“In front of an old villa in Whanganui, a wildflower garden flourishes where a large area of concrete had been removed and the existing lawn levelled.”
We were stoked to have writer Phil Thomsen from New Zealand Gardener (Kaingaki Māra) magazine stop by the Black Pine studio towards the end of summer for a chat and to take some photos of our wildflower garden for their April 2026 print edition.
ICYMI: towards the end of 2025 we decided to transform our front lawn by experimenting with a re-wilding project, and the results have been well beyond what we anticipated; you can read the background here, or just check out the before/after comparison here.
As this is being written — in May 2026, on the cusp of winter and with the garden still remarkably abundant with colour and life — the number of people who stop on the street for a look, smell, and to snap a picture continues to surprise us. But, as is alluded to in the article, that’s the value of public beauty: it costs very little, but spreads so much joy.
When you have people take the time to knock on the door to say “thank you” for doing something positive and for brightening up their day, that’s quite an emotional thing. There’s no doubt this experiment has brought us closer to the community, and we’re grateful for all the beautiful people the garden has helped us connect with.
The article picks up on this with an indirect reference to the Living Building Challenge and Black Pine’s broader ethos in which “their team believes architecture doesn’t stop at the walls of the house or business. Rather, it spills onto the surrounding landscape, shaping how we live, breathe, and connect with both nature and each other.”
We reckon that sums it up nicely.
We don’t know what the lawn will look like in six months or a year’s time, but hopefully we’ve literally sown the seeds of something that will keep growing and spreading and have lasting benefits; we’ve certainly collected and given away enough bags of seeds to create some epic gardens across the city!
