Kitchen Aid Tui's Sweet Legacy

The Weekly’s Doyenne of Kiwi Cookery Has Left a Historical Treasure Trove.
 

- Donna Fleming

 

She was considered a national treasure for inspiring several generations of Kiwis in the kitchen, thanks to her years as the Weekly’s food editor.

But what many people didn’t know about Tui Flower, who died last August aged 91, was that her Auckland home was packed full of real treasures, including valuable antiques and MaÌ„ori artefacts.

Now her family’s incredible collection is being sold off to fund a project that Tui carefully planned for many years.

Tui’s protégé Robyn Martin, herself a former long-serving Weekly food editor, says details of the project can’t be released at the moment, but it will greatly benefit others and is something that Tui was very passionate about.

“It was Tui’s wish that her legacy lived on and funds from the sale of her collection will be going to make sure that happens,” says Robyn, who is involved in seeing that Tui’s plans are brought to fruition.

“For many years before she died, whenever I used to visit her, she would say to me, ‘Now you know what I want to happen, don’t you?’ and I’d say, ‘Tui, I know!’ It was something that meant a lot to her. I can’t say much more at the moment, but watch this space!”

The collection is worth many thousands of dollars and comprises thousands of items bought by or given to Tui, her mother Irene Flower and her maternal grandfather William Mincher. An article written about William in 1939 described how “from his infancy, he has yielded to his inborn desire to collect things.”