Spanish Coup For Kim
New Zealand fashion designer Jaeha-Alex Kim, 23, was one of 10 finalists at the second El Boton-MANGO Fashion Awards held in Barcelona and though not the winner, Kim’s collection has been selected to be…
News of New Zealanders via Global Media
Love bites
“Anna Paquin is about to catapult into a rare form of superstardom, the kind in which a television actress becomes an A-list fixture (á la Sarah Jessica Parker)”, writes Cristina Greevan Cuomo for the…
Be Seen In Wickstead
Twenty-five-year-old Auckland-born fashion designer Emilia Wickstead’s “elegantly demure collection of refined, pretty silk separates is already being seen at some of London’s most fashionable locales,” writes Julia Neel for British Vogue “as the well-heeled…
During on NZ best
New Zealander, private arts advisor and curator, Helen Klisser During, who is based in New York and Connecticut, talks to the NYArtsmagazine.com’s D. Dominick Lombardi about New Zealand art. When asked to put New…
Learning With Light
Hawkes Bay-based designer David Trubridge’s The Three Baskets of Knowledge features in a Los Angeles Times photo gallery with an image of “pendulous lighting fixtures that look like giant water droplets suspended in baskets…
Ladyhawke’s in Vogue
Pip Brown aka Ladyhawke, the former-Wellingtonian and undisputed queen of the synthpop revival, is profiled in the April issue of Teen Vogue, as one of “five musical acts who will be in heavy rotate…
Urban Trampers
Kate Sylvester’s great-outdoors inspired Take a Hike collection took to the runway at Rosemount Australian Fashion Week with models parading shorts, gaiters and anorak-style dresses. Sylvester told Grazia about the inspiration behind the collection:…
Snowed In
Some of New Zealand’s top ski spots are reviewed by worldwide online ski site On the Snow, including “the quirky ski field that is home to Burton’s The Stash, a natural terrain run with…
Couplets at the Globe
Hokianga-born actor Rawiri Paratene, well-known for his role as Koro Apirana in Niki Caro’s Whale Rider, is Friar Lawrence in a London Shakespeare’s Globe presentation of Romeo and Juliet, the first New Zealander…
Upritchard’s new work
London-based New Zealand artist, Francis Upritchard, 32, launched her new book Every Colour By Itself last week, at a reception held at New Zealand House in London by High Commissioner Derek Leask, hosted by…
Something Gained
Defending IndyCar Series champion New Zealander Scott Dixon, 28, has won the Road Runner Turbo Indy 3000 at Kansas Speedway. “We needed something,” Dixon said. “You know, even a sniff of something. Because so…
Transformed in Sydney
Auckland-based artist Lisa Reihana will consider “what it means to transform the self into another persona”, at an upcoming exhibition entitled Double Take on at the Art Gallery of New South Wales from May…
Mothers make green
Ecostore founder Malcolm Rands has been touring American hypermarket chain Meijer promoting his environmentally friendly household cleaning products, the stores the exclusive retailer of his products. A well-known environmentalist in New Zealand, Rands is…
Merino magic
For the fourth year running South Canterbury merino farmers Barrie and Yvonne Payne, owners of Visulea Farm in Maungati, have won the Loro Piana Record Bale Award for the highest price paid for a…
Tree Gods Unite
A ceremony to form a “sister-tree relationship” between Waipoua Forest’s Tane Mahuta and an ancient Japanese cedar tree located on Yakushima Island, a UNESCO World Heritage site, was held this month at the base…
Man of the match
Captain of the Black Caps and Delhi Daredevils player Daniel Vettori, 30, is interviewed by the Hindustan Times about his role as spinner in T20 and his adjustment to the Indian Premier League. “You have to…
To Henley Royal
New Zealand Rowing has confirmed that after the Munich World Cup in June, the entire team will move to England to train at Dorney Lake for Britain’s summer Henley Royal Regatta. The trip, between…
Painted loneliness
Christchurch-born painter Euan Macleod has won the 2009 Gallipoli Art Prize, a prize valued at $20,000 for Smoke/Pinklandscape/Shovel which portrays the muddy trenches of World War I. Competition judge John McDonald said: “This year,…
Leading negotiant
