Gothic horror film Mārama chosen as New Zealand’s entry for the 2027 Oscars
A gothic horror film about a young Māori woman who travels from Wellington to a brooding Yorkshire manor will carry New Zealand’s hopes at the 2027 Academy Awards. The New…
Category: Culture
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Wellington’s City Gallery reopens after two years with a Cornelia Parker show of exploded sheds and flattened silver
City Gallery Wellington opens its doors in Civic Square today, Saturday 10 October, for the first time since it closed in June 2024 for earthquake strengthening, and it has brought…
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What to plant in your New Zealand garden this October
October is Labour Weekend — which in Kiwi gardening folklore means the tomatoes go in. It’s also the month for corn, beans, cucumber and the first kūmara in the warm…
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World of WearableArt cancels two Wellington shows after a crew member dies at TSB Arena
World of WearableArt has cancelled two performances of its 2026 Wellington season after a crew member died at TSB Arena on Friday morning. The organisers also had to change how…
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Katherine Mansfield’s childhood home in Karori is for sale for almost $2 million
The Karori house where Katherine Mansfield spent what her biographers describe as the happiest years of her childhood is for sale. Chesney Wold, at 372 Karori Road in Wellington, is…
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Flight of the Conchords announce five November shows in their first New Zealand tour since 2012
Bret McKenzie and Jemaine Clement will play Wellington, Christchurch and Auckland in November, 14 years after their last New Zealand tour.
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The Pink and White Terraces and the night Tarawera erupted
The Pink and White Terraces drew the world to Rotomahana until Tarawera erupted on 10 June 1886. What visitors saw, how the night went, and where they are now.
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Sir Peter Buck, Te Rangi Hīroa, the Urenui doctor who became the world’s great scholar of Polynesia
He was a Te Aute boy and an Otago-trained doctor, an MP for Northern Maori, the second-in-command of the New Zealand (Māori) Pioneer Battalion at Gallipoli, the director of the…
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What to plant in your New Zealand garden this September
Spring has arrived. September is when the gardening year really starts — potatoes go in, peas and carrots can be sown, and the summer vegetables begin their long journey from…
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Dame Whina Cooper, the Hokianga rangatira who turned three lives into one long argument with the Crown
She was 18 when she filled in the drains as fast as the European farmer could dig them, 55 when she became the first president of the Māori Women’s Welfare…
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Every gold award at The Big Sing finale went to an Auckland school choir
Twenty four choirs competed in Christchurch over three days and all eight gold awards went to Auckland schools, three of them to the two Westlake colleges.
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Te Moananui-a-Kiwa Ngārimu, the Whareponga shepherd who threw stones on the night Tebaga Gap broke
Te Moananui-a-Kiwa Ngārimu was 24 when his platoon of Ngāti Porou soldiers took the rocky under-feature of Point 209 in Tunisia and held it through one night of German Panzergrenadier…
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Takapuna gelato shop that opened in January wins one of New Zealand’s top ice cream prizes
A gelato shop that opened its doors in Takapuna in January has been named one of the two best frozen dessert makers in the country, eight months into trading. Joylato,…
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Jason Wynyard, the Kawakawa axeman who won the world woodchopping title 14 times
Jason Wynyard won the Stihl Timbersports world series 14 times between 1997 and 2017, held world records in both the standing chop and the single buck, and inherited the only…
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Wynton Rufer, the Wellington striker who conquered European football
He was 19 in Spain at the 1982 World Cup and 31 when he topped the Champions League scoring charts. The story of how a Strathmore boy with a Swiss…
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John Walker, the Manurewa boy who broke the four-minute mile a hundred and thirty-five times
On the evening of 12 August 1975, on a windy track in Gothenburg with a Swedish pacemaker who dropped out 100 metres early, a 23-year-old from Manurewa named John Walker…
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Richard Hadlee, the Christchurch boy who turned a long run into a short one and bowled New Zealand into the world
On the morning of Friday 8 November 1985 at the Gabba in Brisbane, a 34-year-old Cantabrian with a slightly receding hairline and a measured fifteen-pace approach ran in to bowl…
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Murray Halberg, the boy with the withered arm who ran a lap of his own at Rome
He was 17 when a rugby tackle in 1949 left his left arm paralysed and the doctors told his mother he was unlikely to last the week. Eleven years later,…
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Auckland’s St James Theatre tower is visible from Queen Street for the first time in 70 years
The ornate 1928 tower of the St James Theatre has emerged from behind its 1953 cladding and will be visible until 1 September.
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Colin Meads, the King Country lock who carried New Zealand on his shoulders for fifteen years and most of his country with him
On a grey Edinburgh afternoon in December 1967, the largest man on the field at Murrayfield was sent to the dressing room with three minutes to play, the second All…
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Yvette Williams, the Dunedin long jumper who outlasted Fanny Blankers-Koen
Yvette Williams was 23 when she stood on the long jump runway at the Helsinki Olympics on 23 July 1952 with two fouls and a wrenched knee. Her next jump…
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George Nepia, the boy fullback who played all 32 matches and was then left behind
He played every minute of every match on the 1924-25 Invincibles tour and came home a teenage hero. Four years later, the All Blacks left him at home because South…
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Sir Peter Blake, the Bayswater boy who took five Whitbreads to win one
He sailed in the first five Whitbread Round the World Races and only won the last of them. He took the America’s Cup off the Americans in San Diego, defended…
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Topp Twins named New Zealand arts Icons with Dame Lynda accepting for her late sister
The Topp Twins have been named among New Zealand’s newest arts Icons, and for the first time in more than forty years only one of them was there to accept.…
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Dave Dobbyn, the shy West Auckland kid who wrote the songs the country sings to itself
He was the diminutive, freckled, ginger-haired Catholic schoolboy from Glen Innes who got picked on for being small. He wrote Be Mine Tonight, Whaling, Slice of Heaven, Loyal and Welcome…
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Bacon and egg pie from Blockhouse Bay named New Zealand’s best at the 2026 Supreme Pie Awards
A bacon and egg pie built on a family recipe more than 40 years old has been named the best pie in New Zealand, handing a Blockhouse Bay bakery the…
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Don McGlashan, the North Shore boy who became the most literate songwriter in the country
Born in Auckland in 1959, Don McGlashan played French horn and percussion in the Auckland Symphonia, was the drummer in Blam Blam Blam when their song became the unofficial anthem…
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Court tells the Crown it must protect the rest of an ancient canoe buried in Chatham Islands dunes
A judge has told the Crown it cannot draw a line around the pieces of a centuries old ocean going canoe it has already dug out of a Chatham Islands…
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Peter Snell, the Ōpunake boy who ran the perfect race in Tokyo and then spent forty years in a Texas exercise lab
On the evening of 21 October 1964 in Tokyo, a 25-year-old former plumber’s apprentice from Taranaki ran the last 200 metres of an Olympic 1500m final faster than any other…
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What to plant in your New Zealand garden this August
August is the hinge month. Winter is ending, the soil is warming, and the gardening year restarts. Here’s what to sow, transplant and start indoors this month.