Royals Makes Top 10 and Selena Gomez Covers
Auckland singer Lorde, 16, has made it into the United States Billboard Top 10, with her “debut alternative/pop hit” Royals, which pop star Selena Gomez covered at the Heineken Music Hall in Amsterdam on…
Tag Archives: Auckland
Pacific Nations on Track to Meet Renewable Energy Target
According to a report presented by New Zealand Foreign Affairs Minister Murray McCully, Pacific Island nations are on track to achieve their goal of increasing their reliance on renewable energy resources within the next…
Lorde Single Breaks into Billboard Top 10
Sixteen-year-old New Zealand singer, Lorde, has had continued success the US, with her single ‘Royals’ currently sitting at 8th place on the Billboard Hot 100 List. The single has also been sitting atop of the…
Cormack on Remand in Wentworth Drama
Auckland-born actress Danielle Cormack, 42, has said she jumps at the chance to play strong women, this time in the lead role of Bea Smith in Wentworth Prison, a contemporary reworking of Prisoner:…
Casual Brilliance Shines Brightest of All in Canada
“Amateur Lydia Ko is a humble sports prodigy, a student and 16 years old, all of which means that rarely have the absolute best pros in women’s golf had their collective butts…
Auckland Students Feminist Video a Hit
YouTube’s parent company, Google, has admitted the site made a mistake when it removed Auckland University law students’ viral parody video of Robin Thicke’s “Blurred Lines”. The video received over 300,000 views before it was…
Illinois Race Win for Young Cyclist
Auckland cyclist Alexander Ray has won the Bloomington Jaycee Criterium in Illinois. The 22-year-old’s solo breakaway with six laps left so shredded the legs of his opponents, he had more than enough strength to…
Stamps Behind Stories of Terrible Wartime Loss
Aucklander Bruce Chadderton, president of the Philatelic Society of New Zealand, has had his book Descent into the Abyss: The Shoah — a philatelic retelling published by the Society of Israel Philatelists after one…
Pre-schoolers Star in Karen Walker Eyewear Campaign
Iconic New Zealand fashion designer Karen Walker has launched a new campaign for her Spring ’13 eyewear collection featuring four pre-schoolers – Alice-Rose, Claudia, Elise and Tyler – as the models. The images follow…
Sky Tower Named One of Regions Top Towers
Auckland’s Sky Tower has been named as one of the Asia Pacific’s top ten iconic observation towers by TripAdvisor, the world’s largest travel website. Coming in at number five on the list of famous…
Lydia Ko Wins Canadian Women’s Open
16-year-old Lydia Ko has made history at the CN Canadian Women’s Open, defending her Canadian Open title with a dominating win in Alberta and becoming the first amateur in history to win two LPGA…
New Zealand’s Friendly Airport
Airports are often the least enjoyable part of travelling – while travellers want to enjoy every last moment of their holiday, there’s only so much an airport can offer. However according to Jaunted, Auckland…
Who is This ‘Lorde’ Everyone’s Talking About?
Lorde continues to make waves internationally ahead of the launch of her debut album, with US online magazine Vulture writing giving their readers a crash course in who the 16-year-old singer is and why…
Smarter Together with Hill Holliday
New Zealander Graham Ritchie, 48, has been named new strategy chief for American advertising agency Hill Holliday, overseeing a department of 38 strategic planners who work on brands such as Dunkin’ Donuts, Bank of…
Evidence of Genetic Basis to Sense of Smell
After testing some 200 volunteers in Auckland, Richard Newcomb of the New Zealand Institute for Plant & Food Research (PFR) and his colleagues have found the most convincing evidence yet of a…
Lorde, First Woman to Top Billboard Alt Chart in 17 Years
New Zealand singer/songwriter, Lorde, has landed the top spot on the Billboard Alternative Songs Chart with her hit single ‘Royals’. Not only is she the first solo woman to top the charts in her…
America Better Watch Out
The “unflappable” Lorde, 16, “hypnotises” at her first concert in the United States introducing “her collection of immaculately drawn pop compositions with a confidence and demeanour well beyond her years”, Billboard’s Jason Lipshutz writes…
Fighting for Recognition in a New Field
New Zealand stuntwoman Zoë Bell’s film Raze is screening at the Imperial Theatre as part of the one of the most influential genre film festivals in the world, the Fantasia International Film…
Artful Combinations Cross Cultures
New Zealand chef, London-based Peter Gordon, “the godfather of fusion cooking,” is the inspiration behind recipes recommended in an Irish Times article, which include a frittata topped with Greek yoghurt and sumac. “Gordon really…
