Once a Catholic convent that later became a notorious boarding house, this landmark building in Auckland’s Grey Lynn has been transformed into The Convent Boutique Hotel.

The Spanish mission-style building was constructed in 1922 for St Joseph’s Convent. It was vacant for a period of time before it became a hostel in the early 1990s. With its heritage listing removed, the interior became unkept and was damaged over time. But as part of its transformation into a boutique hotel, The House Concept have refurbished the building’s heritage fabric, bringing original decorative elements back to life. The use of FireZone 52 pigmented interior intumescent paint has meant many of the original ceilings can be retained while still meeting the fire code for hotel accommodation.

"We used FireZone in all the hallway ceilings and in rooms where the original ceiling was a key feature," says designer Blair Moray-Cook. "The old fibrous plaster ceilings needed to be fire rated and upgrading with FireZone 52 allowed us to maintain heritage fabric."

The pigmented intumescent expands under heat to protect the substrate below. Glendene Painters, who are Zone approved applicators, applied the FireZone for The Convent Hotel.

"There were few tricky areas," says Moray-Cook. "One room had suffered a fire, and the ceilings generally had the staining of an old building, with smoke and nicotine discolouring the plaster surface. The painter used extra layers of primer to form a good base."

The fully water-based, low-VOC range of FireZone products comprises four core systems, designed for both new builds and for existing surfaces, to bring buildings such as The Convent Hotel up today’s compliance standards.

Says Moray-Cook, "60/60/60 was required, but we used the FireZone for 90/90/90 — the highest rating."

FireZone 52 is designed to achieve Group Surface finish requirements (1 / 1S / 2 / 2S/ 3) on timber, as well as improve the FRR of the existing substrates up to 90mins FRR on an extensive range of materials, including plasterboard, fibre cement and concrete. Using the FireZone range, with no red list chemicals for fire treatment, is critical for heritage refurbishments, so that many of a building’s highly valued wood and plaster features can be retained and enjoyed for decades to come.