Te Papa was opened on 14 February 1998, and it stayed open until midnight due to the cues (left). Te Papa co-lead with a CEO and Kaihautu since the start among other progress bi-cultural practices even to this day. The target was to reach 700,000 visitors over a year when opened, instead it had 2.3 million back in 1998. For context, the pre-pandemic visitor levels were around 1.6 million which was helped by the Lions Tour.
They employ 600 people with commercial viable model as well as baseline budget support from government.
Each year the government funds $3million to acquire objects of importance to Aotearoa to display, which includes collaborative collecting projects with community.
Did you know that Te Papa also host New Zealand's national fish collection with over 900,000 specimens? Over the next eight years they plan to be moved to Upper Hutt.
A recent highlight was that Te Papa hosted Hautapu for Matariki, being recognised for the first time as a public holiday last year and the repatriation of Moriori tupuna (ancestors) which was led by Maui Solomon.
Another recent project was the Unravelling threads - Asian mental health, providing an insight into the mental health of Asian people in Aotearoa. 
A recommendation was to visit He kaupapa Waka navigating journey - exhibition. See powerful photos of the waka fleet that gathered on Waitangi Day in 2020 to commemorate the 80-year anniversary of the 1940 launch of Ngātokimatawhāorua – named after the ancestral waka that made the voyage from Hawaiki to Aotearoa.