New Zealand’s Ambassador to the World Trade Organisation (WTO) Dr David Walker has been appointed as the new Chair of the WTO Doha Round Agriculture Negotiations. Walker replaces fellow New Zealander Crawford Falconer, who…
Alternate landscapes
From next year, the North and South Islands could be renamed in Maori. A discovery by officials that the existing names had never been adopted in law has increased pressure from Maori nationalists for…
Embassy Glamour
New Zealand High Commissioner Rupert Holborow hosted a World of Wearable Art show for this year’s Indian contestants at his residence at Chanakyapuri. Blurring the boundaries between art and fashion, of the 10 sculptural…
Eskimo furore
The humble Eskimo lolly will remain on New Zealand shelves though lambasted by a Canadian visitor who claimed the confectionary’s shape and name was a racist slur against the Inuit. Seeka Lee Veevee…
Space traveller
Gisborne-born aeronautic engineer Lester Waugh has been presented with a New Zealand flag which has traveled 216 times around the earth in the space shuttle Discovery. The gift from Nasa was a “rare honour”,…
Balance in stone
Waitakere sculptor John Edgar’s ‘Ballast’ exhibition, which uses stone collected from various historic Scottish quarries, will be on show as part of the Edinburgh Arts Festival from August 5 through November 30 at the…
Up in the Trees
New Zealand directory company Yellow has built a Tree House Restaurant using only resources listed in its books. The restaurant, described by Lucy Gauntlett of the Los Angeles Times as “a graceful pod that…
Bony buoyancy
Peter Jackson’s film adaptation of Alice Sebold’s best-selling novel The Lovely Bones though “murderous is also optimistic”, headlines USA Today. For all the violence and grief of The Lovely Bones, Jackson believes the movie…
Symphony ire
New Zealand anti-apartheid activist John Minto recently flew to Capetown to lend his support to 127 families who for the past 14 months have lived in makeshift homes on Symphony Way pavement in the…
Bringing Back Bold
Artistic director of Lancôme Auckland-born Aaron de Mey, 35, “is one of the new breed of male creative directors shaking up the beauty” who “longs to halt the relentless tide of beige, to put…
Changing fiction
18 April 2009 – Auckland-based author Witi Ihimaera, 65, is in the process of reworking earlier fiction saying that “as the author grows, so should their stories.” “Writers should be able to transform their…
All Fenced in and Loving It
The South Island Tieke is making a protected return home after a 100-year hiatus, as the newest resident of the Orokonui Ecosanctuary. Forty tiekes, also known as saddlebacks, were released into the predator free…
Ratting Out the Weasels
Stoats, which were first introduced to New Zealand in the 19th century to combat the spread of the rabbit, have decimated the kiwi population reducing little spotted kiwi and Rowi or Okarito brown kiwi…
Critical Condition
Three birds have joined ranks of the critically endangered, after an assessment by a panel of experts analysing data on 428 native birds. The grey duck, the eastern rock hopper penguin, and the grey-headed…
Paquin the heroine
On the back of recent success as Sookie Starkhouse in vampire series True Blood, New Zealand Golden Globe winner Anna Paquin turns her talents to a made for television film taking the lead role…
Ballroom blitz
Professional ballroom dancers Aucklander Erin Boag, 33, and her partner Briton Anton Du Beke who both starred in the successful UK television talent show Strictly Come Dancing, have just completed a documentary for Sky…
Truly popular
Creator of the 1999 New Zealand reality show Popstars Jonathan Dowling, 46, has changed the face of television sparking spinoff TV formats, such as The X Factor, American Idol and Britain’s Got Talent. Though…
All that Jazz
The rapid growth of New Zealand’s premium new apple variety Jazz has reached another milestone this year with over 1.2 million cartons of apples forecast to be exported in 2009. Revered for its outstanding…
Professionally talking
The Flight of the Conchords are touring the United States donning “unwieldy” robot costumes and “playfully insulting” theirenthusiastic heckling audiences. At New York City’s Radio City Music Hall by the end of Too Many…
Kakapo Comeback
