May 2019 Archives

EDGE #365 On the Anniversary of Ernest Rutherford’s Find + 12 stories

EDGE #365 On the Anniversary of Ernest Rutherford’s Find + 12 stories

News of Global New Zealanders From Brian Sweeney, publisher, NZEDGE.COM | 31 May 2019 | #365 | New York Researched, edited and produced by Jane Nye (Wellington), Carla Hofler (Auckland) and Alexandra Burnside (New York). See all stories and a …

Malcolm Black: We Remember Your Smile (1961-2019)

Malcolm Black: We Remember Your Smile (1961-2019)

Malcolm Black ONZM, leader singer of the early 1980s anthemic band Netherworld Dancing Toys from Dunedin, died in Auckland on May 10, 2019, aged 58, of cancer diagnosed 18 months previously. NDT’s signature song For Today is in its fourth …

Pua Magasiva, Actor (1980-2019)

Pua Magasiva, Actor (1980-2019)

Popular television actor Pua Magasiva died on May 11, 2019 aged 38. Born in Samoa but raised in New Zealand, Magasiva played the Red Ranger in 2003’s Power Rangers Ninja Storm as well as 2004’s Power Rangers Dino Thunder. He …

Quentin Pongia, Kiwi Hardman (1970-2019)

Quentin Pongia, Kiwi Hardman (1970-2019)

Kiwi rugby league legend Quentin Pongia died on May 18, 2019 aged 48, in Greymouth. “Q” represented the Kiwis 35 times and played for the Raiders, Warriors, Roosters and Dragons in Australia between 1993 and 2003, before spending two seasons …

Perfectly Preserved Moa Prints Discovered

Perfectly Preserved Moa Prints Discovered

Michael Johnston was out taking his boss’s dog for a dip in a nearby river in Ranfurly, when he stumbled across some unusual markings in the waterbed. Jonathan Ore writes about the discovery for a story, which recently aired on Canada’s …

Have Car Will Travel the North Island

Have Car Will Travel the North Island

“Let me be clear: so long as you are in a car, there’s no wrong way to see New Zealand,” Erin Florio writes in a feature on the North Island for Condé Nast Traveler. “Every route is the scenic route …

On the Anniversary of Ernest Rutherford’s Find

On the Anniversary of Ernest Rutherford’s Find

“In 1907, a New Zealander named Ernest Rutherford moved from McGill University in Canada to the University of Manchester. There, he conducted a series of experiments where he fired alpha particles at different materials,” Vasudevan Mukunth writes for Indian news …

Sydney’s Carriageworks Hires Blair French

Sydney’s Carriageworks Hires Blair French

The international search for the next leader of Carriageworks in Sydney has ended with the appointment of the Museum of Contemporary Art’s New Zealand-born Blair French as the inner city arts precinct’s new chief executive officer. Linda Morris reports on …

At the Organ with Sarah Mary Chadwick

At the Organ with Sarah Mary Chadwick

Sarah Mary Chadwick’s artistic output has been an ideal combination of quality and quantity, according to Robert Ham who Skype interviews the New Zealand musician for monthly music and entertainment digital magazine, Paste. Chadwick cranks out paintings and drawings at …

New Zealand Responds to Alternative Protein Threat

New Zealand Responds to Alternative Protein Threat

In a report for The Japan Times, journalist Charlotte Greenfield talks to Dave Harper, a farmer in the scenic Canterbury region, where his painstakingly bred flock of lambs is grazing not on grass, but on a field of herbs selected …

Sake Expert Rebekah Wilson-Lye on Sake Culture

Sake Expert Rebekah Wilson-Lye on Sake Culture

International PR and marketing manager at Japan Craft Sake Company, New Zealander Rebekah Wilson-Lye, 44, is profiled in The Japan Times. Wilson-Lye tells the Times that she discovered sake 14 years ago at the welcoming party by the language school …

