News of New Zealanders via Global Media

Don’t Mess with Mary Quin

Don’t Mess with Mary Quin

After narrowly surviving being held hostage, former-Xerox executive, New Zealander Mary Quin tells 60 Minutes how she brought a radical British cleric to justice for his role in the kidnapping. A dual citizen of New…

Francis Upritchard’s Frieze Show a Tour de Force

Francis Upritchard’s Frieze Show a Tour de Force

New Zealand-born Francis Upritchard’s solo presentation at this year’s Art Frieze Fair in London at the booth of London dealer Kate MacGarry, was the “best and most absorbing” of the exhibits, according to the…

Thomston Making Unashamed Pop Music

Thomston Making Unashamed Pop Music

There’s a tendency for males making pop with any sort of prefix to skew themselves towards less mainstream channels. That’s exactly why 20-year-old New Zealander Thomston could be the next best popstar, according to…

Flying Nun History with Pictures

Flying Nun History with Pictures

Following a review of founder Roger Shepherd’s memoir In Love With These Times: My Life With Flying Nun Records, Wire magazine has published the stories behind some of the photographs included in the book. The…

New Zealand’s Plan to Save The Kiwi

New Zealand’s Plan to Save The Kiwi

“Some 100,000 wild kiwi could be roaming New Zealand in less than 15 years, according to a new government plan,” reports the BBC. “The Kiwi Recovery Plan 2017-2027 by the Department…

4 Hidden Gems to See in New Zealand

4 Hidden Gems to See in New Zealand

“Tell someone you will be traveling to New Zealand, and you are bound to be showered with plenty of free travel advice,” writes travel blogger Worldwide Scott in an article for

New Zealand’s Summer Cruise Season

New Zealand’s Summer Cruise Season

New Zealand’s 2016-17 summer cruise season “will welcome a record number of ships, including many first-time visitors, most notably the biggest vessel ever to sail in local waters, the 4,180-passenger Ovation of the Seas,…

Tourism New Zealand Recognised at Luxperience

Tourism New Zealand Recognised at Luxperience

Tourism New Zealand “won the prestigious ‘Destination Award’, which is awarded to the destination that best incorporates luxury travel as a key contributor to attracting visitors, and an award for their display area at…

Excellent Reasons to go to New Zealand

Excellent Reasons to go to New Zealand

While New Zealand “is an adventure traveler’s paradise with bungee jumping, skydiving and extreme zorbing options galore, you don’t have to be Richard Branson to enjoy it all,” writes Beau Flemister for

Shifting Sands take Gorgeous Guitar Pop to US

Shifting Sands take Gorgeous Guitar Pop to US

Dunedin psychedelic pop trio The Shifting Sands were encouraged to tour the United States by a big fan, American singer-songwriter Sharon Van Etten. Etten said: “I fell in love with The Shifting Sands music a…

Why 2016’s Exciting New Americana is Antipodean

Why 2016’s Exciting New Americana is Antipodean

New Zealanders Nadia Reid and Marlon Williams are part of “a bold young Oceanic Americana cohort” according to the Guardian’s Laura Snapes. A new wave of young New Zealand and Australian-based artists are giving Nashville’s…

Kimbra’s New Single Sweet Relief Praised

Kimbra’s New Single Sweet Relief Praised

New Zealand pop singer Kimbra, 26, has released a new single, the first since the release of her sophomore album The Golden Echo in 2013. “Sweet Relief” is “bloody excellent,” according to online music…

Waiheke Island and Great Barrier Island

Waiheke Island and Great Barrier Island

New Zealand’s “Great Barrier Island is a gorgeous unspoilt spot where native forest runs down steep slopes to beautiful isolated beaches and walking trails interconnect the paved road to a paradise of hot mineral…

Rebecca Taylor Talks Breezy Autumn Denim

Rebecca Taylor Talks Breezy Autumn Denim

New Zealand-born designer Rebecca Taylor, who recently launched her new Parisian-influenced line La Vie, talks with Stuart Magazine about the collection, a lot of denim, and her inspirations. “It’s been a long-term goal of mine…

