Introducing this beautiful cookbook filled with treasured family recipes from the Napier Central School neighbourhood…

Dael and I are thrilled to have played a small part in this beautiful cookbook, “Neighbourhood Eats”, which features mouth-watering, tried and trusted recipes from the Napier Central School community. The book is a school fundraiser to raise money to help save their school pool, which needs major refurbishments.

I know when you envisage a school cookbook you might think photocopied pages and spiral binding, but not this cookbook! Neighbourhood Eats is the most beautiful hardback book filled with 275 recipes and more than 300 incredible original photographs shot by our favourite photographer, Florence Charvin.

Every family has at least one or two favourite recipes. You know the ones handed down from your grandmother; the ones that have a story that goes with them, and a history; the ones that have been experimented with and adjusted until they’re just right. Put together in one stunning book, the recipes and the stories in Neighbourhood Eats will make their way into your kitchen and your heart.

The recipes in this book are a perfect reflection of the cultural diversity found at Napier Central School. As well as Kiwi kids, they have pupils whose backgrounds include Thai, Swedish, Scottish, Malaysian, Japanese, Indian, Australian, Irish, Middle Eastern, Greek, Italian, and German, to name a few. Also scattered through the book are recipes from some well known New Zealanders - Jacinda Ardern, Peter Gordon, and Jospeh Parker have all donated their favourite recipe.

Behind the scenes there has been the most incredible group of people working tirelessly to make this book a reality. A group of volunteer cooks made up of mums, dads, grandmothers and teachers, cooked all of the recipes. Members of the Napier Central PTA organised and oversaw the photoshoots, liaised with the graphic designer, recruited sponsors, organised printing, donating their time all in an effort to help their childrens’ school.

The name Neighbourhood Eats came about because of the huge effort put in from the whole community - parents, teachers, pupils and local businesses. Sponsorship support from a large number of local businesses covered all of the production costs, which means that 100% of the profits can go directly into the Napier Central School “save the pool” fund. Between us Dael and I have five daughters, all of whom are past pupils of this wonderful school, so we were very happy to be able to help with this project, sponsoring the ‘soups and breads’ chapter.

The Neighbourhood Eats cookbook costs $45 and can be ordered from their great looking website (built by Kathryn McGarvey). What a brilliant gift it would make, so why not grab a few copies for your mum and your sister too, knowing that you’ll be giving a fantastic gift as well as contributing to a worthy cause. I’m sure these are going to fly out the door, so don’t miss out, order your copy today.

Dael and I wanted to share a project with you that we've had so much fun with and are very proud to have worked on. It's a campaign for GIB® to promote their new range of GIB-Cove®. With five different cove profiles available, you can choose the one which best suits your style and your personality, whether that is modern and minimal, more traditional, or something in between. Coving is an important architectural detail in your home and deserves as much consideration as any other piece you'd choose for your room. We worked with the amazing team at justONE in Auckland who created the campaign and the five different personalities to represent each cove. We designed a living room for each personality that we felt worked beautifully with the chosen GIB-Cove®.

We were able to fly up to Auckland to create one of the rooms we designed, and it was amazing to see the room come to life. We designed the room for Mason (and his dog Rusty) to suit his laid back lifestyle and personality. The contemporary lines of the Mezzo GIB-Cove® complimented the room beautifully.

The other four rooms we designed have been turned into fabulous illustrations. Make sure you check them all out on the Gib® website and click on each style to see how to 'get the look'.

A special thanks to all our suppliers whose products we've used in our room designs, but especially to those who allowed us to use their products for Mason's photo shoot - Soren Liv, The Ivy House, Maytime, The Poi Room, Bianca Lorenne, Torpedo7, Carpet Court, and Black Bridge Nurseries. If you're interested in any of the amazing products we've featured you can also purchase through us, just give us a call or fire through an email. And if you're interested in using the GIB-Cove® in your home talk to your local, architect, interior designer, or builder about the range.