A Dunedin museum turned one wall's budget into a room inside the harbour

Toitū Otago Settlers Museum, part of Dunedin City Council, wanted a permanent experience about Dunedin Harbour; Te Taki Haruru, the council's Māori strategic framework, guided the brief, and Aukaha was engaged to work with mana whenua.

Spend the same hardware budget enveloping the visitor instead of facing them with one screen — a harbour journey told backwards to the waters' earliest birdsong.

Blue Alchemy Labs acted as client contact, project manager and executive producer, designing the room and its projection, playback and show-control systems; early visualisations used the wake of a waka as the visual language to convince the council a whole-room experience fit the existing budget. Five Panasonic laser projectors with ultra-short-throw lenses cover floor and walls, Dataton WATCHOUT runs playback, Medialon Showmaster fires fog and haptic seating on cue, and S1T2 and Colour Theory Co developed content alongside mana whenua, who shaped the narrative, approved the visual style, supplied audio and signed off at every stage.

The permanent installation debuted on 28 August 2026 with a blessing ceremony; museum director Cam McCracken called it visually and technically sophisticated without letting technology overwhelm the stories. No visitor figures are reported yet.

Te Awa – River of Many Journeys opened as a permanent immersive installation at Toitū Otago Settlers Museum in Dunedin, New Zealand, on 28 August 2026. Visitors take a floor-to-wall projection journey through Dunedin Harbour told in reverse: it begins with a karanga and karakia in te reo Māori and travels backwards by waka, guided by the figure Matamata, from today's working harbour to the arrival of Western ships, early Māori settlement, the birdsong of the waters' earliest days, and finally the ancestral being who created and cares for these waters.

The project began in July 2025 with a site visit alongside Kāi Tahu mana whenua and Dunedin City Council, briefed around a single wall-mounted projection. Blue Alchemy Labs and content studio S1T2 used the wake of a waka as the visual language for early visualisations, showing how the same hardware budget could wrap images around floor and walls and place guests inside the harbour rather than facing it. The council backed the more ambitious idea, which was delivered within the existing hardware budget.

Before any content was written, the team spent three days visiting significant harbour sites by boat and on foot, listening to stories shared firsthand by mana whenua, who stayed involved throughout — shaping the narrative structure, approving the visual style, providing authentic audio recordings and giving formal sign-off at every stage.

Blue Alchemy Labs designed the room to feel underwater: projections across floor and walls, low-lying fog that turns the floor into water, and haptic seating that conveys the story's emotional shifts through the body. Five Panasonic laser projectors use ultra-short-throw lenses so guests cast no shadows on the walls; Dataton WATCHOUT manages playback and signals Medialon Showmaster to synchronise fog, haptics and effects. Content was developed by S1T2 and Colour Theory Co working alongside mana whenua, with much of the review done live in the room itself.

The reverse chronology makes a settlers' museum tell an Indigenous story first: the harbour's deep past is the spine, not a footnote.

Mana whenua were co-designers with formal sign-off, not consultants — the narrative structure and audio come from the people who hold the stories.

The whole-room concept was won on visualisation, aligning creative ambition with the client's existing hardware budget.

Sell the bigger idea with the budget you already have: a visualisation of the same spend won the whole room before a cent was added, and co-design kept tech serving the story.

The installation is now permanent at the museum, which is part of Dunedin City Council; both the council and mana whenua have responded positively, per the museum's director. Visitor numbers are not yet reported.