Air New Zealand Koru

The full text of this story The tail of the flying waka can be found in PRODESIGN 87, Feb /Mar 2007, p.78.

What we know

c.1946. Bill Haythornthwaite and George Moore designed a stylised maroro, a flying fish, logo for Tasman Empire Airways.

1965. TEAL changed its name to Air New Zealand, when it was expanding routes to North America and Asia by replacing Lockheed Electra turbo-props with DC-8 jets.

1970. Air New Zealand Marketing Services Manager Bernie McEwen briefed a number of the advertising agencies to creatively consider ‘a new promotional image’. Initial recommendations were presented in November.

Dailey & Associates, Los Angeles, noted that “no one carrier presently operating in the South Pacific is doing the image job that the area connotes (romantic, exotic, Polynesia, etc), argued for retaining the blues and greens while simplifying and upgrading the existing maroro and Southern Cross and proposed the theme “The Pacific Adventure”.

Grant Advertising International, Hong Kong, recommended a strong, simple, modern Air New Zealand symbol and a visual expression of Air New Zealand’s personality as the airline that ‘knows the Pacific best’. They suggested that “the story of the Great Canoes from mythical Polynesian/Maori culture” provide the design themes.

Grant Advertising, London, proposed countering "Pan Am’s 747 – the plane with all the room in the world” and “Continental 747 – the proud bird of the Pacific” with “Air New Zealand DC-10 – the Pacific Island in the Sky.” Concepts for exterior livery and interior themes also reflected the “Pacific Island proposition”.

Dobbs Wiggins McCann Erickson, Wellington, saw the New Zealand people and the government as a critical audience. Their “logical, sensible, believable” proposition presenting the airline as “New Zealand’s international airline serving the Pacific” was to be expressed in a “bold, imaginative, memorable and succinct design concept”. They proposed “the canoe – a magnificent symbol of navigation, of exploration, of travel and of adventure”. They explained that Maori applied the words ‘manu rere’ – flying bird – to both canoes and aircraft and suggested red ochre and teal blue as the corporate colours.

Dobbs Wiggins argued the case for using a Maori motif. “No one can deny the place of the Maori in New Zealand’s culture and the history of the Pacific,” they wrote. “Parallel to this is our present emerging nationalistic feeling and pride in the rich Maori part of our history.”

Roundhill Studios artist Ken Chapman remembers Bernie McEwen coming to the studio with a model of the DC-10, the Dobbs Wiggins concept of a Maori waka stern post bearing a Polynesian pattern and a strong view that the teal and blue colour scheme was preferred.

1973. The first DC-10 bearing the new livery was rolled out in January to general acclaim.

It was some years later that concerns were raised by some Maori about the Air New Zealand koru as an example of cultural appropriation – probably in the lead up to placing the Wai 262 claim before the Waitangi Tribunal. Air New Zealand argued that the acknowledgement of Polynesian heritage had been completely respectful and the result of a thorough professional process, including consulting Auckland Museum ethnologist David Simmonds.

What we would like to know

Anything we have missed about the Air New Zealand koru development.

Documentation or recollections relating to Maori objections and concerns about the use of Maori imagery by Air New Zealand.