Up and coming fashion designers in New Zealand have the chance to boost their careers to the tune of NZ$10,000 in sponsorship prize money.

Italian brewer Peroni is giving away the cash to celebrate the launch of Peroni Leggera, a low carb, low alcohol version of the classic Italian beer.

The first annual Lighter Side of Italian Style Fashion Design competition is open to designers aged 20 or over. Entrants can be in their last year of tertiary fashion study or a graduate of up to five years.

The brief is to submit a sketch and working drawings of a unique design inspired by the Peroni Leggera colour palette and the concept of “Lighter Side of Italian Style.”

A panel of industry judges will commission five entrants to turn their sketch into real garments, and these finalists will be flown to Auckland and present their designs at an event in late August, where the winner will be announced.

Entries opened on July 1, so if you’re keen to submit a design, head here.

News from the crew at instinct: WordCamp New Zealand will be held in Wellington, New Zealand on the 8th and 9th of August.

Here’s the Word from the event site:

WordCamp is a conference that focuses on everything WordPress. WordCamps are informal, community-organized events that are put together by WordPress users like you. Everyone from casual users to core developers participate, share ideas, and get to know each other. WordCamps are open to WordPress.com and WordPress.org users alike.

The two-day conference will be held at the Mt. Victoria Bowling Club and will feature Matt Mullenweg (above) aka PhotoMatt, he who set up Automattic, and was one of the founding developers of WordPress, as a keynote speaker along with hands-on sessions focused on the WordPress platform and the community around it.

You’ll also be hearing for Dan Milward from Instinct, Harley Alexander from Aussie designers Baffle Inc and Anthony Cole from Dunedin’s Fresh Pacific Media. And if you have the inclination to speak yourself, head to the content wiki.

Earlybird tickets for the whole weekend are only $75, and you can get them here.

It was less than 2 years ago when kiwi global entrepreneur Rod Drury lead the first IPO of the 2007 year on New Zealand’s stock exchange - NZX by listing online accounting software Xero.

Now just 22 months on and Xero has over 6000 customers and has just completed a strategic capital raise totalling $23.2 million.

Building a successful Public company

When Rod first listed Xero on the NZX just 9 months after starting the business and very early into it’s revenue, many people questioned whether Xero deserved the public valuation it was going for. The round closed successfully with $15 million raised from some 1600 investors and Rod and the crew got down to the business of making Xero a success.

Then came global recession, public money and equity markets everywhere have taken a beating, including New Zealand’s stock exchange, but again, Rod and the crew at Xero have stayed calm, focused on building partnerships and getting customers and results. This laser focus on succeeding has helped them pull together a $23.2 million strategic round which sees the addition of the founder and ex-director of major competitor MYOB - Craig Winkler to the shareholder register with Craig taking an $18 million stake.

Xero now has a firm and fast growing presence in New Zealand, the UK and Australia, and has just strated their moves into the US, and with no debt on the balance sheet, a major competitor bleeding talent, Xero is poised to use this growth capital very wisely for the next major stage of expansion.

Silicon Welly content management gurus SilverStripe have had another big win in the US following their selection as CMS provider to the US Democractic Party in last year’s Presidential elections (which obviously worked out quite well).

Now Microsoft has chosen SilverStripe as one of ten companies worldwide to have their software included in its web developer suite of free apps.

According to stuff.co.nz, the free SilverStripe CMS has been downloaded 140,000 times and with 40% of users installing into a windows environment, the company has been working to integrate better with Microsoft’s server software.

The work has paid off, and now there’s a little bit of Wellington in every Windows install. Congratulations Tim, Siggy and the crew! SilverStripe are based upstairs from our Wellington HQ at Silicon Welly, so we’ll be off up the lift now for a celebration…

Auckland based web designers Fracture have taken out one of the top spots at 12th Annual South by Southwest (SXSW) Interactive Web Awards for their work on www.jasmax.co.nz

Sponsored by Adobe, the SXSW Web Awards honored 20 of the top Web developers and designers chosen from hundreds of entries submitted across the world.

Up against the likes of CNN and home improvement mega-brand Lowe’s, the young guns from Fracture showed they are world class talent who can compete for web design on an international stage. Fracture won the Business category which covered sites devoted to the promotional needs, functions and services of for-profit businesses.

