Luke's Harakeke

March 10, 2026 · 32 min · Season 4 · Episode 3

About this episode

Luke Gardner shares his plant story about Harakeke, a New Zealand native plant, and its significance in his cottage garden.

For this episode we are in New Zealand. Luke Gardner wrote to me saying he had been listening to Our Plant Stories since day one and he had a plant story he wanted to share. Luke's childhood memories are of a cottage garden with roses and peonies and tulips - 'exotics' and in the garden there were blackbirds and thrushes. He has now created his own cottage garden and plants thousands of tulip bulbs each year, opening his garden for a tulip festival. Yet the plant he wanted to talk about was a New Zealand native - Harakeke, swamp flax. It is the soul of his garden, giving a sense of place, woven in amongst the cottage plants. Luke admits he is still learning about native plants so his conversation with Edith Rolls a Māori weaver focus on the significance of this plant to the Māori and I think connections are forged again through plants. If you enjoy this episode and want to hear about another native New Zealand plant then seek out the episode called Mona's Corokia. Can I share my plant story with you? YES PLEASE! I called this OUR Plant Stories for a reason and that is that I love to hear from listeners wherever you are in the world! You can email me Sally@ourplantstories.com and…

People in this episode

Host: Sally Flatman

Guest: Luke Gardner

Topics covered

cottage garden
native plants
Māori culture
plant stories
tulip festival

Keywords

Harakeke
swamp flax
cottage garden
tulip bulbs
Māori weaver

Mentioned in this episode

Books & works: Our Plant Stories, Mona's Corokia

Places: New Zealand