Tuitui is taking museum dining to a new level – but those seeking a taste of nostalgia will be pleased to know the bistro has one eye fixed firmly on the past. By Anna King Shahab.
I have such fond childhood memories of Tāmaki Paenga Hira Auckland War Memorial Museum. They include dripping umbrellas piled into stands by the entrance (museum visits often happened on rainy days); gazing up at Rajah, dusty and dimly lit yet majestic, the hushed thrill of exploring the creepy/fascinating Centennial Street and – a rare treat – a sandwich or lamington and a small carton of juice at the museum cafe.
A pleasant eating experience, I think, makes the places and experience around it "stick" better in one's memory – food as a thread that gathers the fabric around it. Appropriate, then, that Tuitui, the name chosen for the new bistro and cafe in Te Ao Marama – the revitalised South Atrium - means to bind together, to sew.
Jack McKinney's architecture extends the weaving metaphor, gently – cedar panels, carefully fluted from top to bottom to create a vision that echoes the building's Doric columns, have been trimmed at the top to perfectly meet the original bolted steel beams that have been left subtly exposed, white-painted. It would have been easier - and offered a more streamlined look - to run them flush against the ceiling but that would be to bury the past, rather than to acknowledge it. The bar area graduates into a generous length of counter dining – long, artfully curved to match the building's exterior, deep-green Greek marble slabs which, if you look closely, you will see have been carefully arranged together so the striations are mirroring, like butterflies.
The leather bar stools have comfy padded backs (no awkward perching here) and the dining chairs are generously sized and comfortable. Tuitui has been purposely designed as a space diners will want to linger in, whether as part of a visit to the museum's collections and special exhibitions or as a destination on its own.