News of New Zealanders via Global Media

Niki Caro’s Latest Feature Hits the Ground Running

Niki Caro’s Latest Feature Hits the Ground Running

New Zealander Niki Caro is the director of McFarland, USA, a Disney film based on the true story of a 1987 cross country team from a predominantly Mexican-American high school starring Kevin Costner. McFarland,…

New Zealand Shines As Bright As A Movie Star

New Zealand Shines As Bright As A Movie Star

“New Zealand might be best known for its breathtaking scenery, excellent wines and friendly locals; however, the land of the long white cloud has also earned a stellar reputation as a popular film location”…

New Zealand Soccer Player Winston Reid Renews Contract

New Zealand Soccer Player Winston Reid Renews Contract

West Ham defender Winston Reid has ended speculation about his future by signing a new six and a half year deal worth up to £20 million with the Upton Park Club. “There was a lot…

Ashleigh Good in Dolce & Gabbana’s Tribute To Mothers

Ashleigh Good in Dolce & Gabbana’s Tribute To Mothers

New Zealand born model Ashleigh Good came down the catwalk holding her baby daughter Emily at the Milan Fashion Week. The duo was part of the Dolce and Gabbana show, which had…

Join the Red Nosed Kiwi Coffee Caravan

Join the Red Nosed Kiwi Coffee Caravan

Caravan Coffee Roasters, set up by New Zealand chef Miles Kirby with Kiwi friends Laura Harper-Hinton and Chris Ammerman, has launched Coffee Relief to support this year’s Red Nose Day. From the…

Lorde and Joel Little Back into the Recording Studio

Lorde and Joel Little Back into the Recording Studio

Teenage global “phenom” Lorde will hit the studio in a matter of weeks to begin work on a follow-up to her acclaimed debut album, Pure Heroine, according to Billboard. The big news didn’t come via…

Teddy Tahu Rhodes Commemorates Gallipoli at Sydney Opera House

Teddy Tahu Rhodes Commemorates Gallipoli at Sydney Opera House

Two of the best opera singers from New Zealand and Australia will come together on Anzac Day for a special commemoration of the 100-year anniversary of Gallipoli at the Sydney Opera House…

Composer Annea Lockwood Celebrates Waterway Sounds

Composer Annea Lockwood Celebrates Waterway Sounds

Christchurch-born composer Annea Lockwood was one of nine artists represented at a recent audio and visual art exhibition in Manhattan, New York called “Foot Notes: On the Sensations of Tone,” an exhibition which celebrated…

Rainbow Hunters Find Their Violet in New Zealand

Rainbow Hunters Find Their Violet in New Zealand

One mother and two young boys are on a trip around the world to seven countries to find the origin of seven colours. The Rainbow Hunters, as the trio are called, are…

Cycling an Exceptional Route from the Alps to the Ocean

Cycling an Exceptional Route from the Alps to the Ocean

The 78km Twizel-Omarama section of the South Island’s Alps 2 Ocean cycle trail “is simply exceptional,” writes Andrew Bain for Australian Geographic Outdoor. “Twizel isn’t Queenstown. It’s not Wanaka, and it’s not Nelson. This South…

Geoff Sewell’s Guerilla Opera Singers Hit Exclusive Parties

Geoff Sewell’s Guerilla Opera Singers Hit Exclusive Parties

Former Amici Forever tenor New Zealander Geoff Sewell and his wife Simone Lanham run London-based Incognito Artists, a group of performers who specialise in “guerrilla opera” – available for hire as “chefs,”…

Luke Willis Thompson Exhibits at NY’s New Museum

Luke Willis Thompson Exhibits at NY’s New Museum

Walters Prize recipient, Auckland-based Luke Willis Thompson, 27, is one of 51 young artists participating in New York’s New Museum Generational Triennial, a “hotly anticipated” show which will explore the frontiers of digital technology,…

Glenn Martin’s Jetpack Dream Achieves IPO Liftoff

Glenn Martin’s Jetpack Dream Achieves IPO Liftoff

In 1981, a young aviation-obsessed university student, New Zealander Glenn Martin, began working on his dream to invent the world’s first commercial jetpack, the Sydney Morning Herald reports. In late February the company he…

Scott Baigent’s Eight Degrees Brewing Increases Capacity

Scott Baigent’s Eight Degrees Brewing Increases Capacity

Four years in and New Zealander Scott Baigent’s Eight Degrees Brewing company, based in Ireland, is increasing production capacity tenfold. Baigent, (pictured right, with head brewer Mike Magee) a former engineer and Australian…