EDGE #364 Climate Change A Critical Issue – NZ US Ambassador + 18 Stories

EDGE #364 Climate Change A Critical Issue – NZ US Ambassador + 18 Stories

News of Global New Zealanders From Brian Sweeney, publisher, NZEDGE.COM | 23 May 2019 | #364 | New York Researched, edited and produced by Jane Nye (Wellington), Carla Hofler (Auckland), Alexandra Burnside (New York). See all stories and a 15,000 …

Taika Waititi Explains Our Sense of Humour

Taika Waititi Explains Our Sense of Humour

New Zealander Taika Waititi is now one of Hollywood’s hardest working filmmakers with a slew of projects in development, writes Joe Utichi, who interviews the director for entertainment news site, Deadline. Wherever he goes next, Waititi is certain to raise …

Aldous Harding Entices with Taunts and Teases

Aldous Harding Entices with Taunts and Teases

In an article for Singapore’s The Straits Times, Yeow Kai Chai reviews Auckland-born singer-songwriter Aldous Harding’s latest album, Designer. “Any attempt to pin down Harding is a foolhardy venture, especially when the songstress is not predisposed to self-explanation,” Chai writes for the …

On a Road Trip about the North Island

On a Road Trip about the North Island

A journalist for Canada’s Calgary Herald spent several weeks traipsing across New Zealand. In the first of two stories about the country, Will Ferguson details what he found on the North Island. “New Zealand is a land of contrasts and …

Te Papa’s Te Taiao Nature an Urgent Call to Action

Te Papa’s Te Taiao Nature an Urgent Call to Action

Dunedin-based Guardian journalist Eleanor Ainge Roy writes on Te Papa’s biggest development since its inception 21 years ago, the result of the largest ever investment in a museum exhibition in the country. Te Taiao Nature, a $12m permanent nature zone, …

Allbirds Is Just Flat out Busy

Allbirds Is Just Flat out Busy

Allbirds’ first distinctly feminine silhouette has just been released. Shannon Fitzgerald reports on the new line, a brightly-hued ballet flat called The Tree Breezer, for Fortune magazine. The flat is constructed from an extremely light eucalyptus fibre and has the …

Review: Marilyn Waring The Political Years

Review: Marilyn Waring The Political Years

Marilyn Waring’s forensic record of her Parliamentary career (Marilyn Waring: The Political Years Bridget Williams Books) is a layered work, a primer in the travails of Aotearoa’s parliamentary democracy. It speaks of values, loyalty, courage, and timing: when to which. …

Climate Change A Critical Issue – NZ US Ambassador

Climate Change A Critical Issue – NZ US Ambassador

Climate change is a critical issue for New Zealand and the Pacific island region as a whole given its exposure to extreme weather events, says New Zealand’s ambassador to the United States Rosemary Banks, in a wide-ranging interview with Anna …

Kimbra Hits Mexico on World Tour

Kimbra Hits Mexico on World Tour

New Zealand-born Kimbra was in Mexico recently performing as part of her worldwide Primal Hearts tour. Alejandro Mancilla interviewed the singer for GQ México. A resident of New York City for the past three years, this was Grammy Award-winning Kimbra’s …

Kowtow’s Gosia Piatek Doing Things Differently

Kowtow’s Gosia Piatek Doing Things Differently

Some designers are doing things differently: rethinking the business model and coming up with better ways of doing things, like Kowtow founder, New Zealander Gosia Piatek, who The Guardian’s Alexandra Spring features in an article about sustainable and ethical “Australian” …

Pioneering Facial Reconstruction Work Of Harold Gillies Carries Graphic Warning

Pioneering Facial Reconstruction Work Of Harold Gillies Carries Graphic Warning

The pioneering work of Dunedin-born surgeon Dr Harold Gillies is graphically displayed in a Daily Mail spread featuring the facial reconstructions of soldiers wounded in WWI. Under the headline “The rebuilt faces of war: Shocking pictures show how ‘the father …