“To win at South by Southwest is just an amazing honour. We were the only Kiwis in the finals, up against the biggest names in web design from around the world and we took it out. It’s quite a coup,” says Creative Director of Fracture Nick Shaw.

Fracture hopes that with accolades like this, savvy overseas client who need amazing work will become aware of New Zealand’s massive creative talent base, a very favourable exchange rate, and start sourcing production down here.

“It’s already happening with our film industry right now, and there’s no reason that design and technology should be different,” says James McKee, Fracture’s Managing Director.

The Jasmax websites was one of the first in New Zealand to use a complete 3D environment; new technology that gives the user a sense of being part of the visual space with elements of the website rotating around them, and brings the buildings to life in their own virtual world.

The SXSW interactive festival is held in Texas and attracts digital creatives as well as visionary technology entrepreneurs from around the world. The event celebrates the best minds and the brightest personalities of emerging technology.

Check this interview with Nick from Fracture on KiwiFM.

givealittle has launched a brilliant new initiative to recognise and reward someone who is in need of a helping hand as the recession bites in New Zealand.

The Wellington based social enterprise is giving away up to $10,000 to the friend in need, a family, a local school, favourite charity or community organisation that attracts the most ‘givers’ via its website.

‘Givealittle wants to know who you would like to give to, what you want to give and why it is deserved,’ says CEO Nathalie Hofsteede. ‘We have received a request from a woman wanting to replace stolen items from her elderly parents’ home, two parents wanting to shout their disabled child’s caregiver a trip home to Australia as thanks for years of hard work. It’s all wonderful stuff.’

Givealittle.co.nz will shortlist 10 submissions to become Givealittle Friends in Need projects and give the finalists advice about how to use the power of the web to reach a wider audience. Each page will have one month to gather a crowd of givers. The page with the largest number of givers (but not necessarily the most raised) will be given $1 for every giver up to a maximum of $10,000.

It’s about encouraging a crowd of people to give just a little to help make a big difference. Online submissions will be accepted until 5pm Friday 3 April 2009 at www.givealittle.co.nz/friendsinneed

Breastmates Specialty Breastfeeding Store is New Zealand’s leading online maternity store, and their usual business involves sending out bras and breatfeeding supplies around the world. But over the last couple of weeks the bras have been coming to them, all part of a drive to support women in Zimbabwe.

It all started when the Breastmates team was approached by Hot Milk, the maternity lingerie brand they stock, with a plea to help school girls and women in Zimbabwe who often do not own any underwear.

Breastmates’ Frances McInnes was happy to help, and is asking women to donate any of their preloved bras which will be collected up and sent to those in need.

The collection is called “Knickers for Africa” but Frances clarifies that only secondhand bras are being collected from the public. “We are also sending our end-of line knickers that are brand new, not secondhand ones.”

Frances has already started taking collections, through pamphlet drops in her neighbourhood, local community groups, and promotions on her website.

“I’ve been quite bombarded with bras already” she says, “every day there are a few more in the mail box and my postie must wonder what is going on!”

The collection is being run from February to March, when the bras will be shipped to women living in villages in Zimbabwe.

For more information go to www.breastmates.co.nz or call 0508 BREAST if you would like to donate.

A wine tasting held recently (19th Feb) in London by some of the world’s best palates and wine critics has seen the Sacred Hill Helmsman rated in the top five.

Hosting the panel were international renowned wine personalities Jancis Robinson, Michael Schuster and Neal Martin. Alongside them were well known wine critics James Lawther, Oz Clarke and a number of other extremely influential writers and wine buyers.

Six wines from the Gimblett Gravels wine district in the Hawke’s Bay, including the Sacred Hill Helmsman, were double blind tasted alongside six wines from the Bordeaux region in France. All details about the wines, apart from the provenance of the wines, were hidden from the participants.

The results saw the Sacred Hill Helmsman ranked as 4th. This wine is made from predominantly cabernet sauvignon grapes which are solely sourced from company owned vineyards located in the Gimblett Gravels area.

According to Sacred Hill’s Chief Winemaker Tony Bish this is a stunning result for Sacred Hill and the Gimblett Gravels Association.