NZ’s Beauty Garners Tongue-in-Cheek Buzzfeed Response

NZ’s Beauty Garners Tongue-in-Cheek Buzzfeed Response

New Zealand, and why travellers should think twice before visiting, features in a tongue-in-check tourism photo essay on Buzzfeed. The image above of Mt Aoraki mirrored on Lake Matheson is just “urgh”. “The second you…

Lydia Ko takes New Zealand Women’s Open for 2nd-straight victory

Lydia Ko takes New Zealand Women’s Open for 2nd-straight victory

Lydia Ko, the 17 year old New Zealand LPGA star sits atop of the golf world with her second straight win of the 2015 season finishing with a 1-under 71 at Clearwater Golf Club…

New Zealander James Lucas Wins Oscar for Short Film

New Zealander James Lucas Wins Oscar for Short Film

Christchurch-raised James Lucas has won an Oscar in the category Best Live Action Short Film, for his “moving” and “well-deserved” The Phone Call, a star-studded film he co-wrote with friend, Briton Mat Kirkby. “Previous nominee…

Kiwis Claim Thrilling Victory Over Rivals

Kiwis Claim Thrilling Victory Over Rivals

Auckland is humming. After a month of sublime weather, and on a day in which the Volvo round the world yachts arrived in post, the 175th anniversary of the signing of the Treaty of…

BBC’s Adrenalin-Fuelled DJ Zane Lowe Looks Ahead to LA

BBC’s Adrenalin-Fuelled DJ Zane Lowe Looks Ahead to LA

The “faintly tearful” DJ Zane Lowe, BBC Radio 1’s “most enthusiastic music fan, explains why his stomach is churning at the thought of saying goodbye,” bowing out of the network after 12 years for…

Greatest Uniforms in Sports, No. 5: New Zealand All Blacks

Greatest Uniforms in Sports, No. 5: New Zealand All Blacks

“Aggressiveness, intimidation, honour, respect, courage, war—embodied in one uniform. And it only needs one colour to say it all” is how Arden Zwelling describes the New Zealand All Blacks uniform in an article for…

Emilia Wickstead on BFC/Vogue Designer Fashion Fund Shortlist

Emilia Wickstead on BFC/Vogue Designer Fashion Fund Shortlist

New Zealand designer Emilia Wickstead, the Duchess of Cambridge Kate Middleton’s go-to for gowns, has made the British Fashion Council (BFC)/Vogue Designer Fashion Fund shortlist. Wickstead also made the shortlist in 2013 and 2014. The…

Martin Crowe Inducted into ICC Hall of Fame

Martin Crowe Inducted into ICC Hall of Fame

Cricket’s “most stylish batsman” Martin Crowe, 52, has been inducted into the International Cricket Council (ICC) Hall of Fame on Saturday, the terminally ill former national player describing it as a “great honour” and…

Lydia Ko’s Latest Caddie Lands the Top Gig

Lydia Ko’s Latest Caddie Lands the Top Gig

Lydia Ko’s search for the right caddie has been an intriguing storyline for the media throughout her short span on the LPGA Tour, but it appears Australian bag man Jason Hamilton, for the foreseeable…

Russell Crowe considers Leeds United takeover

Russell Crowe considers Leeds United takeover

New Zealand-born actor Russell Crowe took to social media to address football fans who tweeted him in regards to whether he would take charge of Leeds United FC at Elland Road. In response to fans…

Hagley Oval Integral to Christchurch’s Regeneration

Hagley Oval Integral to Christchurch’s Regeneration

Cricket’s World Cup and the return of top-level sport to Christchurch’s Hagley Park has been integral to the city’s regeneration since the devastating earthquake of 2011, says the Guardian’s Mike Selvey. “To a visiting eye,…

New-Zealand based start-up Xero raises $110M Round

New-Zealand based start-up Xero raises $110M Round

New Zealand based cloud accounting software vendor Xero has announced a $110 million funding round from Silicon Valley venture capital firm Accel Partners and Matrix Capital Management. Xero has long stated that the US market…

Gill Pattison’s Yangon Gallery Part of Myanmar’s Creative Boom

Gill Pattison’s Yangon Gallery Part of Myanmar’s Creative Boom

Owner of Yangon’s River Gallery, New Zealander Gill Pattison is part of the city’s creative boom. Myanmar’s art scene is flourishing since military rule was scaled down in the country. “Life in Myanmar at this…

The Bushwhackers Announced For WWE Hall of Fame

The Bushwhackers Announced For WWE Hall of Fame

New Zealand wrestling legends The Bushwhackers have made the cut into the World Wrestling Entertainment Hall of Fame Class of 2015. The native New Zealanders who wrestled under the names Luke Williams and…