Jane Campion Casts Cumberbatch and Moss

Jane Campion Casts Cumberbatch and Moss

After a decade of being absent from the big screen, Academy Award-winner New Zealander Jane Campion is readying her first feature since 2009’s Bright Star. Campion will next direct her own adaptation of Thomas Savage’s 1967 novel, The Power of …

Mancunians Queue for Brunch at Federal

Mancunians Queue for Brunch at Federal

Five years ago, New Zealander Jon Perry and Portuguese Claudio Ribeiro co-founded the Antipodean coffee bar, Federal in Manchester’s Northern Quarter. A second café has recently opened in the city’s Deansgate area. Daisy Jackson reviews the new offering for the …

Brand Australia Glances Eye At NZ

Brand Australia Glances Eye At NZ

A high-level group of Australian business leaders charged with formulating a “unified and strategic representation of Australia’s capabilities” has referenced New Zealand’s international performance and perception. According to AFR Boss Deputy Editor Patrick Durkin in an article “How Twiggy built …

EDGE #363 Virgin CEO Josh Bayliss Reflects on Climate Action + 18 Stories

EDGE #363 Virgin CEO Josh Bayliss Reflects on Climate Action + 18 Stories

News of Global New Zealanders From Brian Sweeney, publisher, NZEDGE.COM | 15 May 2019 | #363 | New York Researched, edited and produced by Jane Nye (Wellington), Carla Hofler (Auckland), Alexandra Burnside and Maria Pazos (New York). See all stories …

Mental Health Means Business for Hannah Hardy-Jones

Mental Health Means Business for Hannah Hardy-Jones

A new wave of female entrepreneurs who are using their own experiences of mental health to help others feature in Forbes, including New Zealander Hannah Hardy-Jones, founder of The Kite Program, “the world’s first personal development app for mums”. Postnatal …

Coffin Clubs Take Sting out of Death

Coffin Clubs Take Sting out of Death

Across New Zealand, a country of almost 5 million, five major groups like the one Judith Aitken joined in Hastings have sprung up in recent years for people wanting to build and customise their caskets. They’re called coffin clubs, and …

Hidden Tattoos: Bradley’s Puaki Portraits Conceal Maori Markings

Hidden Tattoos: Bradley’s Puaki Portraits Conceal Maori Markings

New Zealand photographer Michael Bradley’s Puaki exhibition shows what Maori people would look like without their facial tattoos. Daily Mail reporter Ben Hill explains how Bradley used a digital camera to take photos of 48 people with ta moko – …

Jacinda Ardern: How To Stop The Next Christchurch Massacre

Jacinda Ardern: How To Stop The Next Christchurch Massacre

In a New York Times op-ed, PM Jacinda Ardern calls for the reform of social media, saying that the right to freedom of expression “does not include the freedom to broadcast mass murder.” The full text of the Prime Minister’s …

Jacinda Ardern Popular In Australia

Jacinda Ardern Popular In Australia

Jacinda Arden’s “empathy and grace” in the aftermath of the Christchurch shootings has been applauded in a recent New York Times opinion piece by Sisonke Msimang, an author who divides her time between Australia and her native South Africa. Msimang …

Rachel Carrell Fixing Broken UK Childcare System

Rachel Carrell Fixing Broken UK Childcare System

There are a dozen different words that Rachel Carrell can think of to describe the challenges of finding childcare for parents in the UK. None of them are positive. “It’s exhausting, expensive, overwhelming, stressful and fragmented,” the New Zealand-born entrepreneur …

Virgin CEO Josh Bayliss Reflects on Climate Action

Virgin CEO Josh Bayliss Reflects on Climate Action

New Zealand-born Josh Bayliss, CEO of multi-billion-pound brand the Virgin Group, which holds a stake in Virgin Atlantic, discusses with BusinessGreen journalist Michael Holder how corporates should respond to consumer outcry over climate change. There has scarcely been a more …

