Entrance to the Hobbit artisan market

As preparation for the Hobbit premiere (today! YAY!) there is an Hobbit Artisan Market in Waitangi park. It’s been on since last Sunday and will close today. Flo and I managed to go there twice which is enough as it is really quite small. =)

The entrance is a wooden Hobbit hole. On Sunday, there was a lot going on there with many people taking their pictures with that sign. When we were back on Monday, it was less busy and we also took a picture. The cute thing about this photo opportunity is that the city council of Wellington has hired some people to stand around the entrance to take picture of people/couples who always have the problem that they need to ask strangers to get a picture of both. So cute! =)

The market itself was maybe 10-15 stalls, so basically one half circle. Some of the artisits working on the hobbit exhibited their usual work. Unfortunately, all of it is quite expensive otherwise I could have bought a lot of things. =) There was a Weta Workshops stall which sold all the Hobbit merchandise. I bought premiere t-shirts for people back home but apart from that nothing really.

On Monday, I even sat down in the bodypainting stall. For just $5 you could have a small design painted in your face. After looking at kids getting cat’s and butterfly’s faces, I kinda wanted a painted face too. The “elven design” that I requested didn’t really look that elven to me but I still liked it. =)

Next to the grass there was a small line of food stalls.

Most of Waitangi park was left as a grassy atch though so that people could sit down while eating and watching stuff on the big screen. On Sunday, someone from Weta workshop showed how to change a stunt man into an orc complete with make-up and costume. That was pretty cool to watch.

The last three evenings they showed all three parts of Lord of the rings there starting at 6pm and ending at 9pm. We didn’t make it there but I like the idea of the public screening.