Opened with great fanfare 18 months ago, Queenstown’s Wahlburgers – part of a burger chain created by Hollywood A-lister Mark Wahlberg – has quietly shut up shop. The restaurant, advertised for lease, was on the ground floor of the Upper Village entertainment precinct, below the Skyline gondola, which originally opened…

Stars in glamorous gowns often peacock on the Cannes Film Festival red carpet, but one attendee Saturday night literally came as a bird.Ahead of the the premiere of Lynne Ramsay’s Die, My Love, with Robert Pattinson and Jennifer Lawrence, a man came fully dressed as bird, complete with a beak…

Classically trained Austrian singer JJ won the 69th Eurovision Song Contest with Wasted Love, a song that combines operatic, multi-octave vocals with a techno twist.Israel’s Yuval Raphael came second at an exuberant celebration of music and unity that was shadowed by the Gaza war and ruffled by discord over Israel’s…

Wānaka search and rescue teams are responding to more avoidable accidents as unprepared people venture deeper into the back country, lured partly by the influence of social media and websites.Volunteers said they had observed more people “lost and out of their depth” in 22 rescue operations between October and March,…

Two customers have been turned away from VTNZ because inspectors deemed their cars too dirty, with dog hair.VTNZ reserves the right to reject a vehicle if it is not in a clean and tidy state, it is contaminated or it is impossible to access and properly inspect critical safety components.Lynn…

Police have arrested one person after officers swarmed Auckland’s Lynn Mall last night. About 5pm, officers responded to reports of a robbery at a Batkin Rd address in the suburb of New Windsor.”A person reported being robbed by two men and threatened with a firearm,” police said.”The alleged offenders fled…

Lotto’s jackpot is growing, with a $15 million prize pot up for grabs tonight, opening up the question of whether there is a best place to buy your ticket.Debate about strategies to increase players’ chances of winning always hots up as the money on offer rises.One of the key discussion…

TVNZ’s excellence in news and current affairs reporting has been recognised at the 2025 Voyager Media Awards.Three reporters – Indira Stewart, Te Aniwa Hurihanganui and Zoe Madden-Smith – collected prizes at the awards ceremony held in Auckland on Friday night.Stewart, a member of TVNZ’s In-Depth team, won two awards and…

Ten thousand New Zealanders may have lost vision — sometimes permanently — due to toxoplasmosis, an infection triggered by a parasite spread by cats.Otago University researchers estimate 40,000 people are affected by ocular toxoplasmosis — one in four seriously — but their efforts to develop new treatments are being hampered…

Police investigating the death of 15-year-old Kaea Karauria from Napier say rumours the whānau and victim have gang affiliations are “damaging and unhelpful”. A homicide probe was launched early Sunday after Karauria was found critically injured at an Alexander Avenue address. The teenager died at the scene.In an update this…