Breakers a Basketball Outlier With an Inside Track

Breakers a Basketball Outlier With an Inside Track

“The New Zealand Breakers are the most unconventional team in Australia’s National Basketball League,” Scott Cacciola begins in a feature article, part of a series chronicling good basketball around the United States, and the…

Antidote To Mythical Bloodsucking

Antidote To Mythical Bloodsucking

Jemaine Clement and Taika Waititi’s What We Do in the Shadows, in which vampires mix with a mockumentary crew, is rapturously reviewed by the Wall St Journal’s Joe Morgenstern. The film, writes Morgenstern, is “a…

That’s ‘70s for Karen Walker in New York

That’s ‘70s for Karen Walker in New York

For spring 2015 it was photographer Valerie Finnis. For autumn 2014 is was New Zealand’s suffragettes. This time around, for her autumn 2015 collection presented at New York Fashion Week, Karen Walker focused on…

New Zealand Trounce England at Cricket World Cup

New Zealand Trounce England at Cricket World Cup

“At the hands of an urgent New Zealand superbly led by Brendon McCullum” Engand’s defeat at the Cricket World Cup in Wellington, “went beyond the realms of simple humiliation and entered that of fantasy,…

New Zealand Beats Britain in Men’s Pursuit Final

New Zealand Beats Britain in Men’s Pursuit Final

New Zealand has beaten Olympic champions Britain in the men’s pursuit final at the track cycling world championships in Saint Quentin en Yvelines, France, the team’s first ever world title and the seventh fastest…

Emilia Wickstead’s Trademark Polish Gets a Bit of an Edge

Emilia Wickstead’s Trademark Polish Gets a Bit of an Edge

The Duchess of Cambridge and Samantha Cameron are regular clients of fashion designer Emilia Wickstead and would have been able to pick something straight off the catwalk from her morning show at London Fashion…

Zane Lowe to Leave BBC Radio 1 for Apple in US

Zane Lowe to Leave BBC Radio 1 for Apple in US

The presenter of BBC Radio 1’s popular weekday evening music show, Auckland-born DJ Zane Lowe, 41, is moving to the United States after 12 years at the station to take up a role at…

Mike Campbell Scores Top Spot in Men’s Health Man Comp

Mike Campbell Scores Top Spot in Men’s Health Man Comp

Sydney-based personal trainer, New Zealander Mike Campbell, 33, has been named in the top six of Australian Men’s Health magazine’s Man competition. The competition calls for blokes who are in top shape and the best…

Berlin’s Pie Addiction Is Growing

Berlin’s Pie Addiction Is Growing

Named in tribute to Berlin-based Josh Joblin-Mills’ grandmother, famed for her home-cooked meat pies back in rural New Zealand, Oma Marnies has been stacking up a loyal customer base since it opened…

Savouring Views in New Zealand with Julian Robertson

Savouring Views in New Zealand with Julian Robertson

As the co-founder, chairman and chief executive of the US$30 billion investment firm Tiger Management L.L.C., American Julian Robertson, 82, has achieved a high profile in the world of finance. Robertson, who owns three…

With Bombastic New Single UMO Channel Stately Soulful Music

With Bombastic New Single UMO Channel Stately Soulful Music

New Zealand-born Ruban Nielson’s Portland-based three-piece Unknown Mortal Orchestra makes the Guardian’s daily playlist, with their “bombastic” new single Multi-Love. “Such was the oddball beauty of Unknown Mortal Orchestra’s introverted second album II that Multi-Love…

Karen Walker Taps Instagram Sensation Toast the Dog

Karen Walker Taps Instagram Sensation Toast the Dog

New Zealand designer Karen Walker and four-legged Instagram sensation Toast the Dog, the droopy-tongued pup rescued by American comedian Josh Ostrovsky and wife, Katie Sturino, both don shades for Walker’s spring 2015 eyewear campaign. “A…

There Is No Occasion That a Pavlova Doesn’t Add to

There Is No Occasion That a Pavlova Doesn’t Add to

“Most New Zealand and Australian rivalries are fought on the rugby field, the cricket pitch or the netball court,” according to the Vancouver Sun’s Tracey Tufnail, who includes her own family’s recipe for the…

Running Gets Epic in Asics’ Biggest Global Campaign

Running Gets Epic in Asics’ Biggest Global Campaign

Asics has just launched its biggest ever global campaign with an epic new advertisement which was shot on location in New Zealand, and features crowds of runners summoned by a hunting horn…

