A look at the Island Bay village streetscape design

Completed in November 2024, the upgrade occurred over four years with 10 months of construction, with the goal of improving access, increasing safety, and strengthening the suburb's special identity.

The community let the Council know they wanted to see connective, welcoming and green spaces that celebrated Island Bay’s unique character. 

Island Bay was named for Motu Tapu-te-Ranga, and pre-colonisation had been home to Māori pā, kainga and grounds situated around the bay, the valley flat and the hills. Like the Māori before them, settlers went to fish the natural, sheltered harbour of Island Bay, with a fishing community emerging from Shetland Islander and Italian fishermen and their families who came to live in the area. 

Later, farmlets sprung up around the area, and Island Bay became a popular seaside holiday resort – where people could enjoy a day at the beach and take tea at the Kai Toa or Blue Platter Tearooms. Punters could also go to the horse races at the local racecourse! 

The 1905 electric tramline connected Island Bay with the city and people built houses in droves, transforming Island Bay into a growing seaside suburb.

Today, Island Bay’s distinct history is woven through the suburb, where you’ll find descendants of the Shetland and Italian fishing families alongside a rich Catholic community, and those who connect to the extended whānau of Tapu Te Ranga Marae.

Read on to learn about how the history made it’s way into the design.

The design elements

New artwork

Murals were created to bring vibrancy to the area. These works were completed by artists Gina Kiel on the public toilet block and Greta Menzies in the pedestrian laneway between Island Bay School and the parade.  

Greta Menzies worked with children at Island Bay and St Francis de Sales Schools to create a colourful fun mural that children could see on their daily walks to school. 

Gina Kiel brought her distinct style to create a curvilinear design that evokes the coastal, shifting environment on an overlooked building.

Gardens 

The Council planted coastal vegetation endemic to the coastal valley area in the garden beds, ensuring these natives will thrive in the seaside environment. 

Rocks were put around the plantings to evoke the nearby coastal and cliff environments. The chosen plants were New Zealand sedge and silver tussock grasses, with the ‘Red Rocks’ coprosma creating an aesthetic like the coastal dunescape on the South Coast.

Street furniture 

The existing bus shelter was the perfect blank canvas to share glimpses into the character of Island Bay as a fishing village, its local, maritime and transport histories, and the people that created them. Community members chose archival images to print as vinyl overlays onto the shelter, and the Council team worked with local families to carefully select and lay out images of family members, tūpuna, and the surrounding landscape.

As a lot of the pavement was re-done on both sides of the street, the team incorporated colourful play stencils depicting local marine life outside the library and childcare centre, and original tramline rails that used to run down The Parade to indicate the early suburb’s transport history. 

The Council also wanted to include the words of people who knew and loved Island Bay, and were lucky to receive permissions to include excerpts of poetic and literary works, alongside a whakatauākī to engrave into the pavement.

Here are some of the words that can be seen across The Parade.

“Ko te ringa tangata i hanga i te whare, ko te tuarā o te whare i whakatipu i te tangata.”
Bruce Hirini Stewart (Ngāti Kirihaka, Waitaha ā-Hei) writer and rangitira of Tapu te Ranga Marae

The sun went on streaming down, a cicada sang in the grass.
A dog barked somewhere. Another tram rumbled by.
Excerpt from Our Street 1950, by academic and author Brian Sutton-Smith
 
Old sea wall was a statue of a wall, warm and gritty. The air is rough and blue. 
Excerpt from The Sea Walks into a Wall 2021, by poet and novelist Anne Kennedy
 
…their oars will be lifted in dusk, light-feathered
As wings of terns, that dip into dream, coming back blue
Excerpt from The Beaches VII, Houses by the Sea 1939, by writer and poet Robin Hyde
 
Fisherman’s silver fingers, fumbling the nets:
And the island lies behind them
Excerpt from The Beaches VII, Houses by the Sea 1939, by writer and poet Robin Hyde

To find out more about the Island Bay Village upgrade, visit our website.