Te Papa external view. Photograph by Michael Hall. Te Papa

Our buildingsKo ō mātou whare

Te Papa is a landmark building in the heart of Wellington. It’s an engineering feat, rich with symbolism, and accessible to all.

A colourful stage within a room with sunlight through coloured windows bathing the room in shades of blue and purple

Te Marae o Te Papa Tongarewa: Rongomaraeroa

Rongomaraeroa is a unique marae (meeting place) within Aotearoa New Zealand. Like all marae, it is founded on Māori principles of kawa (marae protocol) and tikanga (cultural practices) it was created for our unique museum context as a contemporary marae acknowledging the whakapapa (ancestral history) and the taonga (treasures) of all peoples who call Aotearoa New Zealand home.

A large building that has oddly shaped walls photographed at dusk. There are three flags outside the entrance.

Te Papa’s main building: Engineering facts

What sets our building apart? Just how many base isolators support us? How many rugby fields could you fit inside Te Papa?

The three boulders on our forecourt

The three boulders outside the main entrance symbolise our commitment to New Zealand’s land and people.

A man in a red top is pointing at a very tall wooden carving. He is describing something to the man crouched next to two small children.

Waharoa at Te Papa – Gateways to Aotearoa New Zealand

The three main waharoa (gateways) at Te Papa are significant and special to our museum in several ways.

Stories hidden in our building

There are millions of stories contained within the walls of Te Papa – some of them literally! Pete Bossley, who was Design Director at Jasmax Architects when they designed and built Te Papa, takes us on a tour of the building to reveal some of the lesser-known facts.

A wall of brightly coloured windows with a reflection of another building on the bottom windsows.

Coloured glass panels by Milan Mrkusich

If you have walked along Cable Street in Wellington you will have seen one of the largest artworks at Te Papa. Two stories high, and running the length of the building, the work is by the artist Milan Mrkusich (1925–2018).

Two young children have their hands on a big black ball made of stone set in a stone box. The ball has water on it.

The spinning ball in the main entrance

The spinning ball in our entrance is the oldest material in Te Papa as the rock it’s made from is 1.4 billion years old.

A white and yellow building with cars parked in front of it.

Our other buildings

A lot of work happens at our Tory Street facility including research, documentation, digitsation, curatorial authoring, and development of our taonga (treasures) knowledge of Aotearoa New Zealand.

Jars of fish on a long shelf with hundreds of fish in jars

Te Papa receives funding for new storage facility

Thu 19 May 2022

Te Papa has been allocated $42.9 million in Budget 2022 to create a new storage and research facility that will house part of New Zealand’s natural history collection.

Press release He pānui pāpāho

Halting the jolts: How Te Papa resists earthquakes

How did Te Papa survive the Kaikoura earthquake nearly unscathed?

Putting the pieces back together after the earthquake

In 2016 an earthquake shook Wellington awake. Out of our two million collection objects, only nine were damaged. Here, conservation intern Charlotte Jimenez explains the intricate process of restoring one of them.

Quake Braker

Go underground to see the amazing Kiwi innovation that ‘puts the brakes on’ in an earthquake.

On now

Permanent exhibition

Exhibition Ngā whakaaturanga

A photo of the forecourt of Te Papa with four concrete blocks lined up. Each of the blocks has a mirrored-glass rectangle at different positions on each.

Four plinths on the forecourt

The Collin Post 4 Plinths Project next to our forecourt is managed by The Wellington Sculpture Trust. The current project is Merging Blocks (2024) by Sabine Marcelis. It consists of four large boxes created out of coloured and mirrored glass, which vary in proportion and orientation.

This link will take you to The Wellington Sculpture Trust website.