James Bond Would Be Impressed
Ivan Sentch, an Auckland programmer and Aston Martin devotee, has decided to build a full-scale 3D printed replica of a 1961 Aston Martin DB4. “He’s already made considerable progress, with much of…
Fairy Tale Television Role for Actress
New Zealand actress Rose McIver, 24, who starred in Peter Jackson’s 2009 film The Lovely Bones, has landed the pivotal season three role of Tinker Bell on the ABC fairy tale drama, Once…
Young Kiwi Artist’s Focus is Art, Not Boys
In an interview, Auckland singer-songwriter Lorde, 16, said that unlike many female teenage artists, boys aren’t all she is interested in when it comes to writing songs. “I feel like that isn’t maybe the…
Mystery Making Process Paying off in US
Identified only as her stage name, Lorde, 16, the artist kept her true identity a mystery for months, Wall Street Journal correspondent Megan Buerger writes. The only available representation of her was a drawing…
Archaeologist Made Extraordinary Contributions to Field
New Zealand-born archaeologist Mike Morwood, who was best known for discovering Homo floresiensis, has died in Darwin, aged 82. In 2003, Morwood led a joint Australian-Indonesian team of archaeologists, which uncovered what appeared to…
Committing to Biculturalism in Education
Newton Central School in Grey Lynn, Auckland, is the subject of a story about how New Zealand, and Newton Central in particular, is making biculturalism in education work. Special advisor on education…
Lawless Set to Razzle Dazzle in Chicago
Television star Lucy Lawless, 45, will join True Blood’s Stephen Moyer and Les Misérables’ Samantha Barks for a special three-night performance of the Broadway smash Chicago, which will run from 26 July to 28…
Young Aucklander Breaks US Charts
Auckland born singer Ella Yelich O’Connor has broken into the American Billboard Chart despite doing next to no State-side promotion. The sixteen-year-old who goes by the name Lorde became a national sensation in late…
Mayor Gives Residents a Sense of What Auckland Could Be
Auckland sits at No 10 on Monocle magazine’s annual “Top 25 liveable cities” list, with Copenhagen at No 1, followed by Melbourne at No 2. “Auckland’s mayor Len Brown talks of making his city…
Modern New Zealand Cuisine Hits New York
Auckland-born chef Matt Lambert’s new enterprise The Musket Room, is a “New Zealand-centric … upscale, casual neighborhood restaurant,” with “a wine list weighted to New Zealand selections beyond the usual…
Rugged Coast a Place of Refuge for Hillary
Sir Edmund Hillary’s daughter, Sarah reflects on the area in New Zealand – along the wild coast of the Waitakere Ranges – where the mountaineer found refuge, from the attention that followed his conquest…
None of It Has Anything to Do with Orcs
Auckland, home to a third of all New Zealanders, has recently welcomed a raft of bars, boutiques and restaurants that highlight locally made products, from excellent craft beer and wine to fashion and art,…
With Guns Blazing Manhattan Establishment Opens
Auckland-born chef Matt Lambert has opened The Musket Room, a 65-seat establishment in Manhattan’s Nolita, New York. “Named for the Musket Wars of the early 19th century … the menu has Asian…
Chris Wood’s Premier League Hopes Dashed
Chris Wood, All White and Leicester City striker, has missed out on joining fellow-All White Winston Reid in the English Premier League next season. Wood’s team were beaten 3-1 by Watford in the second…
Auckland City Lets You be the Planner
Scientific American recently featured an article, from Fast Company, on the Auckland City Council’s Shape Auckland Housing Simulator. The simulator helps residents engage with Auckland’s Unitary Plan, a blueprint for the cities…
Voted Top Player by His Irish Peers
Aucklander Nick Williams, 29, who plays at back row forward for Ulster Rugby, has been presented with Player of the Year at the RaboDirect PRO12 awards gala in Dublin. By beating Irish internationals, Cian…
So Good and So Vegetarian
“You’ll find Kokako in a 1940s post office in Auckland’s Grey Lynn, a rapidly gentrifying inner-city liberal stronghold,” Monocle reports. “The café opened a year ago – a welcome addition to a…
Olivia Lefebre’s Modeling Career Takes Off
From being discovered while shopping, at St Luke’s mall in Auckland, New Zealand, to strutting on the Paris catwalk– Cook Islander Olivia Lefebre is making a name for herself in the tough world of…
Change of Character
“Each city seems to have its own character and voice; each community has a completely different attitude to life,” Huffington Post freelancer Karen Edwards writes in a blog describing her recent trip….
