The Meeting Place — (Ngarluk Yalur — meet people)

The Dunsborough Heritage Trail finds its centre in the newly designed Seymour Park. The Meeting Place is proposed as the heart of the park and the heart of the community. It is a place for gathering as well as a place that celebrates the exceptional and vibrant voices of the Dunsborough community.

The design of the Meeting Place has been inspired by the wonderful conversations that emerged during the community consultation component of this project. In one room came together members of the community that do not often interact with each other. Regardless their stories confirmed, supported and delighted each other. It illustrated deeply how the sum of the parts works together to create the exquisite whole. A second element revealed through these conversations was the sense that so many of the stories have been amended, smoothed and re-written over the years. History was not necessarily forgotten but had been altered, often for very well meaning reasons. The elements of the Meeting Place attempt to address these potent revelations.

The Meeting Place is made of several simple elements: a bench, water, text and a tree. The bench is sculpted from stone. Lines of text are carved into the bench, much like the stone inscriptions that many cultures use in commemorating acts and people. (see image). The text is made of the unedited words, quoting directly from various members of the community. The discreet words and stories merge at the top of the bench where there is a rill of water. The water symbolically merges the words, flowing down together along the bench to the paving where the rill continues across the meeting place to a lone tree. This tree is a Melaleuca that has been cloned from the "Cauliflower" tree located on the original Seymour farm that was cut down a few years ago. Metaphorically and literally the water-washed words of the community feed and nurture this new community tree.