Inhabit Project  

Final harvest at Ngakinga

Images from yesterday mornings natural dye workshop amongst the flowers.

On Sunday I unfurled myself from our home in Mangawhai, the sacred space of my mums passing, and drove to the garden thats held so much of my grief over the last year. As broken as I was, it felt important to put my feet back in the soil at Ngakinga. The tears flowed, the people came and we hosted a morning natural dye workshop amongst the flowers. The story of the garden; of grief, failure, compost and worms, flew on banners I have been making over these last few months. Hot

Inhabit, Iteration 4; Ngakinga March 2025-March 2026 Tend To Tender Not, 2026 Redline cloth nappy, dyed with Black Knight Scabiosa grown at Ngakinga and sewn with wool felt. Photograph by Holli McEntegart

Inhabit, Iteration 4; Ngakinga March 2025-March 2026 How Comfortable I’ve Become With Grieving, 2026 Redline cloth nappy, dyed with Coreopsis grown at Ngakinga and sewn with wool felt. Photograph by Holli McEntegart

Inhabit, Iteration 4; Ngakinga March 2025-March 2026 Pollen and Potential, 2026 Redline cloth nappy, dyed with Coreopsis grown at Ngakinga and sewn with wool felt. Photograph by Holli McEntegart

Inhabit Iteration 4; NgakingaPapa ki Awataha in Northcote, Tāmaki Makaurau. Image 1, March 2025 Image 2, February 2026 Photographed by Petra Leary @petraleary We are approaching our final month here. Grieving, mothering, growing, making.Down on the whenua. We lay it all and compost it back into love. We acknowledge Mana Whenua as the kaitaiki of this land, and their tupuna past, present, and emerging. 🖤🤍❤️@uruwhakaaro #socialpractice #naturaldye #taiao

Yesterday I cried in the garden for the first time in a while, (if you know me/this project you will know that I cry here a lot 😂) Over the weekend many of the giant sunflowers have been cut down and someone has ripped the largest Hue off the vine. It was grown from seed and gifted to us by Pacific Vision Aotearoa (PVA). This Hue was such a taonga. Not to be harvested until the air has cooled and the skin is hard. To be held with ritual, intention and care. I’ve been talking

On Saturday we held our first full natural dye workshop at Ngakinga. It was huge day of tending to our sweet flowers and feeding the soil, worms and roots. The sunflowers stood to attention and smiled down from their towering height approvingly (I believe). Dye baths of yellow coreopsis and black knight scabiosa turned fabric to hues of blue and gold. After such a long, wet, muddy, raw and uncomfortable growth journey over the last 10 months, I’m struck by the audacity of wha

Had a team of harvesting hands today to gather blooms before the rain and tested out the newly dyed nappies before I start sewing. These are dyed with the black knight scabiosa and coreopsis that I harvested last week. Kitchen is overflowing!

The banners that flutter on washing lines strung across the garden are made from old red line flat nappies hand dyed in my kitchen with natural dye made from food sources; Irish breakfast tea, blueberries, turmeric, onion skins, avocados… Sewn with wool felt, they speak to the invisible labour of care work inside and outside the home. The next banners will be dyed with colour we have grown at Ngakinga. They will tell the story of the garden. Of caring for the whenua; a collab

Ngakinga is in bloom. The bees and the worms are at work. Flowers are reaching for the sun and shapeshifting daily. Today we hung washing lines to Install our drying artworks that tell the story of the garden. It’s a long and winding one full of care, grief, compost, connection and letting go. 🌻🌱🌸 Tomorrow is our first full natural dye workshop, only a couple of spots left for this (book via link in bio) but you’re welcome to come along to help harvest and learn about the

And here we are. After 10 months of digging, composting, planting, feeling, growing, grieving, replanting and watering. We are harvesting. My kitchen is filled with pots of simmering colour. Fabric soaking and transforming. Telling the story of the garden and all the labour it took to get here. As always, taiao is in control and we will be busy following its lead. Harvesting as the blooms bloom and unfolding as needed. Come join us on the 18th for a day of harvesting and stir

Early on Christmas morning I went to water the garden before heading north and so many blooms were blooming after the rain! I had to quickly harvest as many as I could and make first two dye vats. Black Scabiosa🪻gives a deep purple dye that can be altered to blue and green hues by changing the Ph balance of the water with backing soda. And Coreopsis gives all the yellows, deep orca to a buttery lemon 🌼 Our next workshop in the garden is January 18th, sign up via the Inhabit

We gathered for our first flower hammer printing workshop yesterday morning. The blooms were blooming. The sun was shining. The hammers were cathartic 😆 and the experimental nature of pulling colours out of plants was in full effect! Such a fun morning. @uruwhakaaro @northartnz

Had a beautiful morning with the Birkenhead Playcenter this week. 20 sets of hands on the whenua. Tending tending tending. Tiny watering cans and tiny fingers pressing sunflower seeds into the soil.

We had a sweet sign painting hui on Sunday, asking the community to be as kind as poss to the plants that are doing their very best to grow in conditions that aren’t particularly favourable - floods, road run off, pollution, unwell soil thats only slowly coming alive again - all of these things are contributing to the slow growth of our plants and the general health of the garden. Interesting how none of us thrive when the conditions aren’t good for all eh… 🧐 It felt good to