Newtown Festival brings Wellington’s creative capital to the streets

Tuesday, 3 March 2026

Sean O'Brien is a former Beehive adviser and Wellington musician.

OPINION: This Sunday, March 8, around 100,000 people will wander through the 32nd Newtown Festival. Sometimes called the last day of summer, it’s a celebration of creativity and culture in what must be one of New Zealand’s most diverse suburbs — around 40 languages are spoken at Newtown School.

It comes at a time when some would have you believe Wellington is a bureaucratic wart impeding New Zealand’s stride, and when diversity itself is increasingly questioned in public debate. Let’s back up that bulldozer.

In the early 1990s, during a deep recession, a completely left-field campaign appeared: Absolutely Positively Wellington. At the time I was a farm boy in the Manawatū, where the consensus was that no such place existed — just windy Wellington, home to the Beehive and the Cook Strait ferry.

Wellington was struggling, and the publishers of The Dominion and Evening Post were grappling with a slump in advertising as the news grew gloomier. They asked advertising firm Saatchi & Saatchi to help with a municipal pick-me-up. Working pro-bono, Saatchi devised the slogan and a campaign featuring businesses succeeding despite the downturn. People loved it, and before long T-shirts were printed and flags flown bearing the now-familiar high-contrast logo.

Enter a newly elected mayor. Fran Wilde saw it was time to shake things up. Recognising both the brand potential and the groundswell behind Absolutely Positively Wellington, she picked up the ball and ran with it.

If the campaign was akin to committing goals to paper to increase the likelihood of achieving them, Absolutely Positively blew away the perception of windy Wellington by changing the fabric of the city physically and culturally.

The wharves and quays were redeveloped so the city faced the harbour. Te Papa landed like an abstracted taniwha near Mt Victoria. The Cake Tin - now Hnry Stadium - was built. This coalesced into one of the country’s finest public spaces - the Wellington waterfront.

Alongside this came a human shift: cafe culture flourished; the flat white was invented here by Fraser McGuinness; design, tech and engineering disciplines cross-pollinated; and people from around the world choosing Wellington as home broadened the city’s horizons. Entrepreneurship took hold.

Wellington companies reshaped industries: Wētā, Trade Me, Xero, Icebreaker, Allbirds, Sharesies, Goodnature, PikPok, Hnry, phil&teds and more. As CreativeHQ ambassador and Sharesies co-CEO Leighton Roberts recently said, “Many innovative Kiwi companies made their start here because Wellington has an active population of creative people - people who are happy to question the status quo and think outside the box. That’s a real asset in business.”

At night, music venues nurtured international acts such as Ladyhawke, Fat Freddy’s Drop, Connan Mockasin, King Kapisi and So So Modern. And let’s not overlook New Zealand’s fourth most popular folk duo, Flight of the Conchords.

Innovating and giving things a go became Wellington’s ethos.

Zealandia had its share of knockers, but last Christmas I counted 12 kākā near the Cable Car in a magnolia tree (…my true love gave to me). Kākā were once among our most endangered birds.

Set up the conditions for good things, and good things happen.

Which brings me back to the Newtown Festival.

It’s where young artists take their first outdoor stage, emerging creative communities step into public view, and entrepreneurs test ideas. A carnival takes hold, norms loosen, and the streets become a shared celebration. Around 1000 performers across 16 stages and hundreds of stalls - with free activities for kids - come together helped by a big volunteer effort.

This isn’t peripheral to Wellington’s identity. It is Wellington’s creative engine in motion: place-making at scale and proof that diversity, lived day to day, fuels creativity.

Wellington has drawn its strength from that openness - from an attitude that welcomes difference and lets it shape the city. When we remember that, we remember what Wellington is.

It’s been a tough few years, but this Sunday, March 8, as people flow through Newtown’s streets, they won’t just be attending a festival. They’ll be taking part in living proof that Wellington remains - by culture, by community and by conviction - New Zealand’s creative capital.