Mon Repos Turtle Centre, Bundaberg QLD

The Challenge

Mon Repos Conservation Park near Bundaberg is one of Australia’s most important marine turtle nesting sites and supports the largest concentration of nesting endangered loggerhead turtles on the eastern Australian mainland. Successful breeding here plays a direct role in supporting the long-term survival of this species.

The Mon Repos Turtle Centre, operated by Queensland Parks and Wildlife Service, underwent a multi-million-dollar redevelopment to improve visitor facilities, interpretive spaces and conservation education year-round. The centre’s upgrade included modern exhibits, immersive displays and expanded research and educational capacity.

As part of these improvements, outdoor visitor spaces required renewal to better support use throughout the year, align with the centre’s new direction and reflect the ecological significance of the site. Furniture needed to perform reliably in a coastal environment exposed to salt air, strong UV and changing weather conditions, and align with sustainability goals that reinforce the park’s conservation purpose.

Rather than standard street and park furniture, the project required outdoor seating that could both perform in a coastal setting and visually connect to the site’s turtle conservation story.

The Solution

A semi-custom solution was developed using GX Outdoors HYVE modular park seating range, allowing functional seating to also reflect the identity and purpose of Mon Repos.

HYVE is a modular park furniture system made from 100% recyclable aluminium — designed to grow with your community. Add, reconfigure or expand components over time while maintaining a cohesive look, reducing waste and avoiding full furniture replacement.

To respect the natural environment and coastal setting, the seating was finished in TimberImage, providing a warm timber-like aesthetic while using aluminium for durability, corrosion resistance and low maintenance in salt-air conditions.

Custom laser-cut turtle detailing was applied to the HYVE park seats, embedding a meaningful reference to the endangered loggerhead turtles into the built environment. Rather than relying on standalone signage, this semi-custom feature links the furniture directly to the conservation work and natural narrative of the park.

Aluminium’s fully recyclable properties also supported the broader sustainability intent of the Turtle Centre’s upgrade, aligning material selection with environmental values. The result is seating that performs in a coastal environment, supports visitor comfort and reinforces the conservation story at the heart of Mon Repos Conservation Park.

Learn more about this project in the video below where the GX Outdoors team revisited Mon Repos for World Turtle Day.