The New Zealand Pavilion, located at the centre of the Exposition site, quickly gained a reputation for being one of the best international Pavilions - and with the longest -some time up to 3 or 4 hours - queues. Avoiding the wait, it became common folklore by the end of the Exposition to do the 'Exposition sprint' to the New Zealand Pavilion as soon as the Expo opened it's gates at 10.00 a.m. Hoards of visitors with Expo guide book, bags and children in hand running to the Pavilion became a sight to see in the first few minutes of the Expo day!

People endured hours to see this neighbourly friend - so close, yet so far - whose exterior featured a distinctive turquoise colour water-wall - reminiscent of the  New Zealand indigenous paua shell (that also provided a stage for Maori dancing) - and a replica of an ancient Kauri forest adjoining the banks of the Expositions's popular Pacific Lagoon. Here amongst the artificial mist one could explore as a child the wonders of New Zealand's forests - with several of the ancient tree stumps open to further exploration.

Inside the Pavilion,  past the Hall of Fame where New Zealand's heroes and inventions were chronicled in ice, guests entered the 'Theatre of Sensation' - a 'moving theatre' highlighting New Zealand through the eyes of Children - theme of the Pavilion - with humourous animated cattle dog from "Footrot Flats" (a popular syndicated New Zealand cartoon that also has a great following in Australia) as one of the guides.

Finally, guests left the Pavilion through a replica glow-worm cave.

The New Zealand Pavilion at the 1988 World Expo in Brisbane won for Logan Brewer Production Design, designers of the Pavilion, the vote of Most Popular Pavilion and the NZ Institute of Architects Presidential Citation. Logan Brewer Production Design were later also commissioned to design the New Zealand Pavilion at the Universal Exposition of Seville, in Spain, in 1992.