ABSOLUTELY CREATIVELY WELLINGTON AWARDS
~ sponsored by Wellington City Council
These Wellington City Council awards aim to promote and recognise creative and innovative individuals in the Wellington region.
Absolutely Creatively Wellington Award
The WCC award for creativity and innovation in the Wellington region. This award goes to an individual who has demonstrated creativity and innovation through their work in the Wellington region that has had local impact.
Absolutely Creatively Wellington Ambassador Award
The WCC award for greatest international exposure. This award goes to an individual who has demonstrated creativity and innovation through their promotion of a product or service overseas and gained international exposure and/or recognition for themselves, their product and Wellington.
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THE WINNERS
2010
ACW Award: BARNABY WEIR- Musican more...
ACW Ambassador Award: TAIKA WATITI - Actor & Director more...
2009
ACW Award: STUART NIVEN - Urban Designer more...
ACW Ambassador Award: IAN ATHFIELD - Architect more...
2008
ACW Award: CHARLIE DAILY - Bagel King more...
ACW Ambassador Award: RUTH PRETTY - Cuisine Queen more...
2007
ACW Award: ROD DRURY - IT Entrepreneur more...
ACW Ambassador Award: DR. ALEX MALAHOFF - Scientist more....
2006
ACW Award: GARETH FARR - Composer & Musician more...
ACW Ambassador Award: RICHARD TAYLOR - Director/Effects Supervisor more...
2005
ACW Award: DARCY NICHOLAS - Artist & Arts Administrator more...
ACW Ambassador Award: JEREMY MOON - Icebreaker's Merino Entrpreneur more...
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THE WINNERS... 2010
Absolutely Creatively Wellington Award 2010:
Barnaby Weir is the singer, songwriter, and guitarist with New Zealand dub, funk, and reggae group The Black Seeds – as if you didn’t know.
The Black Seeds are a Wellington 8-piece with two double-platinum selling albums, and a masterful live show. With successful tours and releases in Europe behind them, and a recent U.S record deal signing, their fan base continues to spread quickly throughout the world.
Not content with being world-famous in the world, Barnaby also keeps busy with other projects including Flash Harry, Dub Connection and Fly My Pretties… all collaborations with Wellington musicians, artists and performers – keeping Wellington right on the front edge of the world stage.
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Absolutely Creatively Wellington Ambassador Award 2010:
TAIKA WAITITI - Actor & Director 
Spending long nights in a pub carpark is not always guaranteed to lead to a successful career, but once in a while it comes off. If your name is Taika Waititi. After all, this is the man who having won an Oscar nomination for his short film Two Cars, One Night, then won instant notoriety by pretending to sleep through the awards ceremony.
Taika’s fame, though, has mostly come about by his not sleeping on the job, far from it. From drama studies at Victoria University in the late 90s, Taika teamed up with Jemaine Clement to form comedy duo The Humourbeasts, and won the Billy T Award in 1999.
Wanting to tell his own stories, Taika embarked on a career as a writer-director. His first success – and it was huge – came with Two Cars, One Night. The short film won awards internationally and was a huge hit on the film festival circuit.
His first feature film – Eagle vs Shark – made geekdom sexy, and once again scored a lot of nominations and awards internationally. At the Sundance Festival screening of Eagle, Variety Magazine named Taika as someone to watch, in a good way.
Taika worked again with his old Humourbeast buddy, writing and director on The Flight of the Conchords
His next feature – which he began writing long before his first – was Boy, which was winning awards overseas before it opened in New Zealand. Here, in the first four weeks, it outgrossed – again in a good way – the previous top New Zealand comedy, Sione’s Wedding.
Taika himself was unable to attend the movie’s premiere, flying off instead to Hollywood to pursue his dream of becoming the next Cliff Curtis , with a role in the live-action remake of the Green Lantern comic book.
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THE WINNERS... 2009
Absolutely Creatively Wellington Award 2009:
Stuart Niven was Wellngton's first Urban Designer. He got the job in the late 1980s and started work with colleagues on developing the Cuba Precinct Plan. Eventually, this led to the Council establishing an Urban Design Group and the development of another first – the City’s first Urban Design Strategy – of which the Chew’s Lane development today is just one tangible result.
Meanwhile, Wellington's waterfront was in for some radical changes. Stuart was responsible for initiating, and leading, a major conceptual overhaul of the plan for the troubled project. Today a lot more people look at the waterfront because of the way Stuart looked at it twenty years ago.