New Zealand – 13th Most Competitive Country

New Zealand – 13th Most Competitive Country

New Zealand has been identified as the 13th most competitive country in the World Economic Forum’s Global Competitiveness Report. “Countries were ranked according to the “12 pillars of competitiveness,” which includes macro-economic environment, infrastructure, health…

Carrie Beehan Premieres “Ass In The Middle”

Carrie Beehan Premieres “Ass In The Middle”

“An artist in the truest sense of the word, Carrie Beehan is now gearing up to unveil her latest sonic self and narrative,” as reported in article in GroundSounds. The New Zealander…

Katherine Mansfield’s Inscrutability Intrigues

Katherine Mansfield’s Inscrutability Intrigues

In the acclaimed biography La Vida Breve di Katherine Mansfield, written by famed Italian literary critic and author Pietro Citati, the New Zealand-born writer’s stories are described as having the special quality of “distance”….

Elderly New Zealanders Building Their Own Caskets

Elderly New Zealanders Building Their Own Caskets

Quilting, lawn bowls and bridge it is not. Elderly people in New Zealand are enthusiastically embracing a new pastime: coffin construction, providing retirees with new friends and, ultimately, cheaper funerals, Eleanor Ainge Roy reports…

The Rehearsal Adaptation a Team Effort

The Rehearsal Adaptation a Team Effort

The spirit of collaboration runs deep in Alison Maclean’s The Rehearsal, the Canadian filmmaker’s often ambitious and hearteningly daring big screen adaptation of Man Booker Prize-winning author New Zealander Eleanor Catton’s first novel of…

Stephen Moore Completes Singapore Bike Quest

Stephen Moore Completes Singapore Bike Quest

A New Zealander who set out two years ago to pedal his bike on every Singapore road – save those where cycling is not allowed – has finally completed his quest. Stephen Moore, 49,…

No Caller ID Makes Hollywood’s Screamfest Lineup

No Caller ID Makes Hollywood’s Screamfest Lineup

Slasher film No Caller I.D., which was shot in one night and on a three-figure budget, has been accepted into Hollywood’s prestigious Screamfest Horror Film Festival. Best friends Guy Pigden and Harley Neville shot the…

Pumas No Match for Unstoppable All Blacks

Pumas No Match for Unstoppable All Blacks

Title-holders New Zealand have made it five bonus-point victories out of five in this year’s Rugby Championship beating Argentina 36-17 in Buenos Aires in front of a 50,000-strong home crowd, South Africa’s Independent Online…

What We Do In The Shadows – Mockumentary You Need to Watch

What We Do In The Shadows – Mockumentary You Need to Watch

Kiwi mockumentary What We Do In The Shadows has been included in a list of mockumentaries you will need to watch in an article on Vice. What We Do in the Shadows, directed,…

BMW to Help Build NZ’s Electric Vehicle “Highway”

BMW to Help Build NZ’s Electric Vehicle “Highway”

German automaker BMW has partnered with national charging network Charge Net NZ to help “build an electric highway of fast-charging stations to help overcome one of the main obstacles to electric vehicle uptake”, as…

NZ Researchers Decode First Electronic Song

NZ Researchers Decode First Electronic Song

Researchers from the University of Canterbury in New Zealand have managed to restore the first ever computer-generated piece of music, which was created by Alan Turing, as reported in The Telegraph. The recording was…

Bali Dog Orphanage Volunteer loves Results

Bali Dog Orphanage Volunteer loves Results

Ten years ago, New Zealander Alanah Dalton was holidaying in Ubud when a poster outside a shop front that said “I Love Bali Dogs” caught her eye. “I love animals, so I stopped in…

Why Craig Cooper Invests in Adventure Sports

Why Craig Cooper Invests in Adventure Sports

When New Zealand-born venture capitalist Craig Cooper isn’t rock climbing, meditating or writing for his men’s health blog The New Prime, he’s looking for the next great product to invest in. As…

Actor Terence Bayler Was Brian and so Was His Wife

Actor Terence Bayler Was Brian and so Was His Wife

Whanganui-born film, stage and television actor Terence Bayler, known notably for his collaborations with the Monty Python team, has died aged 86. Bayler played Gregory (and other roles) in the controversial Life of Brian –…

