It’s Janet Frame’s 100th birthday this month, and while she isn’t here to celebrate, a celebration will still be had.

The Janet Frame Eden Street Trust is planning a special day of free public events in Ōamaru on August 24, to remember the celebrated author, who spent most of her childhood here.

Janet Frame lived at 56 Eden Street, Ōamaru with her family, from the age of six until finishing her schooling at Waitaki Girls’ High School.

The Eden Street house is now a Janet Frame museum.

The August 24 events will mark almost exactly 100 years since Frame’s birth on August 28, 1924.

An open day will be held at the museum 2pm to 4pm on the Saturday, and people can visit the historic house and garden free of charge, enjoy some light refreshments and learn more about Frame’s time in Ōamaru, Janet Frame Eden Street Trust chair Chloe Searle says.

Meanwhile, the same evening, a group of award-winning New Zealand writers will gather for Writers Celebrate Janet Frame. Also free, the event will be held in the Waitaki Girls’ High School auditorium from 7pm to 8.30pm.

Pip Adam, Emma Neale, Michelle Elvy and Rachel Fenton will share readings from Frame’s work and discuss the impact she had. The event will be run by fellow author Kate Camp.

Chloe says the event is as much for those just discovering the celebrated author, through to die-hard fans and she is “delighted” to be marking the occasion in Ōamaru.

“Our trust knows the impact that Frame’s writing and life have had on so many people and it is a pleasure to acknowledge this in Ōamaru in time for the centenary of her birth.”

Frame’s childhood became one of the best known of any New Zealander, after she wrote of its joys and sorrows in her best-selling autobiography, which was immortalised in the celebrated film An Angel at My Table.

By the time of Frame’s death in Dunedin in 2004 she had published more than 20 titles of fiction, poetry, and memoir, and was regarded as a New Zealand icon.

Progress with the planned visitor centre for the Eden Street museum is also being made. 

Fundraising efforts last year, supported by people across New Zealand and beyond, mean next steps can now be taken, including removing the existing garage from the site.