Then & Now: NZ’s Natural Beauty on Display in Turn-of-the-Century Photos

Then & Now: NZ’s Natural Beauty on Display in Turn-of-the-Century Photos

A series of turn-of-the-century photocroms, published by MailOnline’s Tim Stickings, reveal the beauty of the New Zealand landscape a hundred years ago. The colour photographs of the country’s mountains, lakes and fjords “were reproduced from black and white negatives using …

Skyrunner Ruth Croft Prepares for China Race

Skyrunner Ruth Croft Prepares for China Race

The South China Morning Post’s Mark Agnew reports that China might be famous for its food, but two top trail runners are approaching their pre-race meals with contrasting plans. New Zealander Ruth Croft and American Megan Kimmel, among the best …

World’s First Māori Woman Bishop Elected

World’s First Māori Woman Bishop Elected

The Archbishops of the Anglican Church in New Zealand have elected the world’s first Māori woman Bishop, Radio New Zealand reports. Archdeacon Waitohiariki Quayle has been appointed Bishop of Te Ūpoko o Te Ika. She was ordained deacon in 2013 …

EDGE #362 Liddell Says U.S. Government Digital Assets Vital for Unleashing Innovation + 18 stories

EDGE #362 Liddell Says U.S. Government Digital Assets Vital for Unleashing Innovation + 18 stories

This week our newsletter features New Zealand's global news makers in The Guardian, The Times, Vanity Fair, National Geographic, Bloomberg and Lonely Planet.

Symonds Street Cemetery Oasis of Wonder

Symonds Street Cemetery Oasis of Wonder

Auckland’s Symonds Street Cemetery is another New Zealand landmark included on travel site, Atlas Obscura. Atlas Obscura writes: “One of Auckland’s oldest cemeteries was partially demolished during the construction of a major highway in the 1960s. “The first official urban …

Beats 1 DJ Zane Lowe Interviews Taylor Swift

Beats 1 DJ Zane Lowe Interviews Taylor Swift

New Zealander Zane Lowe “tried his best to pull some more Easter eggs out of Taylor Swift during her midday interview on Apple’s Beats 1 Live show”, according to a Billboard story, “but even he knew it was a fool’s …

An Interview with Biljana Popovic

An Interview with Biljana Popovic

Newly published on online art platform Contemporary HUM, arts writer Eleanor Woodhouse interviews artist and designer Biljana Popovic on her 12-month Visual Arts Residency at the Künstlerhaus Bethanien in Berlin, and her wider practice. Popovic’s previous work as a commercial …

Government Switch for Gabriel Makhlouf

Government Switch for Gabriel Makhlouf

The New Zealand government’s chief economic and financial advisor Gabriel Makhlouf has landed the role of new Central Bank Governor in Ireland. The Irish Independent reports on the appointment. The Central Bank of Ireland will be headed by a foreigner …

Kelsey Birse Creates a Career from Gaming

Kelsey Birse Creates a Career from Gaming

When Kelsey Birse was given an Xbox as a Christmas present, he never anticipated a future fulltime career in esports, Stuff reporter Oskar Howell writes. Birse, who goes by in-game name ‘Colourhex’, puts his esports career in strategic shooter Overwatch …

Store Your Bike in Velohawk’s Bespoke Pods

Store Your Bike in Velohawk’s Bespoke Pods

This is what Rouleur magazine had to say about the New Zealand-created innovation, the Velohawk: “So you’ve decided, picked out and bought your dream bike. It’s delivered, well protected and built with a precision hand. You might even have it …

Conquering Heights in the South Island

Conquering Heights in the South Island

Adventurer and writer Briton Sadie Whitelocks heads to New Zealand on a two-week tour of the South Island where she leaps off some “terrifying” cliffs, paddles our national parks, and in Akaroa, spots the endangered Hector’s dolphin. “Fiordland National Park …

