2020 RECIPIENTS:
 

CLASSICAL ON CUBA

Already used to working together in new and inspiring ways, Orchestra Wellington and CubaDupa joined forces mid-Covid to find ways to bring music back to the inner city, post-lockdown.

While the lockdown had put live music performance into a bit of a hiatus, it didn’t stop musicians rehearsing, in a strictly social distancing kind of way of course.

So once the rules were relaxed and lockdown lifted, everyone was back in business, in a collaboration called Classical on Cuba that saw twenty ensembles play over one hundred events in fifteen venues - some of the Cuba Precinct’s most iconic establishments - over two days in June.
 

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WELLINGTON STUDENT VOLUNTEER ARMY

The WSVA is a grassroots organisation of students based across the Wellington region.

When the country began to move into Level Four in March, hundreds of students in Wellington put their hand up and over the lockdown, the WSVA connected with hundreds of people across Wellington, doing shopping runs, delivering letters, picking up medication, providing emergency food parcels, or even just having a quick chat online.

By connecting volunteers with people in their own neighbourhood, the WSVA saw friendships grow between volunteers, and neighbours-in-need.

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KAIBOSH

New Zealand’s first food rescue organisation, Kaibosh links the food industry with charities and community groups that support people in need.

During the lockdown, Kaibosh worked through to make sure good food continued to reach those in need, redistributing over fifty tonnes of food – that’s around 150 thousand meals -to local people in need.

And they did it while shrinking their own bubble. With their regular volunteer programme on hold, a small crew of Kaibosh staff and volunteers kept the food flowing.

 

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HILLS HATS

With his eye always on international markets, Hills Hats’ head honcho Simon Smuts-Kennedy knew very early on that the approaching pandemic would put sales of headwear on hold.

So he and his team put together a plan – to make masks, from existing fabric stocks with no retooling required. Working from a surgical model, they designed a mask that would be easy to put on and would be very comfortable to wear for long periods - a layer of antibacterial wicking fabric on the inside sees to that. And just two hours later – true – the masks were ready to go into production.

Now, Simon’s masks are worn in Europe, the US, Australia and right here, so everyone can breath easy.

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