Trained in the 70s as an architect, Stuart spent several years in Britain and the US, studying, and then practising as an urban designer. It’s something he has a passion for. Urban design, he says, is about "custodianship of the public environment", and not just outdoor space but the buildings around it, and the way their interior life engages with the surroundings.
The urban designer is the champion of the people in the street, the public. The city may well be shaped through negotiations between council, the town planners, and property owners. But it’s occupied and used by a far greater number - the building residents, passers by and citizens in general. Someone has to think of them, be on their side. And for the people to get the most of their city, and put the most back in, the city can’t just happen – it needs to be designed – cajoled – planned – and negotiated to be the best it can be...
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Absolutely Creatively Wellington Ambassador Award 2009:
Described as a shambling mess sprawling down the Khandallah hillside, architect Ian Athfield hastens to point out his house is even worse. Actually it’s a house cum studio office cum community. The Wellington City Council has granted it a unique “organic heritage” status so it’s officially allowed to continue its sprawl, to the delight of Ath, art lovers and of course his neighbours. The house is a work in process – Ath himself has said he likes to doodle, with concrete blocks and plaster. He’s breaking with tradition – or rather, finding it again, paying respect to our roots and questioning the role of suburbia.
Christchurch-born and bred, Ath had his career in architecture mapped out from an early age. He started his architectural career in Christchurch with the firm of Griffiths and Moffat and worked towards an architectural diploma going to Auckland University in 1960. After graduation, he worked for Structon Group Wellington, becoming a partner in 1965. On his birthday in 1968 he was dismissed from the partnership and forced into his own practice.
The Chews Lane project is an Athfield-led project on an enormous scale. He faced a large number of challenges in transforming a narrow dingy rutted goat track into this bright, open, inviting space - and fitting in with the greater neighbourhood.
The Civic Centre, the waterfront, Victoria University, the Adam Art Gallery, the New Dowse Museum, and beyond – Christchurch’s AMI Stadium, Palmerston North Library, Selwyn District Council. The list goes on. As do the accolades. He’s a Companion of the New Zealand Order of Merit. In 2004 he was awarded the New Zealand Institute of Architects Gold Medal for his outstanding contribution to the practice of architecture. In 2006 he became the first New Zealand Architect to be registered as an APEC Architect.
Not bad for someone who’s spent years bucking the trends and challenging the orthodox. And it seems there’s no stopping him, as the residents of Amritsar St can attest. The House on the Hill will continue to tumble and sprawl and remain an icon of Wellington, just like the man who continues to create it.
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THE WINNERS... 2008
Absolutely Creatively Wellington Award 2008:
CHARLIE DAILY - Bagel king
The bagel - it's the roll with a hole, it's the only bread product that's boiled before it's baked, and it was invented, according to legend, somewhere in Eastern Europe in the sixteenth or seventeenth century.
Around three or four hundred years later, the bagel hit Wellington big time, and another legend was born. Like all good legends, it took a while. And... it started with a quest. When American Charlie Daily arrived here in 1992, he had one thing on his mind. Well, two things but we won't go there. Charlie had a craving - for the perfect bagel.
Wellington, 1996… it wasn't going to be easy. Charlie went back home and hatched a plan. He set about raising capital and learning how to bake bagels. Perfect bagels. And then he came back. Wellington 1998… things would never be the same… Wholly Bagels was born.
The first bakery and shop was, and still is, in Johnston Street. Charlie and his three staff worked all hours but the hard work soon paid off. Customers not only loved Charlie's bagels, they loved Charlie's novel approach - allowing the clients an opportunity to custom-design their own bagel. Well, the filling anyway.
The bagel business took off. Soon Charlie was opening another bagelry, in the New World building in Thorndon. Another followed, in Willis Street. And another, in Tory Street. Then Lower Hutt… and Palmerston North.
Charlie's recipe for success is simple. If they're not boiled, they're not bagels - and Charlie's bagels are simply the best in the country. In fact, Wholly Bagels is the only true authentic genuine bagelry in Australasia. The bagels are made the old-fashioned way… with the most modern of equipment.
The world bagel benchmark is probably New York's H&H - and many New Yorkers who've tried a Wholly Bagel swear it's as good if not better. But there's more to Wholly Bagels than bagels. There's the concept. And the man who came up with the concept; who saw an opportunity and made the most of it, establishing a brand, a business that employs around a hundred Wellingtonians, and that sees around six thousand bagels walk out the door each day.