“To make the Top 6 in such a prestigious tasting with the extraordinary 2005 Bordeaux from arguably the regions’ best producers is a fantastic result. I have tremendous belief in the unique attributes of the Gimblett Gravels, as year after year we see wines of intensity, power, and finesse emerge from these bony soils. In particular the Cabernet and Merlot blends along with Syrah seem to shine, consistently producing world class wines. We look forward to a very bright future with these wines as the recognition for their quality and value escalates,” says Bish.

New Zealand born filmmaker and internationally recognised artist Anna Wilding from Carpe Diem Films LLC is a prime example of the initiative and talent that the NZ television and film industry is becoming renowned for.

Succeeding without government funding is a huge challenge in this line of work, but Wilding - in the tradition of other NZ success stories such as Flight of the Concords - certainly has. Her latest feature documentary “Buddha Wild Monk in a Hut” (http://www.buddhawild.com), has played in major cinemas and received significant international recognition with awards such as Best Feature Documentary in the USA for Kids Ages 12-18 from the National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences (October 2008), and has been picked up by number of international festivals and series’ including the India’s International Festival of Films on Tribal Arts and Culture, USA Kids Films Festival and the Screen Actors Guild Series USA.

Voted “a must see film” by Janet Walker (Splash Magazines 2008), and major newspapers Critics Pic, Buddha Wild aims to promote a greater insight into Asian cultures adapting to the West. New York Flavorpill critic Chloe Leichman describes it as “a refreshing synthesis of Eastern and Western politics and culture, without a nibble of Hollywood cheese…Buddha Wild explores what really goes on behind the monastery doors, touching on hot-button issues like the roles of women, racism, and celibacy in a monk’s daily life.”

Partly shot in NZ, this is ‘made in New Zealand’ making it big overseas - without the support of government funding. Private investors backed the project, and Wilding has some words of advice for other potential investors: “No investor should be put be put off by film proposals without NZ government support…it seems that overseas the funding bodies have a broader commercial outlook and perhaps a fuller understanding of talent…for kiwis, not having NZ government financial investment does not mean one is not talented. It is in fact a tribute to those who haven’t received government backing that they succeed as they have had a substantially more difficult road to follow. Talent will manifest itself even in the face of hardship.”

Wilding typifies this proactive kiwi mentality: “I don’t believe in sitting round on your laurels. People have to take initiative. There are stories to tell”. Her career in New York and LA, the UK and Australia as a writer, actress, producer, consultant and director spans over a decade and includes being thanked by Mark Ordesky Producer for her humanitarian work on films such as Lord of the Rings. She has also been hired as a guest speaker at Cannes Film Festival 2008 and World Earth Week 2007, and has recently appeared in the Observer New York Politker section following a successful public conversation on foreign policy with General Wesley Clark.

Counterswirl, Wilding’s latest narrative feature script, was recently selected for a major film market in Canada and Carpe Diem Films LLC is currently inviting investors. It goes to show that if you have the motivation and ability, you can succeed. This New Zealander is someone to watch - for viewers and investors alike.

In New Zealand “Buddha Wild Monk in a Hut” is available at www.insightbooks.co.nz and various rental chains and independent stores, and can be purchased for group educational and institutional purposes by obtaining the distributor details from the films website.

Dow Design is taking on the world at Design Week Awards in London next month with its world-class packaging work for Robert Harris coffee.

The Design Week Awards is one of the world’s most prestigious design competitions with finalists from London, New York, Tokyo, Paris and now Auckland. Dow Design is a finalist in this influential competition along with some big hitting international companies and are thrilled to be part of this world-leading group. “New Zealand is fast becoming known for creative excellence” says Dow’s Andy Jaquet, “and we’d like to think we are helping to contribute to that wonderful global image. Not only that we get to showcase a great NZ coffee overseas!”

The finalists are:

Robert Harris - Dow Design

JME ( Jamie Oliver Products) – Pearl Fisher

This water – Pearlfisher

Linkwood 26 year old whiskey – The Brand Union

Solerno – Stranger and Stranger

Mr Singh’s Bangras – The Partners Design

Silver Cross Packaging – Love

Nude skincare - Pearlfisher