Fresh from the Field – Puna Kōrero – by Unitec School of Creative Industries

4 months ago by

For June & July we are focusing on Design & Te Ao Māori on the Design Assembly website – featuring interviews with Māori designers, project features spotlighting their work & design processes, to thought leadership articles that inspire and challenge the Aotearoa NZ Design community. 

Connecting the local community to the whenua and puna of Te Whare Wananga o Wairaka. The Puna Kōrero project brought the exterior of Te Noho Kotahitanga marae to life over Matariki and looks to disseminate place-based knowledge and narratives as the ecosystem changes over time due to urban intensification. 

Fresh from the Field is a weekly article series sharing fresh and inspiring work from the Design Assembly community. Want to submit your work to Fresh From The Field? Fill out the form here.


The Brief

The current and former campus areas of Te Whare Wananga o Wairaka (Unitec – Te Pūkenga) are undergoing massive change because of the Carrington Residential Development, an urban intensification project that will eventually account for tens of thousands of new residents and visitors in this area. Puna (stream or waterways) nurture life in and around their flow paths, but they are also vulnerable to the negative consequences of the prevailing urban development paradigm. Many puna traverse the campus, connecting it with other parts of the Albert Eden local board area and beyond.

The brief was to develop a project to engage staff, students and local communities in meaningful ways with the whenua (land) and puna (pool/spring) of Te Whare Wananga o Wairaka, so as to facilitate positive experiences of te taiao while educating the public about the cultural and ecological significance of this place. 

The Design Response

In responding to the brief, we developed two design outputs which were launched as part of Unitec’s 2024 Matariki celebration:

  1. An Animated Projection Mapping Experience on the Architectural Surfaces of Te Noho Kotahitanga Marae
  2. Content Development and Launch of a Mobile App for Campus-Based Digital Storytelling.
Photo: Matt Crawford Photography

Design Output 1: Puna Kōrero Drawing and Animation Projection Mapping

Facilitated by Emma Smith and Hohepa Renata with the support of Tanya White, Leon Tan and Peeti Lamwilai, students from Te Kura Kaupapa Māori o Ngā Maungarongo and Unitec School of Creative Industries were introduced to some of the key visual narratives of the wharenui of Te Noho Kotahitanga marae and invited to create drawings in response to these visual narratives as well as the surrounding natural environment.

Photo: Peeti Lamwilai
Image of students from Te Kura Kaupapa Māori o Ngā Maungarongo and Unitec School of Creative Industries creating drawings in response to visual narratives at the marae.
Photo: Peeti Lamwilai
Image of students from Te Kura Kaupapa Māori o Ngā Maungarongo and Unitec School of Creative Industries creating drawings in response to visual narratives at the marae.
Photo: Peeti Lamwilai

Drawings from this collaborative workshop were then developed into animation sequences by Peeti Lamwilai and Bachelor of Design and Contemporary Art (BDCA) students, Marina Fepulea’i, Oleana Lavea and Samantha Waddell. These animated sequences were projection-mapped onto the wharenui exterior surface during the Matariki celebration event programme. The goal was to bring the marae exterior to life with the expressions of the children and young people who live and study here, who are the future of this place.

Image of Puna Kōrero app on phone
Photo: Cris de Groot

Design Output 2: Puna Kōrero App

Developed by Cris de Groot and Bachelor of Design and Contemporary Arts (BDCA) students, Anahera Van Leeuwen and Stephen Liu with the support of Tanya White, Marama Haines-Te Whare, Hohepa Renata, Daisy Bentley-Gray and Leon Tan, the Puna Kōrero App seeks to make knowledge from and about the whenua and place more accessible to the public. The mobile app prototype initially tells feature-rich (audio, video, photo, text) stories of 6 locations, including wahi tapu, within the campus domain. Depending on funding, this app may allow for GPS-triggered content delivery. The longer-term goal is to develop this into a platform for disseminating place-based knowledge and narratives as the ecosystem changes over time due to urban intensification. 

Puna Kōrero Website:

https://www.unitec.ac.nz/about-us/matariki-celebration-puna-k-rero

Project Team:

Leon Tan

Tanya White

Hohepa Renata

Marama Haines-Te Whare

Daisy Bentley-Gray

Te Kura Kaupapa Māori o Nga Maungarongo

Emma Smith

Peeti Lamwilai

Marina Fepulea’i

Oleana Lavea 

Samantha Waddell

Cris de Groot

Anahera Van Leeuwen

Stephan Liu

Michael Craven 

Project Partners

Albert-Eden Local Board

Te Kura Kaupapa Māori o Nga Maungarongo 



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