Year competition has run for the past decade and this year received the most applications to date.
Overall, 18 men and 14 women applied, from which two apprentices from the North Island and two from the South Island were selected.
Mōkihi Hauora general manager Juliette Stevenson said she was grateful to Master Painters NZ for its support.
"It’s amazing — we’re on limited funding and the place is original from when it was built, so it was in desperate need of some updating and refreshing. We’re really stoked to have them on board.
"The rooms they are renovating are the bedrooms that people will stay in, so it’s really important that they have somewhere that is inviting and relaxing so they can recover from what they’ve experienced.
"We are a mental health and addiction service and quite a new organisation. We’ve only been in the building nine months.
"We’ve been fortunate to receive some funding to go towards updating it, but Master Painters have also supported us.
"A collective of local painters came in and painted the kitchen as well as this, so we’ve been spoiled by them. We’re really grateful."
The rooms were completed and judged last Friday, and the winner will be announced at the Master Painters New Zealand conference in Fiji at the end of this month.
