Joss House

It is always pleasing to see a project reach completion and this was especially true for the relocation of Joss House.  The small nondescript weatherboard cottage was once an integral part of Lawrence's Chinese settlement. The building which is owned by the Lawrence Chinese Camp Charitable Trust was part of a project that took three years to come to fruitution. According to Heritage New Zealand research, of all the Chinese camps established in Otago the one outside Lawrence was the largest and, with that at Cromwell, the longest surviving. In 2015 the Otago Community Trust provided a $5,500 donation to assist with the cost of moving the heritage building back onto its original site at the Lawrence Chinese Camp and in 2009 donated $25,000 to the purchase of the building associated with the house. 

The Joss House was loaded onto the back of a Fulton Hogan truck, and very carefully taken just a few kilometres to Lawrence's western end, where it was placed on pre-prepared foundations and piles next to the brick-clad Chinese Empire Hotel.  The Lawrence Chinese Camp Charitable Trust is hoping to gradually bring this once-bustling settlement back to life.