A Taupō café that’s Replete in every way

Welcome to Taupō: Meet Chris & Kathy Johnston

Three decades of quiet rebellion have made Replete a Taupō landmark. In an industry obsessed with reinvention, owners Chris and Kathy Johnston have done the opposite: ignored trends and instead focused on genuine connections to build something enduring.

Spanning two stores on Te Heuheu Street, Replete feels like a lived-in art gallery. Guests settle onto David Trubridge stools beneath monochrome Ans Westra photographs—candid shots of Taupō pedestrians and young hunters near Ātiamuri—while Chris’s sprawling collection of hand-coloured Whites Aviation prints, a sweeping aerial history of New Zealand, share the walls, kept only in check by Kathy. In the adjoining store, shelves display curated design products, each selected by Kathy for their sustainability and aesthetic appeal.

Generations of visitors

The couple are hands-on, working most days. They insist there is no secret to the store’s longevity: “We just keep it real,” Chris says. A sentiment echoed by Kathy who says there is nothing complicated about what they do. Regulars now arrive with grandchildren, and out-of-town visitors keep coming back for a welcome that has remained unchanged for 32 years.

The menu follows the same rule: stick with what works. The café’s famous buttery Ruru slice—made from a local farmer’s wife’s vintage recipe—hasn’t left the cabinet since day one. Whether it’s a perfectly poached egg or aromatic Nasi Lemak inspired by their travels through Southeast Asia, there are no shortcuts in the kitchen.

"It’s about pride in the job," Chris says. "It has to be done properly."

From London to Taupō

The couple’s path to Taupō spanned multiple continents—they met in a London cocktail bar before diverging on separate travels, then reconnecting in New Zealand.

After working their way through Australia and the South Island, they arrived in Taupō in the 1990s. Coffee culture hadn’t yet hit the lakeside township, creating an opening for Chris and his sister, Sarah, to launch a deli-focused café. There was an element of homecoming, too: Chris had spent childhood summers by the lake, while Kathy grew up two hours south in Mangaweka.

Rather than buying an existing business, they took a gamble on a blank shell—a space with no power or water that had sat empty for 18 months. Six determined weeks later they opened after a few collective moments of breath holding as the entire front window was pried off to manoeuvre in a massive, solidly engineered deli counter, a permanent centrepiece that hasn’t budged since.

A family hustle

In those early years, the café was a family hustle: Chris and Sarah ran the shop while Kathy balanced raising their sons, Olly and Tom, with chairing the Taupō Arts Festival and working part time.

Within three years Replete expanded next door, opening one of the country’s first kitchenware stores and, after hours, an intimate cooking-class venue attracting a roll call of Kiwi chefs—from Jo Seagar and Al Brown to Annabel Langbein—to its social gatherings. Tom would later lend a hand in the café making coffees, his head barely peeking above the industrial unit.

What began as a deli-focused partnership between Chris and Sarah slowly evolved through the 1990s—including a partnership with former Huka Lodge chef Greg Heffernan—before Chris and Kathy became sole owners in 1999.

Art and design

When Kathy joined the helm full-time, the store’s focus shifted from a kitchenware shop dominated by pots and utensils into a gallery of Aotearoa and global sustainable offerings. “One day I came in and thought this isn’t really representing us as a couple because we’re quite into art and design,” Kathy says—they both come from families of artists, gardeners and creative spirits.

Today, the shelves house everything from Driving Creek pottery and pukatea platters to French-designed Lexon gadgets and organic beard oils. But nothing is bought without Kathy knowing exactly where in the store it will go. “It’s almost the reverse of what people do,” she says of her visual merchandising approach. “I’m into not being something for everyone—I give people one choice.”

It's a business strategy that works. Visitors lured into the store by the food-laden cabinet often depart with parcels wrapped in the shop’s signature rustic style: upcycled hessian coffee sacks tied with simple twine.

Public art advocates

Their design obsession extends beyond the café walls. The couple live in an award-winning John Wilson-designed home and are avid public art advocates—with Kathy a founding member, now patron, of the Taupō Sculpture Trust, enjoying local debate sparked by the polarising arrival of chrome dinosaur Boom Boom.

Chris is equally hands-on; he once raced bulldozers to save a massive Barry Brickell pottery installation— A Study in Volcanology—about to languish in landfill. A quick exchange of $4,000 secured its safety, and the restored piece was unveiled in 2023 at the new Taupō Airport—a full-circle moment for Chris, who now chairs the Taupō Airport Authority. He’s also the instigator of the town’s industrial-looking sporting sculptures, inspired by a trip to Australia. The red runner caught mid-stride just outside Replete was one of the first pipe sculptures installed.

The town’s recent title as one of the world’s most welcoming places feels right to Chris. “It’s pretty special,” he says. “People [here] are still humanized… they understand that human contact is important; interaction is the essence of a small community.”

It helps that Chris sees hospitality as an honourable and deeply human trade—one that can't be outsourced to an algorithm. “Hospitality doesn’t happen without people. You can’t use AI; you want to have a real interaction,” he insists.

For visitors, their local recommendations are diverse: Kathy recommends the quieter western bays of Lake Taupō with its waterfalls and sharp volcanic cliffs, while Chris is usually found on the old-school single trails at Craters Mountain Bike Park. But must-dos for both include a selfie at Boom Boom, seeing the raw power of Huka Falls, teeing off at Wairakei Golf + Sanctuary and exploring Kaimanawa Forest park on camping trips along the beech-lined Clements Mill Road.

After three decades of welcoming everyone from regulars to roving travellers, Chris and Kathy have no plans to be anywhere else. “Life is pretty simple here,” Chris says. “So why complicate it?”