New Zealand Has World’s Sexiest Accent

New Zealand Has World’s Sexiest Accent

Big 7, a travel website aimed at millennials, conducted a survey among their readers and ranked 50 accents from around the world depending on how sexy they are perceived to be. The New Zealand accent grabbed the top spot and …

Tax Will be Used to Combat Overtourism in NZ

Tax Will be Used to Combat Overtourism in NZ

As Travel+Leisure has previously reported, New Zealand will introduce an International Visitor Conservation and Tourism Levy (IVL). With the tax, visitors will be required to fork over $35 when they apply for an Electronic Travel Authority (ETA). The magazine now …

Liddell Says U.S. Government Digital Assets Vital for Unleashing Innovation

Liddell Says U.S. Government Digital Assets Vital for Unleashing Innovation

The U.S. government has a critical role in working with the private sector to harness emergent technologies such as 5G, quantum computing, AI, advanced manufacturing and synthetic biology, says Chris Liddell, White House Deputy Chief of Staff for Policy Coordination. …

Treble Cone Skiing is Magic for Europeans

Treble Cone Skiing is Magic for Europeans

“As views from ski slopes go, this has got to rank among the most dramatic. In front of me the mountainside drops off, revealing the valley floor below, a craggy patchwork dominated by Lake Wanaka and framed by snowy peaks …

Campaigners Demand Justice for Blair Peach

Campaigners Demand Justice for Blair Peach

Campaigners are demanding a fresh inquiry into the death of New Zealand-born protester Blair Peach during a demonstration held to prevent the National Front (NF) holding a meeting in Southall, west London, 40 years ago last week, reports Vivek Chaudhary …

Lou Brown Shatters World Shearing Record

Lou Brown Shatters World Shearing Record

The 497 merino ewes shorn in eight hours by Napier-raised shearer Lou Brown was 31 more than the record of 466 set by his coach and mentor, fellow-New Zealander Cartwright Terry, according to a Radio New Zealand report. Few jobs …

JP Pomare’s Debut Rated Highly by The Guardian

JP Pomare’s Debut Rated Highly by The Guardian

“Excellent characterisation and the ability to conjure [a] cliquey, insecure adolescent world … add up to an immersive and exciting read,” Laura Wilson writes in a review of New Zealand author JP Pomare’s debut novel, Call Me Evie, which is …

National Geographic Features the Whanganui River

National Geographic Features the Whanganui River

Swelled by myriad tributaries, the Whanganui River twists like an eel through mountainous country – part of it a national park – on its 289-km journey to the sea, reports Kennedy Warne, New Zealand correspondent for National Geographic since 2000. …

Prince William Embodies Diana During Emotional Visit to NZ

Prince William Embodies Diana During Emotional Visit to NZ

The Duke of Cambridge was in New Zealand for a two-day tour to meet survivors of the Christchurch terrorist attacks that killed 50 people last month, and travelled to Auckland for ANZAC Day commemorations. “The Duke has a great affection for …

Aldous Harding’s Designer Dances on Different Feet

Aldous Harding’s Designer Dances on Different Feet

Aldous Harding is happy that her music makes people feel uncertain. The New Zealand-born singer-songwriter recalls a special moment when somebody confessed to her that Designer, Harding’s third record, made them question their taste. “That was the biggest compliment that …

Ross McEwan Completes RBS Turnaround

Ross McEwan Completes RBS Turnaround

Royal Bank of Scotland Group Plc’s top banker, New Zealander Ross McEwan, will leave the state-backed lender within a year, Bloomberg reports. The bank will start searching for chief executive officer McEwan’s replacement immediately, according to a statement. Speculation has …

New Zealanders Flock to Live in the Regions

New Zealanders Flock to Live in the Regions

Auckland is the seventh most expensive city in the world to buy a home, and all three of New Zealand’s major cities are considered “severely unaffordable” by the latest Demographia international housing affordability survey. As homeownership becomes an ever more …