A FINE BALANCE

If Lynne Atkins were to have her way, everyone would spend 20 minutes a day on their heads with their legs in the air.

A formally trained Iyengar yoga teacher, Lynne practises daily and has done so since she attended her first class two decades ago. “Within 15 minutes in that very first class, I knew I’d be doing it for the rest of my life. It gives me a huge amount of energy and an ability to deal with trials that life throws at me calmly. I am a happy, positive person.” Training to be a yoga teacher, is a long slog and hard work, particularly the Iyengar practice, which can be quite strenuous. Yet, teaching provides a life balance that, along with gardening, she believes is ideal.

“It is hard to put into one paragraph the explanation of yoga. It is not gymnastics. It works at a deeper level on body and soul, and the mind through the body. The asana practice is a meditation, and I also find that working in my garden is a meditation. It is involving, and it narrows the focus, which is what meditation is. It stills the other thoughts.

“I have a handstand wall in the Giraffe House where I do spend quite an amount of time each day upside down. There’s huge value in it, with blood flow to the head and the resting of the organs. You could write a book on the benefits of being upside down.” greenhaugh.co.nz

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Lynne doesn’t take all the credit for the garden, far from it. In addition to Les’ designing eye, is a pair of loyal gardeners who have been with Lynne for 30 years. “My astounding gardeners,” says Lynne. “Janet and Colin have built the garden with me. Colin [Mahy] has built all the structures and Janet [Wilson] manages the garden.”

Given the reputation of Lynne’s baking and the legendary morning teas enjoyed by staff around the kitchen table, it is little wonder that staff numbers sometimes swell to nine. Greenhaugh includes a large nursery selling, among other things, rare plants that Lynne and Janet have grown from imported seeds “The nursery is a hobby. I don’t make money out of the garden and nursery, but the plant sales and garden visits go some way towards paying for the gardeners.”

As well as her somewhat-photographic memory, Lynne can see things before they are there. She can visualize a planting before it is completed. But, then, along comes her other secret garden helper, mother nature. “The garden gets better and better, partly helped by plants self-seeding in places I’d never have put them. We have to keep the proportions right, but nature has a way of doing magnificent things, choosing colour combinations I’m way too afraid to try. It will create big patches of plants that I may never have planted on that scale. And, also, you will find plants in an area that you never put them. You think, ‘How on earth did they get there?’ But they look wonderful exactly where they’ve put themselves. And they usually do far better in the situation they’ve chosen rather than the place I’d have chosen for them.”

Lynne adores sharing the garden with her children, who all love it too despite two being in Hawke’s Bay and one in north Auckland. She is a proud grandmother to eight – five of whom she gained in 10 months thanks to the arrival of two sets of twins (coincidentally due one day apart but one set arrived six weeks premature). Her grandchildren range from four to 14 and are regular visitors at Greenhaugh.

Lynne’s long-term plan is relaxed. “We are creating this together, and I know things change, and I don’t expect this garden to be here forever. I don’t know what will happen to it. In the meantime, I love it, and we [the family and gardeners] love sharing it.”

P HOTOGRAPHS

A SMALL POND, shining in the morning sunlight, is centre stage in Wellington illustrator and author Ned Barraud’s Karori front garden. Peer into its still, clear waters for a glimpse of a tiny kingdom of native aquatic plants, snails and water boatmen, plus several jewel-coloured goldfish, non-endemic interlopers.

The pond is a thriving mini eco-system, says Ned. It took a long time to achieve the correct combination of plants and animals to deter algae, but the result is the pond no longer needs cleaning. “It just keeps its natural balance, which is pretty cool.”

This search for equilibrium also sums up Ned’s life. For 15 years, he was a published illustrator - producing awardwinning children’s books - while working full time in the film industry and raising a young family. It was challenging, and his life felt out of kilter. But, now, thanks to a little creative work/life juggling, he says he’s found the right balance and can now continue creating the books that give children an inspiring insight into Aotearoa’s extraordinary, often elusive, natural world.

