Leonie Wise • Photographer & Writer • Based on Waiheke Island, NZ
even in the winter weekends on our tiny island we are outside in cold winds and clear skies—filling ourselves up with moments of quiet joy during these short winter days. we leave the house layered in merino and wearing wooly hats for our regular sunday walks. wandering over
every winter we put fruit out for the birds that we share our home with, and oranges are a favourite of both the tui and the tauhou. these tiny snackers can get through half an orange in half a day (fortunately for us, one of our neighbours has a tree
the year's tipped over its highest point and started rolling towards the end again, and here i am, with a few photos from a recent road trip to share +++  mount ngauruhoe as seen from the desert road • sh1, northbound for rotorua geothermal steam lifting off the
(the big little adventure that wasn’t) as i write this, we’re sitting in a hotel in the south island of new zealand, drinking coffee and contemplating breakfast, our original christmas plans thwarted. if all had gone to plan, we would have been touching down on the
(because it's december now • and october demands to be remembered) homeward bound after a lunchtime swim • lucky 13 october is lunch in the city with a friend and it's all the 13s. it is a cloud atlas and weather-appropriate waiheke wine. it is
a love letter to a place that changed me These are the things I want to remember: how the wind and rain made their home in my bones. How it was impossible to resist standing on the foredeck, legs braced against the weather, feeling the full power of being in
did i already tell you about [one of] the amazing film cameras i have? it's this little yellow beauty. a vintage (circa 1987) minolta weathermatic, 35mm waterproof camera. my bestie, carol, found it in a second hand shop here on the island when she was house-and-cat-
we have a lot of different birds in our neighbourhood; from common sparrows to noisy native parrots. our newest arrival is a fine feathered chap we call percy, because apparently this is the name of all male pheasants*. last week, when sitting on the sofa, i saw a flurry of
it's 2007 and we've just moved to madison, wisconsin. this will be our home for the next 3 months while nic leads the hand over of a software development project to the new team and i hire my replacement. mother fools coffee house • photographed with
new carpet in the bedroom prompts a clean out and tidy up before we put everything back into place + brunch with friends overlooking the sea + lunch at a favourite local + cocktails (vesper martini for me, negroni for nic) and a few games of ticket to ride, europe sunday afternoon board
the ferry from tromsø that takes me, and my new friends, to arnøya where we'll spend the next week in creative heaven it’s 10pm and the sun is still up. we’ve eaten well, shared a few stories and swum together in
described as the amazing race meets food crawl, the great noodle run was one of the auckland restaurant month events and consisted of a fun afternoon visiting four city centre noodle restaurants. love how clear the water is where we live • if we weren't heading to the
monday was my birthday, so nic and i both took the day off and did a roadtrip south to hamilton for the day. i specifically wanted to go to hamilton gardens as its been years since we visited. even in its sleepy winter state, the gardens were a delight. and,
matariki rising + the winter solstice kūmara cake / loaf (since i don’t own a cake tin) honouring matariki by baking christall lowe’s kūmara cake with orange toffee sauce (served warm with vanilla ice-cream) + parāoa parai (fry bread), using the same
tax returns + laundry + poetry in unexpected places + mia yeast bakery treats + chicken kottu from a favourite sri lankan curry maker (who is sadly soon closing up shop) + bus and ferry rides to go visit friends on the other side of auckland + dinner and the delights of a good catch up