Charlie Daily says it could only happen in Wellington. We say it could only have happened because of Charlie Daily…. It's the way he makes 'em.
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Absolutely Creatively Wellington Ambassador Award 2008:
RUTH PRETTY - Cuisine queen
It's often said that we are what we eat. While that might send sushi eaters into a tailspin, the rest of us can feel proud that there's one Wellingtonian who's putting us, and our food, firmly on the world map.
After a brief flirtation in the 70s with rock music, television, drama and fashion… Ruth Pretty got stuck into food - in a good way.
Her Kelburn restaurant, Marbles, quickly became one of the most popular eateries in Wellington. So popular that it was often difficult, even impossible, to get a table.
The most obvious solution - if the people couldn't get to the restaurant, then the restaurant would go to the people. And that was the start of Ruth's catering business.
Ruth's focus shifted to the rural towards the end of the eighties, and to Te Horo in particular, where the germ of an idea - a dedicated catering centre - sprouted and grew rapidly. And while the catering side is still core business, it wasn't long before a cooking school took root as well.
And it all took off - in the first few years Ruth Pretty Catering was off to Germany, to the Anuga food fair, running the restaurant at the New Zealand Pavillion. It was a success - and the team was invited back.. twice.
The not-so onerous task of promoting our fine foods and beverages to the world continues. Visitors to the world expo in Aichi, Japan, and the America's Cup Village in Valencia, Spain, were eating, and drinking our stuff there, with Ruth's team managing the VIP corporate hospitality at the expo, and for Emirates Team New Zealand.
The folks back home have not been neglected - Ruth caters functions, corporate and private, throughout the Wellington region - from King Kong to Wearable Arts, Pinot Noir to Veuve Cliquot, from Singapore to Khandallah ... even those in Auckland are able to enjoy a Ruth Pretty Catered event.
Celebrating its 20th anniversary this year, Ruth Pretty Catering now employs thirty five full-time staff, twelve part-time and around one hundred casuals. The company's fleet of vans has taken the concept of personalised plates to a new level.
Not busy enough, Ruth has, since 2001, found the time to write a weekly food column for The Dominion Post, aptly called Indulgence. Proud to be part of the Wellington food industry and enjoying the camaraderie and mentoring the close-knit community offers, Ruth was honoured in 2005 by the New Zealand Restaurant Association, with induction into their Hall of Fame, joining an illustrious line-up of New Zealand's top chefs. The Commendation stated that "she has worked tirelessly to promote the delivery of exceptional culinary experiences, whether on an intimate scale for a few people through to catering for over 1000 guests." Not to mention promoting Wellington and its food industry pretty much everywhere, all over the world.
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THE WINNERS....2007
Absolutely Creatively Wellington Award 2007:
ROD DRURY - IT Entrepreneur
The speed of traffic on the information superhighway may be getting ever faster, but it's hard-pushed to keep up with one of its early adopters. Rod Drury's always been keen on information and finding new ways to keep it moving, and moving it to the people who need it. In 1995 he established Glazier Systems, one of New Zealand's leading software development and consulting companies. Glazier Systems was later acquired by Advantage Group and continues today as Intergen.
Rod became CTO of Advantage Group where he spent significant time in the USA working with leading international technology companies. He co-founded USA based Context Connect Incorporated which provides Directory solutions for mobile devices. Rod was recently awarded a significant patent in the Directories area.
Next, Rod founded and was CEO of AfterMail which was acquired by Quest Software and subsequently won Best Exchange Product at TechEd in Boston. Rod was an Independent Director of TradeMe, New Zealand's most successful eCommerce Internet site, when it was recently sold to Australian Public Listed Company Fairfax. He continues on the TradeMe Advisory Board.
Rod joined NZ Trade & Enterprise Beachheads Program Advisory Board in August last year and is a member of the New Zealand Institute of Directors. 2006 NZ Hi-Tech Entrepreneur of the Year, Rod's latest venture is Xero, an online accounting solution for Small Businesses, which, typically, was born out of frustration with the status quo. Rod Drury's goal has always been to build a long-term global business from New Zealand, creating an environment that's attractive to the country's very best people. His aim is to revolutionise small and medium business, and that's what he's doing.