Ned is the author/illustrator of several books including Tohorā: The Southern Right Whale, Rock Pools: A Guide for Kiwi Kids and New Zealand’s Backyard Beasts. Along with author Gillian Candler, he is also responsible for the popular Explore & Discover series, which includes the prizewinning At the Beach. All his books are published by Potton & Burton, which specializes in New Zealand non-fiction.

Before being able to illustrate full time, he was a senior texture painter at Wētā Digital, responsible for digitally painting surface textures on characters, environments or props. “I worked on all the big ones from The Lord of the Rings onwards.”

CLOCKWISE FROM TOP: Ned Barraud and his children, Alfie (9) and Leila (14), engage in a real life seek-and-find by their pond; Ned’s art is inspired by “strange creatures — real or fanciful”; Where is it? encourages young readers to interact with nature. OPPOSITE: Ned is a frequent visitor to wild, windswept Mākara. “The sea is constantly changing and gives a feeling of freedom and spaciousness.”

Long days in post-production and the demands of bringing up three children - Rory, now 16, Leila, 14, and Alfie, 9, with wife Niamh Short - made life busy and happy but left illustrating shoehorned into his evenings. He pressured himself to make the books happen. It was the last thing I’d feel like after getting in from work.”

In 2016 Niamh, previously at home with the kids, started a builder’s apprenticeship. Ned was still full time at Wētā and producing books in the evenings, Niamh was training and getting her company, Windy City Builders, off the ground. Life was relentless and hard work. “Despite our best efforts, our home life was complicated and highly managed.”

Last May, Ned’s Wētā contract was not renewed. This turned out to be a great opportunity of change for the family. He now works from home 25 hours a week, allowing him to focus on his books and illustration, and is the family’s primary caregiver. Niamh, meanwhile, can fully focus on her career and company, knowing she has support and back-up at home. “We swapped roles. We had to tighten our belts a bit, but it’s been easier than we thought. Neither of us miss juggling all the balls.”

Niamh, one of the capital’s few female builders, says she uses her psychology degree and the same skills she used running the house on delegating sub-contractors. The project management required to help clients transform their homes into beautiful, workable spaces is hard work, says Ned. “Running a company is demanding. But she’s super-organized and likes to run a tight ship,” says Ned.

As for the kids, there are more chores and fewer cakes on Ned’s watch, but he’s a happier and more relaxed dad, and no longer just the guy who makes an appearance during the stressy breakfast-departure and evening-dinner-bed routines. He’s involved in school schedules and social calendars. “We have a

much closer bond now than before. I find it satisfying keeping the show on the road.”

Every morning, he works for three to four hours on his books. A quiet house and hot coffee get him into the zone. He has time to pick up other illustration jobs, and recently released a series of extra-large format puzzles for Holdson. The Seek & Find series features four different wildlife scenes. It feels incredible, he says, to work “when I’m feeling inspired, rather than doing it under duress”.

Ned has been illustrating children’s books since 2000. Before that, he studied for a couple of years at art school in Dunedin and took a gap year in Ireland, where he met Niamh. He graduated with a degree in illustration from Victoria University in 2001. Creating children’s books was always something he wanted to do, right from the get-go.

“The kids’ books I read have always stayed with me; I remember the impact they made.”

His favourites include books by Theodor Seuss Geisel ( Dr Seuss) and Maurice Sendak ( Where the Wild Things Are), as well as stories specific to a Kiwi childhood, such as Margaret Mahy’s The Lion in the Meadow. Robyn Belton, who illustrated Joy Cowley’s Greedy Cat series, was a big influence.

Ned says that despite the age of iPads and Kindles, children’s books can’t be replaced. “That actual hard-copy kids’ book that you can sit down with and flick through the pages and be immersed in.”

His lifelike drawings provide a glimpse into the lives and habitats of everything from giant squid and humpback whales lurking within the depths of the Pacific Ocean, to now-extinct moa and mosasaurs, and even the stick insects and spiders in the backyard. Or, as Ned puts it, many of his books are about wildlife: whales, weka and wētā.

THIS PAGE: Ned and Niamh met in a pub in a remote Irish village. “A game of pool got the ball rolling. Niamh won it, by the way.” The idea for Ned’s book Backyard Beasts came from exploring his garden with his kids. OPPOSITE: Ned has passed the art bug onto his children, especially Alfie.