Emilia Wickstead Shares Her Favourite Things

Emilia Wickstead Shares Her Favourite Things

London-based, New Zealand-born fashion designer Emilia Wickstead shares a few of her favourite things for the Telegraph’s “My Luxuries” column. Wickstead, who according to the Financial Times showed a “whimsical and poetic”…

Virgin’s Josh Bayliss Plugging Luxury Gyms

Virgin’s Josh Bayliss Plugging Luxury Gyms

Switzerland-based Virgin Group chief executive New Zealander Josh Bayliss was in Sydney recently to promote the company’s luxury gym arm The Collection, which will open its first gym in Australia next year. The gym business…

Fis Creating Eco-Conscious Electronics

Fis Creating Eco-Conscious Electronics

“Before I was producing music electronically I was a drummer, and I really loved just trying to stop thinking and just play rhythm,” New Zealand-born producer Oliver Peryman aka Fis tells The…

Paul Shanta Dealing to Sydney’s Graffiti

Paul Shanta Dealing to Sydney’s Graffiti

New Zealand-born artist Paul Shanta has come up with a colourful solution to the bad graffiti problem littering the streetscapes of Sydney suburb Campsie. Shanta is offering to stencil over the ugly graffiti with…

Epic Middle Earth Locations That Really Exist

Epic Middle Earth Locations That Really Exist

“As World Hobbit Day makes us wistful for Middle Earth’s colossal mountain ranges, mythical forests and untamed rivers, we look to the epic landscapes that stole the show in the Hobbit and Lord of…

Kate Catalinac Keeping Her Eye on US Elections

Kate Catalinac Keeping Her Eye on US Elections

Creative director at San Francisco advertising agency Goodby, Silverstein & Partners, New Zealand-born Kate Catalinac is the co-creator of an “eye-opening” anti-Donald Trump video that juxtaposes the United States’ legacy of great accomplishments against…

Gillian Saunders Takes Top Honours at World of Wearable Art Awards Show

Gillian Saunders Takes Top Honours at World of Wearable Art Awards Show

New Zealand designer Gillian Saunders has taken out the Brancott Estate Supreme Award at the World of Wearable Art (WOW) Awards’ Show in Wellington with Supernova, as reported in Lucire. “I had been…

Flying Nun History Recounted by Roger Shepherd

Flying Nun History Recounted by Roger Shepherd

“We forget, or don’t know, or don’t think about it – how difficult it used to be to release records if you weren’t signed to a major label, pre-digital download, pre-social media, pre-internet, never…

Grant Rawlinson to Row from Singapore to NZ

Grant Rawlinson to Row from Singapore to NZ

Adventurer New Zealander Grant Rawlinson, 42, continues to push the limits embarking on a 12,000km rowing and cycling journey from Singapore to New Zealand. The Singapore permanent resident, who is known as Axe to his…

What Fine Dining Means to Ben Shewry

What Fine Dining Means to Ben Shewry

American quarterly journal of food and writing Lucky Peach magazine features an article in the latest issue on the state of fine dining and talks to 18 of the world’s best chef’s, including New…

World-Class Creative Peter Jackson Says Dream

World-Class Creative Peter Jackson Says Dream

Seventeen-time Oscar winning director Peter Jackson spent some time recently with Forbes correspondent Brian Rashid to share his ideas about creativity, his processes, and mindset around being a world-class creative. “Jackson admittedly, does not consider…

Stunning NZ Films You Should Know About

Stunning NZ Films You Should Know About

“New Zealand certainly brings a fair few ‘bests’ to the table. Aside from being one of the most beautiful countries in the world, responsible for some of the greatest exploratory and scientific minds,…

Peter Jackson Eyes NZ Island For Tourism Project

Peter Jackson Eyes NZ Island For Tourism Project

“Peter Jackson, the man you know as the spirited angel who bestowed cinematic genius upon the world in the form of the “Lord of the Rings” trilogy, is set to inspire more tourism interest…

The World’s Only Alpine Parrot Faces Extinction

The World’s Only Alpine Parrot Faces Extinction

The New Zealand kea, the world’s only alpine parrot “is at threat of extinction in New Zealand as numbers plummet in the face of threats from non-native predators and human development,” writes Eleanor Ainge…

