Taronga Nura Diya Australia Experience
CLIENT: tARONGA CONSERVATION SOCIETY
COUNTRY: Cammeraygal land
LOCATION: mosman, nsw
PROJECT VALUE: $16 million
COMPLETED: 2023
photography: ben guthrie
PROJECT SHEET: download
The new ‘Upper Australia’ exhibit at Taronga Zoo will showcase Australia’s unique flora and fauna in their natural habitat, whether up in the trees, or down in a burrow. The exhibits will be home to everything from larger animals like Kangaroo, Emu, Koala and Dingo, down to smaller nocturnal animals like the Bat, Bilby, Quoll and Dunnart.
The primary objective for the exhibit is to showcase native Australian wildlife and landscapes in an unobtrusive manner, whilst conveying an educational message of conservation through minimal intervention. This will be achieved through working with the existing mature landscape and heritage elements along with integration of multi-layered cultural messaging throughout the exhibit.
The main exhibit path will snake through various native landscapes, ranging from wetlands through to arid woodland and then up into the tree canopy via an elevated boardwalk to view koalas at their natural sitting height in the tree canopy. The Australia journey then winds its way down through the Dingo exhibit of rock escarpments and then underground to the Nocturnal House; where a complete refurbishment of the existing building will provide state of the art back of house keeper facilities and unique night-time viewing of Australia’s nocturnal creatures.