Focus on Liveability
Auckland inspires strong feelings in the editor-in-chief of Monocle magazine, Tyler Brûlé. “Dear Auckland,” Brûlé writes, “I realise it’s less than 96 hours since we parted company but I can’t stop thinking about the…
NZ Home to World’s Largest Waterslide
New Zealanders Jimi Hunt and Dan Drupstee have built the world’s longest waterslide, writes The Daily Mail. Their slide, at 650 meters long, beat the previous record by nearly 440 meters! Two thousand people…
Never a Dull Moment
Four years ago, when Charles Turner was just shy of 91, he and his wife emigrated from London to Wellington. “It has worked,” Turner writes in the Telegraph. “We have a large garden with…
New Zealand Toy Makes World Top 10 List
A New Zealand toy, The Snow Globe, is one of the world’s top ten ‘best creative toys’, according to Britain’s Independent newspaper. The ‘Snow Globe’ is made by Seedlings, founded in 2006 by Phoebe…
Sky Tower to Join St. Paddy’s Day Festivities
The Auckland Sky Tower will go green on St Patricks Day, March 17 2013, says the Daily Mail. The ‘greening’ has been organised by the Irish Tourist Board to promote Ireland’s tourism. Other world…
Landscapes a Drawcard
Foreign buyers are mostly drawn to the Auckland area, or to the lake and mountain views near Queenstown on the South Island, according to The New York Times. Bill Sandston, a real estate lawyer…
Through a Pacific Lens
Auckland poet Courtney Meredith, 26, was at the Frankfurt Book Fair this week for the launch of her debut book Brown Girls In Bright Red Lipstick. Meredith has been described as leading a generation…
Pleased to Meet Him
“Flying Nun is as synonymous with indie rock in New Zealand as Chemikal Underground is in Glasgow or Creation Records is in London,” John Everhart writes in a web exclusive for American magazine Under the…
Made in New Zealand
“Visiting New Zealand with my 1-year-old daughter, and with nephews at home in America, I became obsessed with finding them something actually made in the country,” Meg Nesterov writes for Gadling. “I was impressed…
In Transit Amongst Spies
Auckland singer Gin Wigmore, 26, stars alongside James Bond star Daniel Craig in a new interactive television and digital ad campaign for Heineken and the latest 007 film, Skyfall. Wigmore wrote the ad’s theme song…
Instead of Adrenalin
New Zealand’s less extreme tourism activities provide the Gadling’s Meg Nesterov with plenty to do for a trip throughout the country in which she finds out “why Auckland is worth more than a stopover,…
It’s the Cat’s Whiskers
Auckland’s private Kristin School recently secured the rights to the world renowned musical CATS, spending $85,000 on its annual stage production. Executive principal and show producer Peter Clague said the big-budget show would rival…
Steeped in Melancholy
Former New Zealand-based author Kapka Kassabova’s latest “odyssey” Twelve Minutes of Love begins “in the enthusiastic, though limited, tango scene in Auckland” continuing across “three continents in search of the perfect dance (or ‘tangasm’).”…
Uncorking Auckland’s Potential
Mayor of the new Auckland Council Len Brown is profiled in a Monocle report called, “Ten Smart Govenors”, “a selection of inspiring local legislators.” “In just 18 months he has…
Climbing the City Ranks
Auckland rises four places to rank at nine in Monocle’s annual list of “Top 25 Liveable Cities”. “What a difference a Rugby World Cup and a new political structure makes,” the magazine writes. “Aucklanders…
Niccol Adapts Meyer Novel
New Zealand-born director Andrew Niccol, 48, has adapted Twilight author Stephenie Meyer’s The Host, which stars The Lovely Bones’ actress Saoirse Ronan as Melanie Stryder, one of the last people fighting against an invading…
Solving the Jam
Auckland businesses have come out in favour of a surprising solution to finding the cash for mayor Len Brown’s $12bn transport improvements, Monocle correspondent Simon Farrell-Green explains: “A daily toll on the city’s motorway…
Super Image of Cosmic Lunar Event
Auckland photographer Simon Runting captured this once-a-year cosmic event which lit up the New Zealand night sky as the full moon passed at its closest point to Earth, making it appear 14 per cent…