NZ Selects ‘A Flickering Truth’ for Foreign-Language Category

NZ Selects ‘A Flickering Truth’ for Foreign-Language Category

New Zealand has selected Afghanistan-set documentary A Flickering Truth, which was produced and directed by Pietra Bretkelly, for the best foreign-language film category for the 2017 Academy Awards, as reported in The…

Cliff Curtis Joins Warner Bros’ Shark Pic ‘Meg’

Cliff Curtis Joins Warner Bros’ Shark Pic ‘Meg’

New Zealand actor Cliff Curtis has joined the cast for Warner Bros’ Shark Pic ‘Meg’, as reported in Deadline. The film is based on Steve Alten’s 1997 novel, Meg: A Novel of…

On Top Of A New Zealand Volcano

On Top Of A New Zealand Volcano

“When NBA giant Steven Adams returned home to New Zealand this summer/winter (depending on your hemisphere) with an Oklahoma City Thunder contingent, he made a fast break for” Rangitoto Island – “a magnificent volcanic…

New Zealand Beloved by Expats in HSBC Ranking

New Zealand Beloved by Expats in HSBC Ranking

New Zealand has been ranked as the runner-up in global financial services company HSBC’s Expat Explorer Survey, in which researchers asked a range of questions to 27,000 expats from 190 different countries and territories,…

The Rise Of Film-Friendly New Zealand

The Rise Of Film-Friendly New Zealand

The screen industry in New Zealand is “big business: four of the all-time 20 most profitable films were made here, and revenue in 2015 was $3.22 billion compared to just $2.6 billion in 2005,”…

The Naked and Famous Lay Low

The Naked and Famous Lay Low

“All The Naked And Famous do is deliver hits,” according to Boston-based online music magazine, Vanyaland. “The New Zealand-, Los Angeles-based electronic pop group first crashed our playlists with 2010’s incredible Passive Me, Aggressive…

Photographer Roger Shepherd Dreams of United Korea

Photographer Roger Shepherd Dreams of United Korea

New Zealander Roger Shepherd, who holds the record of being the first foreigner to walk in many of the remotest mountains of North Korea since at least the 1950-53 Korean War, dreams of the…

Apple’s Zane Lowe Securing the Big Interviews

Apple’s Zane Lowe Securing the Big Interviews

Apple’s super-DJ is the most powerful player in music – and the man who can bring Britney to London. New Zealander Zane Lowe tells the Evening Standard about working with Calvin Harris, Drake and…

Countdown to New Zealand’s First Space Launch

Countdown to New Zealand’s First Space Launch

The New Zealand government has signed a contract with Rocket Lab, “a commercial space launch operator using technology developed in New Zealand, for launch operations on the Mahia Peninsula, on the east of the…

Actor Michelle Langstone Getting on with It

Actor Michelle Langstone Getting on with It

From McLeod’s Daughters to Power Rangers and Legend of the Seeker, Sydney-based New Zealander Michelle Langstone, 37, is a quiet achiever of television, according to the Daily Telegraph. Most recently, she’s one of the stars…

How Andrew Dominik Relayed Nick Cave’s Trauma

How Andrew Dominik Relayed Nick Cave’s Trauma

New Zealand-born director Andrew Dominik said he made the Nick Cave documentary One More Time With Feeling, expecting viewers to see it only once, and not many viewers at that. The new album by Nick…

Marlon Williams Celebrates Where He’s From

Marlon Williams Celebrates Where He’s From

Marlon Williams’ renown started spreading outside of New Zealand in 2015 when the highly renowned Bloomington, Ind./Austin-based label Dead Oceans released his excellent, self-titled solo debut, Justin Joffe reports for the Observer. Williams, 25,…

Biofuel LanzaTech Partner with Virgin Atlantic

Biofuel LanzaTech Partner with Virgin Atlantic

LanzaTech, which was formed in New Zealand 11 years ago, has made an aviation biofuel breakthrough with partner airline Virgin Atlantic, producing nearly 5700 litres of low-carbon ethanol produced from waste gases for the…

New Generation of Maori Women Wearing Moko

New Generation of Maori Women Wearing Moko

For Maori women, the moko kauae, or traditional female chin tattoo, is considered a physical manifestation of their true identity. It is believed every Maori woman wears a moko on the inside, close to…