Design a Waitaki Tartan

Published on 02 November 2022

The Forrester Gallery is running a tartan design competition! The idea came from the Ōamaru Victorian Heritage committee as a way to explore this year’s theme; Highland Fling: Celebrating our Scottish Connections.

Forrester Gallery Educator, Elizabeth King said, “I thought it was a great idea from the committee and a wonderful way to get people involved in the 2022 Heritage Celebrations. It was super that Sue and Rod McLean from McLean & Co weavers were happy to be involved too – as they are our local tartan weavers! They have also generously offered to judge and donate prizes.”                                                                          

Sue and Elizabeth worked out the criteria and agreed that the tartan needed to reflect the Waitaki District. While there are some guidelines really it is a chance for people to think about what colours they think best represent Waitaki.

Sue McLean from McLean & Co said, “Rod and I were excited when Elizabeth contacted us about being involved in the Forrester Gallery tartan competition. We love sharing our knowledge about tartan design and weaving and showing people how we weave tartan on our heritage Hattersley looms here in Oamaru. We have our own Waitaki tartan in the pipeline for production later in 2023 so we’re looking forward to seeing how other people view our beautiful Waitaki district in a tartan format. Grab an entry form, get creative and see what you can design.”

We have 5 age categories from pre-schoolers to adults and we are thrilled there have been entries from most age brackets already. Entry forms are available at the Forrester Gallery, Waitaki Museum and Ōamaru Library.

You have until Wednesday 9 November to drop your entries to at the Forrester Gallery, Waitaki Museum, or Ōamaru Library. All the entries will be displayed at the Ōamaru Library for Heritage Week. A winner and runner up from each age category will be announced.

McLean & Co are opening their weaving shed to the public as part of the Heritage Celebrations. Rod and Sue will be demonstrating how they weave tartan on Thursday 17, Friday 1 and Saturday 19 November 10am - 3pm.

We are also getting into the Scottish theme in the Forrester gallery with Scottish Faces; Photographic portraits of Scottish migrants in the vault gallery. Museum Curator Henry Buckenham is doing a floor talk in the museum sharing stories of local Scottish migrants who made their home in the Waitaki; Thursday 17 November 11am -12pm.

ENDS