May 25, 2023
Celebrating the Big Mango
This Doodle’s Key Themes
Today’s Doodle celebrates Australia’s Big Mango, an iconic road trip and tourist destination built to honor Bowen’s agricultural industry. The structure is one of the many Big Things across the country – a collection of massive roadside attractions that includes an acorn, banana, and gumboot just to name a few. Construction of the Big Mango began on this day in 2002, making today its 21st birthday!
In 2002, the town of Bowen, in North Queensland, built a hefty tribute to their world-famous mangoes and prosperous fruit orchards. The Big Mango is on the Bruce Highway, just 5km south of the town of Bowen. The town is also known as the “salad bowl of the north” as they also grow tomatoes, capsicums and other vegetables.
Weighing in at over five tons and standing at ten meters tall, the mango is truly an unmissable attraction. The $90K, fiberglass structure is modeled after The 'Kensington Pride' mango, as Bowen is the birthplace of this variety after it was introduced from India in 1871. The Kensington Pride is also referred to as the ‘Bowen Special’.
A massive mango is unconventional in its own right, but something even more surprising happened in 2014: the giant piece of fruit disappeared overnight! After weeks of mango-filled headlines, a restaurant chain admitted to stealing the mango to promote a new menu item. The mango eventually returned to its rightful place in Bowen.
Now, manGO see this thing with your own eyes!
Check out the behind-the-scenes process for
today’s Doodle artwork by Doodler, Sophie Diao
Early Doodle sketches
Clay model work-in-progress photo
Where this Doodle appeared
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