21239-TaranakiNatural Landscapes and Gardens of New Zealand

14 November - 2 December 2012

Tour Highlights

  • • Join John Patrick and a number of his New Zealand associates, among them eminent landscape architects and garden designers with whom you will be able to interact in garden visits and informal discussions including Trish Bartleet in Auckland and Philip Blakely in Queenstown
  • • Executive Officer of the New Zealand Gardens Trust, Liz Morrow, will join us at her 18-acre coastal garden Omaio, a Maori name meaning 'place of peace and tranquillity'
  • • Auckland architect Ron Sang, will welcome us to his private residence, the garden of which was designed by Ted Smyth, one of New Zealand's most influential and respected landscape architects
  • • Many garden visits will be hosted by their owners, including Mincher, Woodbridge and Ayrlies Gardens near Auckland, the magical Winterhome and Carolyn Fereby's Barewood gardens in the Marlborough region and Oakley Garden near New Plymouth
  • • Meet with the curators of New Zealand's major public gardens and discuss their work with them
  • • Visit some of New Zealand's most magnificent regional parks and nature reserves, such as the Waitakere Ranges Regional Park and the breathtaking Fiordland National Park
  • • Cruise on awesome Milford Sound, and explore the South Island's unique fauna and flora with experts
  • • Be inspired by a number of New Zealand's most interesting modern houses and gardens, recognised in National architectural awards
  • • Enjoy the fresh local produce of New Zealand's wine regions, with visits to vineyards for tours, wine tasting and delicious meals!

Overnight Auckland (4 nights) • New Plymouth (3 nights) • Blenheim (3 nights) • Greymouth (1 nights) • Lake Moeraki (2 nights) • Queenstown (3 nights) • Milford Sound (1 night) • Queenstown (1 night).

Visits include NORTH ISLAND Brick Bay Sculpture Trail • Omaio Garden • Woodbridge Garden • Mincher Garden • Waitakare Ranges • Hynds Garden by Trish Bartleet in Piha • Ayrlies Garden • Auckland Botanic Gardens • Epsom Residence and Garden • Hamilton Botanic Gardens • Mt Egmont National Park • Waiau Estate Winery • Pukekura Park • Pukeiti Garden • Oakley Garden • Puke Ariki Museum SOUTH ISLAND Allan Scott Winery • London Hill Garden • Winterhome Garden • Barewood Garden • Moritaki Garden • Upton Oaks Garden • Hortensia Garden • Cruise on Marlborough's River Queen • Fox Glacier • Lake Moeraki • Stuart Garden • Arrowtown • private gardens in Queenstown with Blakely Wallace Associates • Blair Garden • Milford Sound

Guest Lecturers/Landscape Architects

Guest Lecturer: Auckland

Trish Bartleet is one of the most original and confident landscape designers in Auckland. She has worked on various projects over the years in tandem with different architects, and has a reputation for creating edgy gardens that challenge convention. From her background working in art and fashion and from her interest in design, Trish became fascinated by how plants can be used to create combinations of patterns and textures that lead to a visual reaction. Her gardens display a New Zealand identity and she uses a lot of natives in her designs, highlighting their form and texture through an innovative use of materials and structural planting with distinctive contrasting combinations. Trish is also passionate about travel, which offers her a great source of inspiration. A favourite is the Chaumont Garden Festival in France's Loire Valley, which is synonymous with showcasing groundbreaking trends.

Guest Lecturer: Arrowtown & Queenstown

Philip Blakely, an award-winning landscape architect and partner at Blakely Wallace Associates based in Arrowtown, 20 km from Queenstown. On winning two gold awards at the New Zealand Institute of Landscape Architects Resene Pride of Place Landscape Awards, Philip said of his team “One of our key strengths is to plan and design developments so that they relate to their site and context, yet are visually appealing and highly functional.”

About the Tour

Join John Patrick, landscape architect and presenter for ABC's Gardening Australia, on a tour of New Zealand's extraordinary variety of gardens: public and private, panoramic and intimate, formal, semi-tropical and native. For 80 million years New Zealand was geographically isolated from the rest of the world. This explains the uniqueness of islands' indigenous flora which developed in isolation from the ancient flora of Gondwanaland (the great continent from which New Zealand, Australia, Africa, South America and the sub-continent, etc, emerged) or from the few species that somehow arrived across the oceans from elsewhere. This unique development on the North Island was influenced, in part, by volcanic activity, which produced rich soils. The islands' unique mountain topography (the south island is dominated by an alpine spine), its distinctive temperate climate, its rich soils and endemic vegetation, have molded the identity of both its Maori and European populations, expressed, in part, in how New Zealanders have gardened their new homeland. These unique features have, for example, confronted gardeners with interesting choices such as whether or not to perpetuate European gardening traditions, to reject them completely, or to create fascinating syntheses between inherited forms and inventions borne of interactions between European memory and an unfamiliar environment.

On this tour we trace New Zealand's diverse gardening traditions that were shaped by its exceptional environment, and fine examples of the country's unique flora, at notable gardens. These include Mincher, Woodbridge and Ayrlies Garden near Auckland, and, in the Marlborough region, the magical Winterhome and Barewood gardens. In New Plymouth we visit Pukeiti, considered New Zealand's premier rhododendron garden set in a 320-hectare rainforest property on the volcanic slopes of Mount Taranaki. Enhancing our program is the opportunity to meet with some of New Zealand's leading landscape architects who will introduce us to their gardens, including Robert Watson in Christchurch and Trish Bartleet in Auckland. On the Takatu peninsula to the north of Auckland, Executive Officer of the New Zealand Gardens Trust, Liz Morrow, will join us at her 18-acre coastal garden Omaio, a Maori name meaning 'place of peace and tranquillity'. In Auckland we will visit the residence of Ron Sang, the garden of which was designed by Ted Smyth, one of New Zealand's most eminent landscape architects. Philip Blakely of Blakely Wallace Associates will accompany the group on visits to some of his company's latest projects in the Queenstown area.

We shall also explore New Zealand's awesome wilderness along the beautiful Tasman Coast, enjoy an overnight cruise on Milford Sound, and pass the magnificent Fox Glacier in Westland's National Park. A special feature of the tour is our 2-night stay at Lake Moeraki Wilderness Lodge, where local specialists will introduce native forest plants and the Fiordland Crested Penguins. The tour also visits historic towns like Queenstown, important museums, and some of New Zealand's best wineries where we shall savour the country's new pinots!

* Above image: Mount Taranaki, Courtesy of NZ Tourist Board

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