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Absolutely Creatively Wellington Ambassador Award 2007:
DR ALEX MALAHOFF - Scientist
Ground-breaking discoveries and earth-shattering moments are all in a day's work for Dr Alexander Malahoff, Chief Executive of GNS Science. From plumbing the depths of the oceans to scaling the peaks of active volcanoes, his team is at the forefront of research and understanding of earth sciences around the world.
Dr Malahoff took on the job at GNS Science, a crown research institute, in 2002. Before that, his distinguished career had taken him from Miramar South Primary to Professor of Oceanography at the University of Hawaii via Rongotai College and Victoria University, collecting BScs,MScs, DScs and PhDs along the way.
He's also collected awards and citations the way some people collect teaspoons - from research organisations and institutes in the United States, Russia and here in New Zealand. Among his interests and fields of expertise is tectonics, the study of the structure and movement of those rocky plates that separate us from the earth's molten core … usually. Much of Dr Malahoff's career has been centred on the great tectonic features of the South Pacific, particularly the Hawaiian Islands. While in Hawaii, he was also a director of the Hawaii Undersea Research Laboratory, a world-class centre for deep sea exploration.
His philosophy is very simple "Have a powerful vision, get the best people, provide a great environment for them to work and live in, and then drive the vision forward." During his nearly five years at GNS Science, he has firmly planted the organisation in the Wellington region, and has established a permanent home, in the shape of a campus at Avalon, strategically located within a fifteen minute drive to the CBD. Alex's passion is to help make the Wellington region a centre for world-recognised earth and ocean sciences. Wellington, with its deep enigmatic Cook Strait, and astride the Wellington Fault, is a perfect natural laboratory for developing the science and technology in the ocean and earth arena. And GNS Science, with Alex Malahoff at the helm, is the perfect organisation to be running it.
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THE WINNERS....2006
Absolutely Creatively Wellington Award 2006:
GARETH FARR - Composer & Musician
Farr was born in Wellington, New Zealand, on Leap Year Day 1968. He studied composition, orchestration and electronic music at Auckland University and was a regular player with the Auckland Philharmonia and the Karlheinz Company. Further study followed at Victoria University, Wellington, where he became known for his exciting compositions, often using the Indonesian gamelan. He played frequently as a percussionist with the New Zealand Symphony Orchestra before departing New Zealand to study composition with Christopher Rouse at the Eastman School in Rochester, New York, where he graduated Master of Music.
In 1993, at the age of 25, Gareth became Chamber Music New Zealand's youngest composer-in-residence. Since then, his works have been commissioned and performed by the NZSO, the Auckland Philharmonia, the Wellington Sinfonia, the New Zealand String Quartet, and a variety of other professional ensembles in New Zealand and overseas.
From the Depths Sound the Great Sea Gongs, a commission from the NZSO to commemorate the orchestra's 50th anniversary, was premiered at a Gala Concert in March 1997. Gareth was commissioned to write a work to celebrate the opening of Te Papa, the Museum of New Zealand, and the resulting work, combining symphony orchestra with soprano, tenor and karanga (indigenous New Zealand Maori chant) was hailed as "music with a powerful and moving impact that transcends idiom and individual taste". A recent highlight was the performance of two of Gareth's works by the NZSO at the Sydney Olympics; the percussion concerto Hikoi which was composed for and performed by the internationally-renowned Evelyn Glennie, and Wairua, a unique work combining a Maori kapa haka (performing arts) group with the full symphony orchestra.
In addition to his music for the concert hall, Gareth has written music for television and film, most recently for The Strip, a 20 episode NZ drama series, and Spring Flames, a short film directed by Aileen O'Sullivan. Gareth's music is heavily influenced by his extensive study of percussion, both Western and non-Western. Rhythmic and timbral elements of his compositions can be linked to the complex and exciting rhythms of pacific island log drum ensembles and the dynamic and colourful sounds of the Indonesian gamelan. Five full-length CDs of his music have been released to date on the Trust Records label - chamber orchestra, chamber music, string quartets and two orchestral CDs. A CD single of Te Papa was also released in 1998.
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Absolutely Creatively Wellington Ambassador Award 2006:
RICHARD TAYLOR - Director/Effects Supervisor
Richard Taylor and his partner Tania Rodger began what would become Weta Workshop Ltd twenty years ago. Richard and Tania dreamed of creating a special effects facility to support the New Zealand film and television industry. Their first job was providing caricatured puppets for Gibson Group's Public Eye satire show. In the years that followed, a close working relationship developed between Richard, Tania and New Zealand Director Peter Jackson, working on Jackson's Meet The Feebles, Braindead, Forgotten Silver, Heavenly Creatures and The Frighteners.
