POWERCO TARANAKI GARDEN SPECTACULAR

To celebrate its 25th year as a garden festival, every day of the 10-day Festival running from October 26 to November 4 will have events planned for garden loving visitors coming to see the 51 private and public gardens open for the Festival.

In the Newstalk ZB Garden Speaker series, six local experts talk about everything from the wonders of the clivia flowering plant to attracting native birds into your garden as well as creating colourful hanging baskets.

“Frocks on Bikes” invites women to join the international movement by wearing their favourite frock, jumping on their bike and pedalling with similar “frocktober” lovers to Wintringham Garden for bubbles, nibbles and the smooth sounds of jazz singer Barbara Crow.

The “Secret Dining” event in a private “guesterant” has already sold out so visitors are urged to go online and secure their place at an event of their choice says Festival Manager, Lisa Ekdahl.

“It’s all about fun in the Spring sun this year as we celebrate our 25th anniversary,” says Ms. Ekdahl.
“A really special free attraction open every day and evening during the Festival will be the Peranakan Lights display in Pukekura Park. This fusion of South East Asian cultures is a magical must see particularly in the evening.”

The Lights are spectacular illuminated shapes of flowers, spheres and cones featuring designs by the artistically renowned Peranakan culture of South East Asia. It will be the first time more than 50 of the Peranakan Lights are exhibited in Australasia and the second showing world-wide after first wowing crowds at the Singapore Formula One Grand Prix earlier in the year.

Created from a collaboration between Singaporean artist Sarah Martin and Italian artist Paolo Maimone, the Lights are inflated, illuminated shapes screen printed with designs of traditional Peranakan art - renowned for its rich and opulent designs in ceramics, embroidery, screen-printing and architecture.

The Peranakan Lights is this year’s unique Landscape Design Project supported with funding from the TSB Community Trust and power generation company Agrekko.

The Lights will be installed in New Plymouth’s Pukekura Park in the area known as the Brooklands Lawn.
But the main attraction is the 51 spectacular gardens including 11 Gardens of Significance as rated by the New Zealand Gardens Trust.

Ranging from the sub-tropical to the sub-alpine, and from the ornamental to the oriental, the gardens are spread right around Taranaki with the greatest garden of them all at this heart, Mt Taranaki and the Egmont National Park.
While each private garden is hosted by the owner themselves – a number of the public gardens have scheduled guided walks to learn about their unique history and diversity of flora.

For more information, visit www.gardenfestnz.co.nz or enquiries@gardenfestnz.co.nz