Potter Children's Garden Mythological Maze of Maui - Auckland Botanic Gardens

In 2004 Jill Rice was invited to be landscape architect for the Potter Children’s Garden, a new garden for children at the Auckland Botanic Gardens. The objective was to provide a garden where children could learn through participation about plants and the environment. Stage One of the garden was opened in 2005 by HRS the Prince of Wales. It has become an extremely popular garden for families to visit, with learning experiences designed around the theme of the relationship between the puriri, kereru and puriri moth. Part of this garden was featured as an exhibit at the Ellerslie Flower Show in November 2004 where it won a Gold Award. The show garden was a maze, or journey of discovery, relevant to the garden’s theme, and based around the story in which Maui takes on the form of kereru in order to follow his mother and in so doing finds out who his father is. The “Mythological Maze of Maui” is now the “secret space” within the garden, is great fun for children and caters well to New Zealand’s bicultural perspective. A book Jill designed is included in the garden, laser printed into plywood with a woven copper cover that tells the story in both Maori and English.

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