The Kakapo, a flightless, nocturnal, critically threatened New Zealand parrot that was long thought extinct, has staged a tiny comeback. Scientists are hailing the arrival of 34 kakapo chicks this year, propelling the total…
Moa Meals Uncovered
University of Otago postgraduate Jamie Wood collects moa dung, or coprolites, which he finds on tip-offs from hunters who report findings of moa bones. Alan Cooper of the University of Adelaide, who specialises in…
On Slick for a First
Teenage jockey Samantha Collett — who in only three years has won more than 100 races — rode Sir Slick in the $AU2 million Emirates Doncaster Mile at Royal Randwick, the “biggest race” she’s…
Pro and ready for PGA
14 April 2009 – Eighteen-year-old New Zealand US Amateur Champion Danny Lee has turned pro, signing a deal believed to be worth $US10 million with IMG. Lee will make his professional debut at the…
Surprises from the Bay
Craggy Range winemaker Rod Easthope was up at London’s Penthouse Suite of New Zealand House promoting Gimblett Gravels varietals and astonishing the attending 30 or so UK Masters of Wine, sommeliers, wine buyers and…
Harlequins Hero
As Harlequins fly-half, Nick Evans “produced the greatest four minutes of controlled rugby I have been privileged to see against Stade Français” according to Times sports columnist Stuart Barnes. Evans next plays on Sunday…
Purple potato on the gravy train
Plant and Food Research, New Zealand’s sole potato breeder, has developed a new purple skinned potato as one of 16 new cultivars bred by the company. Purple Heart, as the potato is called, is…
Beautiful or Else
“In New Zealand some things are taken very seriously and some are not. Sport is serious. Politics is not. Lifestyle is serious; religion less so,” explains Joanna Norris for Abu Dhabi’s English-language newspaper The…
Sports Refugee Remembered
Wanganui-born journalist Jock Veitch who as a student at Wanganui Collegiate was regarded as a slacker and told there was nothing wrong with him that a game of rugger or cricket couldn’t fix, has…
High Time for Cricket
Two teams consisting of 30 New Zealanders, Australians and Britons will play a Twenty20 cricket match at the foot of Mount Everest in Gorak Shep, which is at an altitude of 5165 metres on April 21…
Whisked Debate
Helen Leach, an academic at Otago University, is hoping to settle the origins of the pavlova with recipes found in a 1933 Mothers’ Union cookbook and in a 1929 rural magazine, both calling the…
Home on the Pa
Leading member of the Nga Puhi iwi Hone Mihaka is an oral historian guiding tourists about the land of his ancestors and the Ruapekapeka pa, 14km south east of Kawakawa and one of the…
Hokitika’s Wild Side
The population quadrupled this autumn in Hokitika, as food enthusiasts from around the world flocked to get a taste of the 20th Wildfoods Festival, serving up a host of obscure, adventurous, and downright daring…
Hitched
For those looking to tie the perfect knot, New Zealand is worth the trip halfway across the world, according to Brit Marc Brierly and his fiancée, New Zealander Angie Watson. “Afterwards, everyone said what…
Reigniting the value of wool
As Chair of Wool Partners International, Theresa Gattung is at the forefront of a campaign to reignite the value of one of New Zealand’s oldest export commodities on the world stage. Gattung…
To Save the Queen or Not
Former Prime Minister Helen Clark, 59, who has given her valedictory speech to the House after 27 years as an MP, said the country’s institutions had “evolved a long way from our colonial heritage”….
Parisian Hang-Ups
Phillipa ‘Pip’ Brown, 30, that’s Ladyhawke to her fans, is interviewed in Paris, where outside the French capital’s “cavernous Nouveau Casino venue, the line of ticketless opportunists snaking into the fading light speaks for…
Cheap sticks
Wellington-based percussion group Strike is in Singapore to play as part of a New Zealand festival. Strike met at Victoria University, when they were mostly playing chamber music, and now are a group of…
Morrison’s future roles
The best example and a “notable exception” of a “Native … living in the future quite comfortably, particularly in sci-fi movies” would be Temuera Morrison, writes Peterborough Examiner columnist and award-winning Ojibwa author Drew…
