My Space: Stardome’s Victoria Travers on her favourite workplace.

Victoria Travers, pou whakahaere (chief executive) of Auckland’s Stardome on her favourite space

Describe the space: “This is our telescope room which houses our Zeiss telescope. It’s a truly magical space and is the heart of Stardome. ‘The Zeiss’ as we call it, as well as its wooden dome, was manufactured by Carl Zeiss Jena of Germany and commissioned in 1967, one of only 20 of its type across the world. It was a gift to the citizens of Auckland from Edith Winstone Blackwell. She died before it was installed, but she was particularly keen for children to have the opportunity to see the night sky through a large telescope. I think she’d be proud of the work that we still do here and the reach we have with school students in particular.” Why do you come to this space? “It reminds me of the people who created it. It’s one of those spaces that feels illusionary. It is so non-domestic in scale and materials – a round room with a 360 degree curved wooden-slat revolving roof, with a slit that opens up to the sky, housing a huge telescope that can be swung to a particular pinpoint in the sky – it fills me with awe. And, of course, sometimes I come in here to look at the universe and talk with astronomers, not just to drink in the architecture.” What inspires you about this space? “I find it romantic and magical. I love the sound it makes when the dome spins, and the feel of the wood, the steel of the telescope, not to mention the scale. It’s a very privileged experience to come in here. Also the ability to see beyond our world. I am often overwhelmed that of all the times I could have been born, I am fortunate enough to live at a time when I have access to the widest breadth of knowledge, discoveries and explanations of our planet and our universe. It’s such a pan-human experience to look to the sky and orient our lives, navigate, tell stories, remind us of our ancestors and be inspired by the mysteries that will probably always be. I was also one of those kids who was awed by Carl Sagan’s Pale Blue Dot book: ‘a mote of dust suspended on a sunbeam’, and I find that perspective inspiring and our insignificance weirdly motivating.”