Arty Auckland

I think I have had enough to say - too much say some sports fans - on the subject of just how - excessively say some - arty and crafty is the city of Auckland. Well just in case you feel the creativity is restricted to the city centre and notorious K Road, come with me on a little open studio tour of the western suburbs of Auckland. 

The painter, sculptors, potters and fashion designers opened their studios on the  mountains and foothills of the Waitakere Ranges. 

I spent eight hours of last Sunday aboard a bus for a tour of the studios, which was organised by Auckland City Council and the Corban Estate Arts Centre in Henderson. 

The offices and one of the galleries of the Corban Estate Arts Centre 

One of the members of Studio 37 - Pottery Studio Oratia at her wheel.

I couldn't leave this gorgeous cat Kylix in their studio and bought it for feline felicitation. 

Korean couple Sang Shoi Sim and Kuem Sun Lee create their masterpieces with a mix of traditional and contemporary design in their garden studio high in the Henderson hills.

The couple's pottery studio gives a glimpse of three of their gigantic urns drying bearing the incised decoration that has become the hallmark of their award winning work.

Again I clambered back to the bus, down their precipitous driveway, with a lucky find 
- a magnificent example of Sang's mastery of an old Korean engraving technique called sanggam.  My good fortune was to find this pot with a small flaw among the Seconds .

I was delighted to meet Award winning designer Sandra Tupu who shares studio spaces in a rambling old house in Oratia with affable painter Jim Ellis. Her Tatau range is part of her Flying Fox Designs Menswear and the gracious mix of samoan dress and bushwear works - winning the Supreme Award and Runnerup at Westfield's Pasifika Fashion Awards in 2010.

Sea Lady by Monique Endt. Monique's studio in Oratia is set in a beautiful garden

The garden and aboretum is the masterpiece of Monique's sister and is known as Landsendt

Sunday afternoon music at the studio and gallery of  Kiwi Valley, Henderson Valley

At the Kiwi Valley Studio, I was delighted by this Bird Boat birdbath in the garden. 

The historic old church on the Corban Estate is an art gallery nowadays.

An exclamation to rest one's laurels on. The tour ended in front of Corban Estate Art Centre.