Editorial

GUIDING LIGHT

Tiritiri Matangi lighthouse restored

WHAT IS HERITAGE?

Thinking beyond ‘lovely old buildings’

GREEN FINGERS

Preserving Southland’s horticultural heritage

A TAPHOPHILE’S tales

Unearthing Dunedin’s long-buried stories

Heritage

Issue 167 Raumati • Summer 2022 ISSN 1175-9615 (Print) ISSN 2253-5330 (Online) Cover image: Southern Cemetery by Mike Heydon

Editor Caitlin Sykes, Sugar Bag Publishing

Sub-editor Trish Heketa, Sugar Bag Publishing

Art director Amanda Trayes, Sugar Bag Publishing

Publisher Heritage New Zealand magazine is published quarterly by Heritage New Zealand Pouhere Taonga. The magazine had a circulation of 7968 as at 30 June 2022. The views expressed in the articles are those of the contributors and do not necessarily reflect the views of Heritage New Zealand Pouhere Taonga.

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At Heritage New Zealand magazine we enjoy feedback about any of the articles in this issue or heritage-related matters.

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Sparking conversations

What is heritage? For a magazine that’s been focused on the topic for almost 40 years, it seems a curious question to pose.

But in this issue, pose it we have. So, why?

Anna Knox’s story exploring this question (page 30) had its genesis around two years ago when the editorial team got talking about the wider chatter created by some recent additions to the Rārangi Kōrero New Zealand Heritage List.

In particular, media stories about two shuttered sites – the Wellington Central Library (then just 30 years old) and the Modernist Gordon Wilson Flats (a former state housing high-rise) – being named Category 1 historic places generated a volume of commentary rarely seen in the heritage world.

Heritage professionals had made educated and exhaustive assessments that led to these conclusions. Yet the number of eyebrows these listings raised also highlighted an ongoing disconnect in our collective understanding of heritage; for some, ‘heritage’ still seemed bound by the parameters of ‘lovely old buildings’.

We like to think we play a part in highlighting the diversity of our heritage through our stories; in our last issue there were pieces spanning ancestral landscapes, language heritage and the built heritage of a public toilet, an urban apartment building and a former select committee room.

But given the rhetoric at that time, we thought there was still an opportunity to pause and examine why acknowledging and exploring such diversity is important, and to contribute to what needs to be a wider and ongoing conversation.

A story offering an exhaustive answer to the ‘what is heritage?’ question was never going to be possible; instead, Anna’s story poses this question to four heritage professionals. It’s designed to provide some thought-provoking perspectives and – hopefully – spark further conversations.

So, what is heritage to you?

I hope a sense of diversity is carried through the other stories in this issue, along with a certain summery feel. Writing about Motueka’s saltwater baths certainly gave me the urge to get into the sea after a long, wet Auckland winter, and while reading Matt Philp’s story on the heritage of Kiwi surf clubs, I could almost feel the burning Piha sand under my feet.

Another hugely popular summer destination is the Hauraki Gulf island of Tiritiri Matangi. The island sanctuary receives more than 30,000 visitors a year, and those visiting this summer will be greeted by its refreshed lighthouse.

The site of one of the world’s most successful community-led conservation projects, Tiritiri Matangi underwent a native replanting programme during the 1980s and 1990s that reforested 220 hectares with more than 280,000 trees.

But the Supporters of Tiritiri Matangi have also long undertaken projects to conserve the island’s significant maritime heritage.

The group’s chair, Carl Hayson, says the work has been undertaken in an ad hoc way, led by the skills, interests and determination of various members over time. But their achievements have been substantial; their recent work to conserve New Zealand’s oldest continually running lighthouse, for example, was a $400,000 project.

Writing about the group’s achievements conserving both the natural and built heritage of the island reminded me of the power we have to create change when we’re strongly connected to a place that holds meaning for us.

And to me, that’s what heritage is.

Caitlin Sykes

Editor

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