The culmination of this relationship would see the formation of Weta with Richard, Tania, Peter and producer Jamie Selkirk going into business together. Over the past twenty years, the company has provided physical and digital effects for many films, advertisements and television shows including the popular Hercules and Xena series, Master and Commander, I Robot, Van Helsing, The Last Samurai, The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe, The Legends of Zorro and most recently, King Kong.
The crowning achievement for Richard and Tania has been the globally acclaimed The Lord of the Rings trilogy for which Weta provided the design, fabrication and on-set operation of the creatures, special make-up effects and prosthetics, miniatures, armour and weaponry. Weta also provided the full range of digital services from simple compositing through to animation of fully computer generated creatures. For this unprecedented undertaking Richard won four academy awards and three BAFTAs, with Weta having garnered five BAFTAs and six Academy Awards to date.
Richard and Tania have continued to develop their company by diversifying into a variety of new and intriguing creative ventures. These include a high-end collectibles company giving young New Zealand sculptors an opportunity for a career in fine art sculpting, a chainmaille manufacturing company, a publishing arm, and most recently a children's television production company that is now in full production of their first television series, Jane and The Dragon. Richard and Tania are focussed on the development of highly creative projects, and embracing the enthusiasm and passion that young New Zealanders can bring to the creative arts.
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THE WINNERS....2005
Absolutely Creatively Wellington Award 2005:
Darcy Nicholas - Artist and Arts Administrator
Darcy Nicholas is a leading Maori artist and his work is in collections throughout the world. His art is about identity… the ancestral lines that connect with the universal nature of Maori , who he believe have to survive both as a tribal and a global people in this new age of technology and rapid change.
He learned his culture by living it, surrounded by his parents and elders, many of whom had been born in the 1800's. His first one-man exhibition was in 1968 at the Antipodes Gallery in Wellington. Since then, he has exhibited widely throughout the world. He began a full time career as a painter from 1973 until 1980, when he became Director of the Wellington Arts Centre. In 1984 he received a Fulbright Cultural Award to observe Contemporary Native American, African American, British, European and Asian cultures and art.
He has held several senior management positions and is currently General Manager of Cultural Services for Porirua City, and currently runs the outstanding Pataka Museum of Arts and Cultures. It is an innovative organisation, incorporating a museum with contemporary arts, performing arts, an education centre and public library. Darcy has made a significant contribution to Creative Wellington.
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Absolutely Creatively Wellington Ambassador Award 2005:
Jeremy Moon - Managing Director Icebreaker
Jeremy Moon is Managing Director of New Zealand's largest adventure-wear exporter - the 100% New Zealand merino wool Icebreaker. Jeremy established the brand in 1995 and it is now number five on the Deloittes Fast 50, a register of the 50 fastest growing companies in New Zealand.
The company is a market leader for merino outdoor clothing in Australia, Canada, Denmark, Netherlands, Belgium, Sweden, Switzerland, the United Kingdom, Japan, and most recently USA. With successful sales in 18 countries, the branding of Icebreaker clearly carries an enviable record of success. Part of that is due to successfully interpreting the New Zealand story in a way that is culturally relevant to many different markets. Icebreaker has used distinctive New Zealand qualities to create a brand that has resonance for customers all over the world. The logo is also found in a growing number of key retail outlets nationally.
Jeremy's key philosophies are basic and pure - 'it's about our relationship to nature - and to each other'. The company uses only pure NZ merino wool and works directly with 30 leading high country stations. Marketing is driven and focused - outsourcing where it doesn't have a competitive advantage. It has also established key strategic partnerships with overseas distributors and leading 'extreme sport' athletes and adventurers.
The Icebreaker brand is synonymous with quality, comfort, style, performance and health. People are wearing the brand all over the world - the pure merino wool garments are in demand by high performance athletes and the fashion conscious alike.
Jeremy continues to find creative and innovative ways to grow and participate in NZ life. The inaugural Motatapu Icebreaker mountain bike and marathon was held near Queenstown and among the 1300 entrants were 25 Wellington-based Icebreaker staff, including Jeremy Moon. He said - ' We chose this because it's directly relevant to our customers.
The Gold Awards have been proudly celebrating outstanding business performers in Wellington, Hutt, Upper Hutt, Porirua and Kapiti since 1999.