Waitangi Day In LA photoblog… with pics by Jane Ussher

As dawn rose over Santa Monica Beach yesterday morning, the Made From New Zealand team were welcomed to the beach by the Native American people, and the site where we are building the fern was ceremonially blessed.

Temuera Morrison and Rena Owen accepted the welcome along with Wena Harawira from Maori Television, and the building of the fern got underway at about 8.00am.

Then Mike Mizrahi and the team of sand sculptors (that’s Warwick on the wheelbarrow) got to work on the Silver Fern… 200 Kiwis are coming down this afternoon to help us rake, dig and sculpt the 100m sand castle.

Then the Kiwis from up the road in Hollywood showed up to lend a hand. Here’s Simone Kessel, Martin Henderson and Dean O’Gorman with Tem.

Simone brought along her beautiful little boy Jack….

Here’s Martin and Dean taking a well earned break…

…and the team getting stuck in.

More pics soon!