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Blogs / January 2009

February 2009 | December 2008
    • Cover version
      • Don’t judge a book by its cover, the saying goes. There’s no doubt, though, that a book’s cover can say an awful lot about what’s inside. Michael Illingworth, Untitled 1971 Deciding what work should go on the cover of the forthcoming book Art at Te Papa — Michael Illingworth’s Untitled 1971 — wasn’t easy.  We tried lots of different possibilities, shopped ideas around, got sometimes co
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      • te-papa

    • Ephemera
      •    NZ Post has been busy over the last year, sending out messages of PostCodes to the whole of New Zealand. We had, until recently, a system of Post Codes that were laughable in their pathetic simplicity. My NZ Post Code in 2000 was 6001, which I shared with approximately 100,000 other people. I don’t think that I ever heard of anyone living in 6002, although it is certainly possible. In 2008 howe
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      • architecture
      • blogs

    • One Day Sculpture
      • If you are an art follower you may have already know the One Day Sculpture project. One Day Sculpture was launched in Wellington in March 2008 in conjunction with the New Zealand International Arts Festival. Since then there have been 7 projects presented. These were all commissioned by different institutions around Aotearoa/New Zealand and have taken place in Auckland, Hawera, Wellington and Dun
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      • te-papa

    • The big art book
      • Art at Te Papa - coming soon. Hi there, I’m William McAloon, Curator of Historical New Zealand Art here at Te Papa. Over the last couple of years I’ve been working on a big book on Te Papa’s art collection. Art at Te Papa features over 400 works, from the 15th century to the present day. The cover star is Michael Illingworth’s painting Untitled, 1971. The book is due out in
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      • books

    • A Menu for Monarchs
      • In the summer months I get plenty of phone calls and emails from monarch butterfly fanciers, all with a common problem: Monarch butterfly caterpillar (Photo credit: R Sharell, Copyright Te Papa       “My swan plants are almost stripped bare yet I have so many monarch butterfly caterpillars I really don’t know what to do. Is there anything else I can feed the caterpillars on?” This problem arise
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      • te-papa

    • Volunteering Tea and Comfort
      • The streets of Wellington on a day like today are a joy, the sun is shining, the breeze is more balmy than bluster and you probably have a home to go to if you need some cave time.  In Wellington the streets are shared with all, and if you head into the CBD you will see suits, students, hipsters, children and gold-card holders utilising public space alongside street people and alcoholics.&nbs
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    • Century City Ho
      • For a brief moment in time it seemed as though time had stood still, and that El Terry had given up finishing it, but then it was restarted with new contractors who actually seemed keen to complete the project. It’s one of the more complex developments Wellington has seen for a number of years: taking a barren empty site and layering on it a monster carpark for initial income generating pote
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        • 78 Tory Street, Wellington


    • Disguised in the bush - a plant mimic
      •  Last weekend, when I should have been writing grant applications, I was dragged out for a bush-walk. However, my arm didn’t have to be twisted too hard, since it was a fine day and the track between Kiriwhakapapa and Blue Range is lovely (although steep). Alseuosmia pusilla Alseuosmia pusilla was abundant along the track. This is a very interesting little shrub. It looks a LOT like a juveni
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      • te-papa

    • Cinephilia: Opening This Week
      • As Oscar night approaches another of the expected heavyweight contenders goes into cinemas: Sam Mendes' Revolutionary Road reunites Kate Winslet and Leonardo DiCaprio for the first time since Titanic (still the highest grossing film of all time fact-fans) in a story of a middle-class 1950s couple dissatisfied with the American suburban dream. Based on (what I understand to be) an awesome novel by
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      • cinema

    • Big Day Out
      • There seems no doubt that today will go down in history as an important date, and it seems churlish to ignore it and debate the whys and wherefores of buildings in wellington, when the real focus for much of the world has been on the buildings and public spaces in Washington, half a world away.  The date for us is clear enough: its the 21st of January, although America, being so far behind the ti
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      • architecture
      • blogs

    • Summer daze
      • We admit it: we've been slack. Normal blogging service will gradually resume as we re-emerge from the rum-induced inebriation heat-induced torpor of summer, but things are taking a while to crank up again. Some of us have been out of town on summer holidays, enjoying all the clichés of the Great Kiwi SummerTM: beaches, jandals, boats, sunburn and ill-advised sexual liaisons. But some of us
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      • featured

    • In the summer in the city
      • 1. Have you registered for Webstock yet? Only 33 more sleeps left to go and we are very very excited! 2. Have you checked out the programme for Summer City yet?  Wellington City Council's three-month festival of outdoor activities. Events include music festivals, extreme sports, cultural celebrations and children's entertainment. This year, Summer City's music performances focus on Welli
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      • events

