It is with great sadness that we mourn the loss of Jeremy Salmond, a New Zealand architect whose commitment to excellence in the field of built heritage conservation has left an indelible mark on not only the Auckland War Memorial Museum, but indeed on many of Aotearoa’s great buildings and beloved landmarks.

I am thrilled to share that we have received funding from the Ministry for Culture and Heritage for Te Aho Mutunga Kore, a Textile and Fibre Centre for Māori and Pacific, to be located at the Museum. The centre will nurture creativity, knowledge sharing and knowledge creation by decentring the Museum and handing agency back to these communities. Te Aho Mutunga Kore: the everlasting threads of knowledge, will ensure sustained engagement with textile and fibre collections to strengthen the ties (aho) between community and their material culture heritage, creating a safe pathway for knowledge transmission (taonga tuku iho).

This month we were pleased to welcome representatives of the Warumungu community and officials from the Australian Institute of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Studies (AIATSIS) Return of Cultural Heritage team. The team came to the Museum to collect four Warumungu objects that are being repatriated to them from our collection.

Like so many millions around the world, I was saddened to hear of the passing of Her Majesty the Queen, after seven decades on the throne.

As Auckland's War Memorial Museum, it is only right that we at Tāmaki Paenga Hira take stock of the significance of the passing of Queen Elizabeth II, and the contributions she made for our nation.