Kaputī: A welcome home in a cup

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Having a cup of tea is something I grew up associating with love and connection. One of my earliest tea memories is of my grandfather, lighting an afternoon fire with his billy hung above it, after a day out on the land cutting back gorse. He threw in a handful of tea leaves and a sprig of mānuka and let it simmer.

Other early tea memories include him delivering my grandmother a cup of tea in bed each morning. Our kuia and aunties at the kitchen table, laughing, talking, writing letters to the government. Growing up between two worlds, tea was central to coming together and making things happen.

This kaupapa is activated from personal experience and lives through the community that supports it and continues to inform the direction it takes.

From enduring the breastfeeding years through the extended “lockdowns” in Tāmaki Makaurau came a vision for how I wanted to raise my tamariki and nurture my business, grounded in a creative community – I called it the Whanganui dream.

Being part of an international City of Design means I am connected to a network of creatives developing our ideas in concert. The UNESCO accolade is the antidote to the competitive and extractive energy of money-driven economies, because design drives our local economy. The creative headspace I have gained from basing my business here is priceless.

I am guided by my whakapapa. My tūpuna Māori are far north, hard, Ngāti Kurī. However, my English ancestor, Richard Taylor, was a linguist and missionary based in Whanganui during the formative years of our Tirititanga. He was a fluent speaker of te reo Māori. His descendant, my grandfather, the sculptor Peter Nicholls, was raised here, and my grandmother, Di ffrench, has a work, Opera on the Whanganui, currently on display at Te Whare o Rehua. It feels full circle to have my tamariki at Te Kura Kaupapa Māori o Te-Atihaunui-a-Pāpārangi, in Pūtiki, where their ancestors lived and worked. With Kaputī headquarters based in the historic Whanganui Chronicle building on Drews Ave, we’re living the Whanganui dream.

Learn more about the source of inspiration for Kaputī Studio: kaputistudio.co.nz