    • Grand Designs
      • Watching an episode of Grand Designs recently, while on holiday, made me thankful that we don’t have such a high and idiotic level of bureaucracy as they do in England: but then again, nor do we have an architectural presenter with the charisma and sardonic tongue of Kevin McCloud.  In this programme, an architect called Francis Shaw was attempting to restore a castle in Skipton, in Yorkshire. Hi
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      • heritage-buildings

    • Lancewood hunting
      • Field-work is one of the best aspects of working as a Natural Environment curator at Te Papa.  I get to spend about three weeks a year in the field collecting plant specimens. Te Papa’s 4WD. If seen outside Wellington, there is a good chance this vehicle is being used to collect plants, whales, or fossils. I’ve recently returned from ten days field-work in the South Island, collecting samples for
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      • te-papa

    • Comings and Goings
      • The start of each year often sees a shake-up of the bar and restaurant scene, and with the Current Economic ClimateTM one might expect a few more closures than usual. Let's not dwell on such morbid speculation, and look at a few closings and openings that we do know about. While discussing the demise of Temperance (which didn't reopen this weekend, despite DB's threats assurances), Blair mentioned
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      • featured

    • A new structure on T3
      • We are at it again!!This is the beginning of a new structure on T3, thanks to the great guys from the GVN we were able to get the platform in for what will be a very interesting obstacle.For more information you will have to come along on Sunday February the 1st to find out.Meeting at the bottom of Varleys at 10am, lunch and tools provided.
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      • cycling
      • makara

        • Makara, Wellington


    • A new structure on T3
      • We are at it again! This is the beginning of a new structure on T3, thanks to the great guys from the GVN we were able to get the platform in for what will be a very interesting obstacle.For more information you will have to come along on Sunday February the 1st to find out.Meeting at the bottom of Varleys at 10am, lunch and tools provided.
      • Tagged as:
      • cycling
      • makara

        • Makara, Wellington


    • the year ahead
      • In all probability, this year is going to be a bit of a quieter year than previous years, especially on the Design and Construction front. Auckland has been in a constructional doldrum for the last 18 months or so, while Wellington has been curiously bouyant, but realistically, this is not a state that is going to continue. Although there are no real reasons for our economy to crash screaming to t
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      • architecture
      • blogs

    • On the Buses
      • While I’ve been quite impressed by the new trolley buses in Wellington, one gleaming in its paua-shell colour-scheme as it slides silently through the city, I still have a hankering for a double-decker, which are fairly common throughout England, and of which we seem to have one roaming solo in the streets of Wellington.
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      • trolley-buses

    • The Year Ahead
      • In all probability, this year is going to be a bit of a quieter year than previous years, especially on the Design and Construction front. Auckland has been in a constructional doldrum for the last 18 months or so, while Wellington has been curiously bouyant, but realistically, this is not a state that is going to continue. Although there are no real reasons for our economy to crash screaming to t
      • Automatically tagged as:
      • architecture
      • blogs

    • On the Buses
      • While I’ve been quite impressed by the new trolley buses in Wellington, one gleaming in its paua-shell colour-scheme as it slides silently through the city, I still have a hankering for a double-decker, which are fairly common throughout England, and of which we seem to have one roaming solo in the streets of Wellington. It is of course a RouteMaster, the most famous of all the London Trans
      • Automatically tagged as:
      • architecture
      • blogs

    • On the Buses
      • While I’ve been quite impressed by the new trolley buses in Wellington, one gleaming in its paua-shell colour-scheme as it slides silently through the city, I still have a hankering for a double-decker, which are fairly common throughout England, and of which we seem to have one roaming solo in the streets of Wellington. It is of course a RouteMaster, the most famous of all the London Trans
      • Automatically tagged as:
      • architecture
      • blogs

    • The Year Ahead
      • In all probability, this year is going to be a bit of a quieter year than previous years, especially on the Design and Construction front. Auckland has been in a constructional doldrum for the last 18 months or so, while Wellington has been curiously bouyant, but realistically, this is not a state that is going to continue. Although there are no real reasons for our economy to crash screaming to t
      • Automatically tagged as:
      • architecture
      • blogs

    • The Year Ahead
      • In all probability, this year is going to be a bit of a quieter year than previous years, especially on the Design and Construction front. Auckland has been in a constructional doldrum for the last 18 months or so, while Wellington has been curiously bouyant, but realistically, this is not a state that is going to continue. Although there are no real reasons for our economy to crash screaming to t
      • Automatically tagged as:
      • architecture
      • blogs

    • Cinephilia: Opening This Week
      • Following the flurry of Christmas and New Year releases (all of which are still playing), there are only two new titles to report this week. Firstly, The Tale of Desperaux an animated adaptation of a supposedly beloved children's book. Matthew Broderick plays a noble little mouse with enormous ears who teams up with a kitchen-loving rat (Dustin Hoffman) to rescue a lonely Princess (Emma Watson) -
      • Tagged as:
      • cinema

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