Living Building Challenge® projects are rare in the world, so it’s extraordinary that there are two projects that aspire to ‘full living certification’ in the Wellington region: Waitapu within the Pā Reo development project at Te Wānanga o Raukawa (TWoR) in Ōtaki and the Living Pā at Te Herenga Waka (THW) Marae, Victoria University of Wellington in Wellington City.

This week, THW Living Pā whānau joined wānanga teams in Ōtaki to reconnect (we have a rich history) and to connect as a living buildings’ hapori (community) sharing a similar experience. We are both on a journey to cement our founding principles, to build facilities that speak to what we do, and that have unique capacity to shift and uplift mindsets.

The meetings were also an opportunity to test theories, compare metrics, learn from each other, and explore potential research opportunities, such as those initiated in ‘He Pā Mataora’.  This research project, funded by National Science Challenges, is designed to help te whānau o Te Herenga Waka to explore the challenges we, and other Māori communities, face to live, learn and work more sustainably by focusing on four pātaka, or knowledge storehouses: tikanga, te reo, ako and taiao.

Thank you to our TWoR hosts and for Ewan (from Tennent Brown) for setting up the construction site visit.  It was such a nice thing to see how LBC imperatives – around ‘place’, waste diversion, community connection, etc. – align with how the wānanga works. We are excited to have mates in the ‘Challenge’.