Wailea's Newest Garden Grows From a Queen's 1894 Garden, and Two Free Tours This Weekend Walk You Through It

Why does an interior courtyard off Wailea Alanui Drive hold plants from the garden Queen Liliʻuokalani established in Pauoa in 1894, the year after the overthrow? Some of that lineage was carried across the channel and set in the ground at Four Seasons Resort Maui at Wailea under a full moon, the way the Queen opened her own garden.

The space is called The Queen's Garden: Uluhaimalama. It opened in early September, and the resort says it is open to locals as well as guests and visitors. It is a Maui branch of a garden that has stood for Hawaiian continuity since 1894, and this Friday and Saturday bring the only guided tours on its calendar so far.

The original was planted as an act of hope

In 2009 the Honolulu Advertiser reported that Queen Liliʻuokalani created Uluhaimalama in Pauoa in 1894 as a symbol of hope. The paper said it was meant as a gathering place to help Native Hawaiians hold on to their culture after the overthrow. The same story described a sign at the site that reads "ULUHAIMALAMA GARDEN, QUEEN LILI'UOKALANI, ESTAB OCT. 11, 1894."

The Wailea garden takes that history literally. According to Maui Now's report on the opening, plants descended from and gifted by the original Uluhaimalama now grow in the Four Seasons courtyard. The Queen arranged Uluhaimalama's entrance under a full moon the night before its dedication, so that section was planted under a full moon too. The plantings also include ones she treasured, among them crown flowers, roses, pikake and puakenikeni, alongside native species tied to the agricultural history of Honuaʻula.

That last part matters for anyone who lives here. The garden traces a royal story from Honolulu, and it also places that story in the district Wailea and Makena sit within.

Six stations, six voices, and one that starts at your own address

The garden is laid out as six self-guided stations. Each one is built around a named practitioner or kumu and gives a different angle on the Queen's life. In order of how Maui Now described them:

1. Aunty Mopsie Tuivaioge, the resort's Director of Hawaiian Programs, welcomes visitors and invites reflection on the Queen's resilience, grace and devotion to her people.
2. Kumu Hula Cody Pueo Pata sets the garden within the Honuaʻula moku. His station covers the ahupuaʻa system, which treats land and water as connected from mountain to sea, and the springs, streams and fishponds that once sustained communities here.
3. Kumu Hula Hōkūlani Holt covers the political pressure of the kingdom's final years. Her station tells how the Queen yielded her authority under protest to prevent bloodshed, and of her imprisonment at ʻIolani Palace.
4. Kumu Hula Kamaka Kūkona introduces the garden's pā noa and the role of hula in passing down history, genealogy and the Queen's own mele.
5. Uncle Kevin Gavagan, the resort's Director of Landscaping and steward of The Queen's Garden, covers the plants the Queen cultivated and how fragrance and living gardens carry memory.
6. Kumu Hula Karl Veto Baker, steward of Uluhaimalama on Oʻahu, tells the story of the 1894 garden that supplied the plants.

The second station is the one to linger at if you live in Wailea or Makena. Honuaʻula is the moku under the golf courses, the condos and the lava fields toward Keoneʻōʻio. A station built around its springs and fishponds gives that ground a history older than the resort era. It fits with what our earlier piece on where public access starts and stops in Wailea described along the shoreline. Much of what makes this coast work was laid down long before the master plan.

A pā noa is built to be used

At the center of the garden is a pā noa, a space for cultural practice and ceremony. It is named Puʻuwaikilanuiokalani, meaning "courageous heart of the heavenly one." Maui Now reported that it is the only pā noa at a resort on Maui. The resort describes it as a dedicated place for hula and cultural gatherings, so that storytelling through movement and mele "continues to be lived, not just remembered."

That is why "future community events" appears in the announcement. Aunty Mopsie put it this way in Maui Now's coverage:

"We welcome guests, visitors and the community not only into this special place, but into a story that continues to live and grow through all who honor it."

According to Maui Now, the garden was years in the making. It grew from a shared vision between Aunty Mopsie and Uncle Kevin, developed in close collaboration with Hawaiian kumu and cultural practitioners. A space designed for ceremony depends on the community showing up, and the first published chance to do that with a guide arrives tomorrow.

This weekend, the garden gets its first guided tours

Four Seasons is hosting Festivals of Aloha for the fifth year, Friday, October 23 through Sunday, October 25. The resort's October 14 announcement describes the programming as complimentary for resort guests and community members alike. Guided tours of The Queen's Garden are part of it. On the resort's published schedule, they run 10 to 11 a.m. on Friday and again on Saturday.

The rest of the weekend gives a tour morning plenty around it:

Several of these events connect back to the garden. Saturday's He Waʻa Koa talk marks the 50th anniversary of Hōkūleʻa's first voyage to Tahiti and back. Speaker Penny Martin was one of two women aboard. "Hula is the Heartbeat" pairs the Mākaha Sons, who are celebrating 50 years of music, with four Maui hālau and a guest appearance by Miss Aloha Hula 2026. The hālau are Hālau Kekuaokalāʻauʻalaʻiliahi, Hālau Hula Kauluokalā, Hālau Keʻalaokamaile and Hālau Nā Lei Kaumaka o Uka. Sunday's Kumu Hula Panel looks at how hula lineages are sustained here by Maui kumu, the same living-practice idea behind the pā noa. The Live Aloha Market brings 22 local vendors.

Evening times vary a little between sources. Maui Now's August festival preview lists earlier door times, such as 4 p.m. for the falsetto contest. The resort's schedule above is the more recent one, but arriving early for the night shows costs little.

Getting in without hunting for a resort space

The resort is offering free parking with a round-trip shuttle from Wailea Event Parking, across from Monkeypod off Wailea Ike Drive. Shuttle hours are 9 a.m. to 10 p.m. Friday, 9:30 a.m. to midnight Saturday, and on Sunday 8 a.m. to 3 p.m. and again 4 to 10 p.m. The schedule credits WCA as the shuttle sponsor.

A 10 a.m. tour leaves time for coffee first. Pantry Maui by Madhappy opened at the resort in late August. It is the Los Angeles concept's first standalone café and its first in Hawaiʻi, open daily 6 a.m. to 6 p.m. to resort guests and local visitors. The menu includes a Poi Coconut Crown pastry and a Mango Sticky Rice Matcha Latte. It also carries cold-pressed juices from Maui Juice Co. and chocolate from Lonohana Estate Chocolate, made with Hawaiʻi-grown cacao.

For a visit after the festival, the resort's announcement gives (808) 874-8000 as the number for information. Call ahead about access and timing on other days, since the self-guided stations are always there but the guided version so far appears only on the festival calendar. Late October is a good moment for it anyway. As our look at Wailea's three fall clocks laid out, the quiet stretch before the holidays doesn't last long.

The crown flower, pikake and puakenikeni the Queen loved are growing in Honuaʻula soil now, a short drive from home for most of South Maui. At Kate and Wendy Peterson, our family has spent generations caring for Maui's places and the stories behind them, and we're always glad to talk about the cultural side of Wailea and Makena. If the tour leaves you curious about the history under your own neighborhood, reach out to us and we'll share what we know.