Q1: When did you first learn about the Wardian Case and its enabling of the transportation of live plants across continents and indeed hemispheres?
FJ: It was probably around 2016 that I started reflecting on how difficult life must have been for the early European settlers and how making a garden might have been paramount on their arrival to Aotearoa New Zealand. Knowing that not everything grows easily from seed, I was curious to find out how all the early exotic plants we have here actually made it to Aotearoa in the first place. Eventually I came across a few mentions of something called a Wardian Case, mainly around its first usage for bringing exotic plants back to Britain.
MS: To be honest, I hadn’t heard of the Wardian Case until Felicity approached me to attempt this project. I was slightly dismissive at first, but once the first shot was done, I was keen to keep going and learn more. And the more I learned, the more extraordinary it became. This unassuming wood and glass box had allowed plants to travel across oceans and continents, quietly reshaping landscapes and economies. For me, it became more than just a historical object — it became a metaphor for movement, for care and for the way our world can be changed.
Q2: And was there an almost immediate ‘a-ha!’ moment about what, working together, you could create using such a case?
FJ: Case Studies really began as an image in my head, a box of romantic ‘English’ cottage flowers on a path in the 19th century New Zealand bush, perhaps fresh off a settler’s boat and on their way to be planted in some freshly dug soil in a strange land . . . The goal of our first shoot was to somehow recreate this image, and I remember feeling excited that we might have actually done it. Mark had originally agreed to give this and one other idea a go, with no pressure to commit to anything further. However it quickly became clear to both of us that the particular combination of factors involved in this project had potential to create something quite unique.
MS: Yes — pretty much. There was something about the way the case sat in the landscape that really struck me. After the first shoot — and then the second — it became clear that we had something worth pursuing. The project gave us a way to explore all aspects of botanical travel, and to reflect on the good, the bad and the more complicated aspects of how humans have helped plants move through the world, all sparked by Dr Ward’s curious invention.
Q3: It’s been seven years between you first taking a case full of ferns and standing it in the tide at Bethells beach to Case Studies being published. A case of the little seed that grew and grew?
FJ and MS: What started as quite a personal exploration has definitely grown into something much larger. Each new idea and road trip revealed another layer, presenting deeper questions about the entanglement of people and plants. We started to realise the work was limitless as it moved backwards and forwards in time, and as we explored notions of beauty and dislocation, systems of knowledge and science, hierarchies of value in the botanical world and the motivations, aspirations, attitudes and beliefs that lay behind plant travel. Early on, we sat down and made a kind of wish list — plants and locations that had always interested us or that linked back to Dr Ward in some way. There were some big interruptions, like Covid, but we still managed to keep things moving in small ways during that time. We both work full-time and have always self-funded the project, so it’s been a matter of grabbing moments where we could. Exhibitions along the way helped with momentum — and a bit of funding — and kept our interest and energy up.
Q4: You started local, around Auckland, but then during that year when New Zealand was Covid-free you hired a campervan and went down to the South Island for the project. What impact did working there have?
FJ and MS: This time was such a gift. After the huge disappointment caused by the pandemic, when we had planned to meet up in London after completing other assignments, we turned to another opportunity closer to home. Camper vans were being rented out cheaply because there were no international tourists. Heading south enabled us to look at the plant stories from our wish list. Feeling seriously liberated when we did get on the road, and with a new landscape to draw on and plant stories to follow up, we had a new bounce in our step. It changed how we saw the work. The case, the plants and the stories around them took on fresh meanings in those new places. It helped deepen the project’s sense of scale and connection.
Q5: None of these case-in-the-landscape constructs was straightforward of course. Can you tell us about one of your most challenging South Island setups?
MS: Taking advice from locals on where you can drive a camper van is best ignored, especially if it is anything to do with the Nevis Pass, 1300m at the top, the highest public road in New Zealand. It turns out that the local who told us it would be fine had a small camper van, and it was four-wheel drive — both very important pieces of information. Had the road been tar-sealed it would have been edgy at best, but the gravel road became steep and impassable at a point for us, resulted in a very nervous reversing manoeuvre with a sheer drop on one side. We finally got down to a spot where we could do a 15-point turn and drive down to a little area where we could pull off and gather ourselves. The image ‘Forage’ was made there. It was good therapy and good to be back on stable ground.
FJ: Possibly it was the first lupin shot, under the threat of the farmer with a gun.
Q6: When did it become obvious that you would have to compete the circle, as it were, and do the same thing in the UK?
FJ: It was probably after receiving so much interest with our first exhibition. I think it seemed important to go back to the place where much of the global plant travel story began. On a personal note, London, where I lived for many years was home to my very first garden and where my passion for all things botanical really took hold.
MS: After our first show in 2019, we’d always been struck by the kōwhai story pertaining to Banks, Solander and Cook. They had got a seed to grow and there were plant descendants from that voyage alive and well at the Chelsea Physic Gardens, Kew Gardens and the Oxford Botanical Gardens. At that stage they were 250 years old and we were keen to see them. But thanks to Covid it wasn’t until 2023 that we got to look at those specimens and quite a few other parts of the English story.
Q7: Can you tell us about one of the most challenging set ups there?
FJ: They were all pretty challenging to be honest. The most precarious shoot was the punt series: getting everything first on a train to Oxford, onto the punt, travelling up and down the river, me at the front arranging and adjusting our plant material and Mark behind trying to keep his camera steady . . . Thankfully we had the assistance of a friend with plenty of local knowledge and excellent punting skills.
MS: In 2022, Felicity had been in the UK and managed to broker access and contacts to Kew, Chelsea and Oxford, and with help from a prominent New Zealand parliamentarian we were also able to get into the Natural History Museum in London. That day at the NHM was probably our most challenging setup. We had to transport all our gear on public transport, couldn’t bring in any live plant material, and had to complete everything before the public was allowed in. Felicity brought artificial flowers, and we had a portrait of Dr Ward with us — we were hoping to find the right spot to create a portrait of the portrait. It was a scramble, but one of those memorable days where constraint forced us to think creatively on our feet.
Q8: Along the way a crew of experts joined the project, from Greg O’Brien and Huhana Smith to Dame Anne Salmond. What did you learn from them?
FJ and MS: The huge interest and encouragement we’ve received from different artists, scientists, writers and curators has been so gratifying. We were constantly blown away by the experts in their fields who were willing to share their knowledge.
Q9: Dr Ward could not have anticipated what his invention would unleash: plants from one hemisphere becoming pests in another. This must have been sobering to consider?
FJ: Yes, I do wonder what he would think today. There have been plenty of sobering discoveries and realisations throughout, although I wouldn’t want to place too much blame on Dr Ward . . . We have always approached each story with not too much judgement. We are really just trying to put a story in front of people to encourage thinking around how these plants may have got here.
Q10: But this book is also full of hope: the 1769 Seed Archive Garden in Tairāwhiti and the reestablishment of ngātukāka along the east coast, for example. Can you tell us how that is another instance of closing the circle opened up by empire and what these projects are setting out to do?
FJ: There is now a global community of like-minded botanists, environmentalists, anthropologists and Indigenous people who are sharing information and skills. People with the full knowledge of past mistakes but also with the energy and enthusiasm to do better for the earth’s future! The reestablishment of ngūtukāka using seed taken to Kew by Banks and Solander is a wonderful example of that. The Seed Archive, set up by Dame Anne Salmond and her late husband Jeremy Salmond with Graeme Atkins is a remarkable story on its own, if only for the people involved, who believe in being able to facilitate change.
