The Wellingtonista was formed at the start of 2005. The underlying mission of the blog is to promote and write about the many interesting aspects of our wonderful city, from places to get drunk, things to go and see, events to participate in, bands to listen to, places to get drunk, plays to watch, comments on local news, restaurants to eat in, and, sometimes, places to get drunk.

You can receive our semi-daily text updates about what's going on by following our twitter profile (and find out what that is in this post about Twitter).

We also have Wellingtonista group on Zoomin to keep track of places we like, and a Wellingtonista Celeb Vista group to track "celebrity" sightings. You should join!

Publisher Natalie Biz
is an award-winning blogger, ex-librarian and figment of an overactive imagination. She set up the Wellingtonista in 2005 after a severe bout of home-sickness (whilst touring the USA as substitute bass-player in a Swedish prog-rock band).

EditorsJames Guthrie
is rumoured to have become one of Wellington's first entirely online beings, having not been spotted in any physical form since late 2004. As well as trying to keep this place in some sort of order, he also maintains his own noizyland website, and potters about with other online projects.

Joanna McLeod
likes to eat and drink and jump into the ocean in equal amounts and often in that order. Although Joanna might punch you if you use the b word around her (she writes an online journal, dammit!), others have called her Queen of the Wellington Lady Bloggers, and that makes her laugh. She made up the "young" half of the old "young and hip" contingent of the Wellingtonista, likes her music loud & indie and her apostrophes in the right place.

ContributorsAlan Macdougall
struggles under stress to provide witticisms of the sort required for short potted bios on group websites.

Andrew Llewellyn
Likes to be recognised around town as Viggo Mortenson's stunt double. But never is. Because he wasn't. Used to own real black & beige sheep. And felt patriotic for it.

Hadyn Green
was New Zealand's first rugby podcaster. Since then he has moved on to...um...podcasting about rugby AND other sport. Hadyn is easily recognisable by his hate of idiots.

Martha Craig
is the beige sheep of the family, living in the Petropolis of Petone. She has her finger loosely on the pulse of the city, and aims to make it into some (any) society pages before the year is out.

Tom Beard
lives in a tasteful neo-Tuscan mansion in Churton Park. He is a teetotaller, and his hobbies include golf, gardening and watching V8 supercars. He owns three SUVs, but his favourite vehicle is the Hummer with the "I (heart) Peter Dunne" bumper sticker, which he enjoys driving to church.

Michael Gregg
... from the mainland diaspora, settled in Welly, purveyor of online ads, bad at html, good with wine, a Googleophile & a poor photographer.

Sue Tyler
owns two unicorns and sometimes rolls ice cream for a living. When not creating Craft Fairs or decorating computers with buttons, she spends all her time exploring Wellington's arty hot spots.

Stephen Clover
swears too much, drinks too much, and is frequently being sent not-safe-for-work weblinks by his amusing friends. He lives for music and art. He also worships at the same church as Tom Beard.

Kimberley Rothwell
is Wellington's most famous 5'9" tall, red scarf-wearing, freckle-faced, knocked-up journalist. She sticks it to the man by wearing Skechers to work, and has a picture of her cat being interviewed by Radio NZ on her desk. She also has flicky, flicky hair.

Mitch Marks
claims to have lived in nearly every small town in the country during her gypsy childhood, but currently calls Wellington home. Mitch is the editor of a new pop culture and comics-based free magazine called Choice.

Dan Slevin
A refugee from Thatcher's Britain, 20 years ago Dan produced and hosted the Radio Active guide to cultural Wellington, Asleep At The Wheel. Since then he has bounced around various creative endeavours including co-owning and managing the Paramount between 2002 and 2005. Can now be found (on most evenings) welcoming patrons to Downstage Theatre and in print as Capital Times film reviewer.

Robyn Gallagher
has recently moved to the 04 and has been enjoying plenty of early nights, organic goat's milk and brisk walks up Mt Victoria every morning. Robyn also writes a lot, takes too many photos and likes public transport. One of these sentences is not entirely true.

Roving ReporterJessie Scoullar
is the black sheep of the family, residing in far-off Auckland. She gets by with the bare minimum of participation but enjoys sending encouraging behind-the-scenes emails. She appreciates good music and good food.

Gone FishingEmily Walker...enjoys music, gaming, genetics, biology, photography, geocaching, computers, World of Warcraft, nanotechnology, the Singularity, lesbian media, threadless.com, gossip and pop kulcha. Yes, she is a nerd. And closely related to one of the members of Wellington's very excellent Phoenix Foundation.

Che Tibby
A former writer of something interesting, today Che writes pretty much anywhere anyone will let him.

We think this is either a claim to relevance or a cry for help. We're not sure.

Mike Riversdale
is a Miramar-mian/ite ever since moving from Wales to New Zealand back in the dying years of the last century. He never has time to blog everything he wants, has never owned a house, horse or a Holden and doesn't posses a PC. He is always on the look out for cool things to distract the kids with.