'Titiro whakamuri, kōkiri whakamura' 
'When you understand the past, you know your future'

Welcome to
Taonga Tauranga | Heritage Bay of Plenty 

We are the leading heritage voice in the community
towards establishing ​curated museums and ceremonial Heritage Centres 
​in Tauranga city for local, regional and national interest 

Photograph acknowledgement: The Elms, Tauranga City Libraries, NZ History

Introduction
We are an independent heritage group working towards developing a Bay of Plenty Heritage Strategy in conjunction with tangata whenua and our local and regional heritage community, including councils.  Our ultimate goal is to raise the heritage profile generally, address missing aspects of it within in our region,  then connect the sector together locally, regionally and in turn nationall. 

Te Papa Tauranga Historic Area | Precinct:  One of the goals under the strategy is the establishment of an Historic Precinct for Tauranga under a Listing at Heritage New Zealand.  This work is in process.

We also support purpose built heritage educational experiences at The Elms Te Papa and at Gate Pā Tauranga (opposite historic St George's Anglican Church) to commemorate the Battles of Gate Pā, Te Ranga and the New Zealand Land Wars. We fully support the enormous amount of ongoing work done by others towards achieving these collective goals.
 
We are now enjoying strong levels of community support and partnership from within the local and regional historic/heritage sector, the business sector interested in supporting heritage and relevant council departments. ​This is a significant step forward for history and heritage in Tauranga and our region.

The chronological history of a museum in Tauranga ​

1873   First recorded museum collection on display at Mechanics Institute,
          Harington Street
1881   Disaster strikes - the Institute and collection are destroyed by fire
1882   Museum exhibition opens, including 100 Taonga from Captain Gilbert
          Mair
1906   Mechanics Institute becomes a public library
1938   Collection on display in Town Hall, Willow Street
1941   Collection goes into hiding during WWII
1969   New museum opens on the corner of Durham and Hamilton
​          Streets
1975   Collection expands at Tauranga Historic Village and District Museum
1998   Collection goes into storage - where it remains to this day
2019   The Heritage Collection turns 50
​2020+ Lets start planning our iconic Heritage Centre & Museum in
          Tauranga's historic precinct ay Otamataha Pā!

FROM APRIL TO JUNE EACH YEAR WE COMMEMORATE
​
​THE BATTLES OF GATE PĀ and TE RUNGA

read more here

​Victory at Gate Pā? 

Taonga Tauranga supports the continuing work honouring the Battles of Gate Pā and Te Ranga, both significant events during the New Zealand Wars period (1840-1864) which led to widespread land confiscation resulting in the historic Anglican Apology of 1 December 2018 at the Otamataha Pā site, Cliff Road, Tauranga. See our page here

Victory at Gate Pā?  - the book

Take a heritage tour with Buddy Mikaere

​The recently released book ​Victory at Gate Pā? by historians Buddy Mikaere 
​and Dr Cliff Simons is an outstanding explanatory read. Available here​.  

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Take an inspirational tour with historian Buddy Mikaere from Taiao Events on the integrated powerful history of The Elms, Gate Pa and Te Ranga.
​For more information click here and fill in the form provided or ring Buddy on:
​+64 21 384 620

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Taonga - our treasure
Taonga are not just artefacts but also the abundant natural resources such as our rivers, our seabed, our coastline, the Kaimai range and the abundant fauna and flora that flourish within our region:  read more about Taonga here.

Photograph acknowledgement: Battle of Gate Pā, The Gate Pa Charitable Trust, Dave Tipper courtesy Tauranga City Libraries