MEDIA RELEASE For immediate release 23 August 2007

Still Blooming After All These Years

Broadcaster and gardening enthusiast Maggie Barry will launch ‘Heritage Gardens - A Spring Festival’ at the Begonia House in the Botanic Gardens on Saturday 1 September, right on the dot for the first day of spring.

A surprising number of heritage gardens still exist in the Wellington region and have been discovered by members of the Wellington Region Heritage Promotion Council while preparing the programme for this year’s festival.

Heritage Month is usually held in June, but it was decided to extend this year’s programme to cover the months of September, October and November, when gardens in New Zealand are in full bloom.

A brochure outlining the full list of activities for the Hutt Valley, Porirua, Kapiti, the Wairarapa and Wellington is available at i-SITE visitor centres and libraries in all regions. View the full programme at www.wellingtonheritagepromotions.org.nz

Highlights include:) • Tour of the Hutt Minoh Friendship House, a centre for Japanese language and culture, plus a Japanese Cherry Blossom Festival with demonstrations of a tea ceremony, dancing and ikebana. • A visit to ‘Hollycroft’, a formal garden that holds one of the last two remaining natives forest on the Upper Valley floor - one of many open days at heritage gardens in the Upper Hutt agea. • Garden visits in the Kapiti area include Bixley House in Te Horo, an enormous native bush area that includes a totara that is 500-600 years old and has been described by DOC as ‘amazing’. • A guided tour of the Gear Homestead, including the historic gardens and the Woolshed Potters’ rooms. • Secret Valley Project - lectures and guided walks to a native garden in the Waimapehi Stream, once a rubbish dump, now a special community asset in the centre of Pukerua. • Walks on the Wild Side - the Karori Sanctuary will bring alive some of New Zealand’s native plants and exotic arrivals in a series of three guided walks. • Live Cinema! Growing Dahlias: gardens, garden fetes and stately homes - an hour-long selection of colour-filled films from the NZ Film Archive’s collections.

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