Comic Artist Ant Sang Draws on East and West for Inspiration

Comic Artist Ant Sang Draws on East and West for Inspiration

Award-winning comic artist Ant Sang, who was a guest at this year’s Taipei International Book Exhibition, draws on Western and Eastern influences having spent his childhood and teenage years in New Zealand and Hong…

North Island a Land of Volcanoes and Vineyards

North Island a Land of Volcanoes and Vineyards

Over the coming six weeks, the world’s greatest cricketers will be zig-zagging across New Zealand. So for the cricket fan the Independent’s David Whitley suggests, that’s a fine excuse to disappear to the other…

How Jemaine Clement Became 862-year-old Vladislav

How Jemaine Clement Became 862-year-old Vladislav

Being a vampire wasn’t entirely new to Jemaine Clement, co-director and star of What We Do In The Shadows. His first credited role was playing one in a 1995 horror short film called Blood…

Peter Gunn off to Italy for Young Chef Competition

Peter Gunn off to Italy for Young Chef Competition

A mighty fine plate of beef short ribs with roast celery vinaigrette has secured Attica sous-chef, New Zealand-born Peter Gunn a trip to Milan in June to compete with the world’s top up-and-coming kitchen…

NZ Design Firm Helps Museumgoers “Touch” Cities Around the World

NZ Design Firm Helps Museumgoers “Touch” Cities Around the World

For nearly 20 years, New Zealand-based experiential design company the Gibson Group has designed and built one-of-a-kind, interactive, multimedia visitor experiences for museums, galleries, archives, libraries, tourist centers, and businesses around the…

Hobbit Trilogy Unmitigated Financial Grand-Slam for All Parties

Hobbit Trilogy Unmitigated Financial Grand-Slam for All Parties

“The Hobbit trilogy has been incredibly successful on a domestic and worldwide stage,” Forbes contributor Scott Mendelson writes. “The three-film trilogy cost around US$765m to produce and made US$2.916b worldwide thus far. Yet no…

Terraces One of Best Tourist Attractions That No Longer Exist

Terraces One of Best Tourist Attractions That No Longer Exist

Ask a New Zealander what happened on 10 June 1886, and they’ll tell you the planet lost its “eighth wonder,” says CNN, who deem the Pink and White Terraces of Lake Rotomahana one of…

Ross McEwan Gets down to Business at Royal Bank of Scotland

Ross McEwan Gets down to Business at Royal Bank of Scotland

Very few chief executives of big banks know how to brand a cow, what to do when calving season starts, or how to tell Angus from Shorthorn cattle. Except, that is, Ross McEwan, Financial…

Paula Morris Makes Lucrative Short Story Comp Longlist

Paula Morris Makes Lucrative Short Story Comp Longlist

Auckland author Paula Morris has made it onto the 19-strong longlist for the 2015 Sunday Times EFG Short Story Award, the world’s richest prize for a single short story. The award – now…

Simon Baeyertz Helping Reclaim Puerto Rico’s Food Paradise

Simon Baeyertz Helping Reclaim Puerto Rico’s Food Paradise

New Zealander Simon Baeyertz, a “music-business refugee” who once worked with Nine Inch Nails and Marilyn Manson, is now the owner of and the driving force behind Caribbean hotel El Blok. Along…

NZ Open Their Cricket World Cup in Style

NZ Open Their Cricket World Cup in Style

“New Zealand fulfilled the hopes of a capacity crowd, celebrating another landmark in the rebirth of , by defeating Sri Lanka by 98 runs,” the Guardian’s Vic Marks writes. “It was a well-nigh flawless…

New Zealand Both the Hipster and Tipster’s Choice

New Zealand Both the Hipster and Tipster’s Choice

No longer merely the cool underdog that overachieves, New Zealand is a genuine World Cup contender, according to the Hindu, with Brendon McCullum’s men now possessing a gilded opportunity to go where none of…

New Line Cinema to Remake New Zealand Horror-Comedy ‘Housebound’

New Line Cinema to Remake New Zealand Horror-Comedy ‘Housebound’

New Line Cinema has picked up the remake rights of New Zealand horror-comedy Housebound, which earned praise from Lord of the Rings filmmaker Peter Jackson. Gerard Johnstone, who wrote and directed the movie, will produce the remake but…

Black Grace Touring Retrospective in the United States

Black Grace Touring Retrospective in the United States

Choreographer Neil Ieremia and his contemporary dance troupe Black Grace are currently on tour in the United States, firstly performing their 20-year retrospective programme, including Gathering Clouds, for Philadelphian audiences. Wellington-born Ieremia said that his…