Kate Sylvester was a teenager when she realized she wanted to leave school and design clothes. Her mother’s response was telling. “Oh that’s all right… I’d have worried if you’d wanted to be an accountant.”
“Mum has always been incredibly supportive of me. When I was at school, I began chopping up sneakers and putting beads on them. She would drive me up to Orewa [north of Auckland] to sell them on the roadside over summer.” No surprises then, that Kate’s mother Toni was a creative person – a lover of the outdoors, a passionate gardener, a former teacher and stay-at-home mum.
Kate credits her parents (pictured right) with being hugely influential in her life. Her father, Ron, was a teacher and loved the outdoors. A dedicated tramper and climber, he passed that passion to his daughter. Kate and her family are working their way through the country’s Great Walks. “I had an incredible childhood. We had so much freedom.” Kate and her older brother Todd and two sisters, Holly and Joanna, grew up on Auckland’s North Shore, in Greenhithe.
Her parents bought a rundown house on a couple of acres there in the ’70s. “It had a beautiful peach orchard. The grass was over our heads on the back lawn, it was like a bombsite, covered in rubbish.”
It became a massive project. “Mum was obsessed with the garden and Dad worked alongside her. They were always working on grand projects and I grew up thinking that’s what you do in life, you make things and have projects.”
Denne historien er fra February 2020-utgaven av Australian Women’s Weekly NZ.
Start din 7-dagers gratis prøveperiode på Magzter GOLD for å få tilgang til tusenvis av utvalgte premiumhistorier og 9000+ magasiner og aviser.
Allerede abonnent ? Logg på
Denne historien er fra February 2020-utgaven av Australian Women’s Weekly NZ.
Start din 7-dagers gratis prøveperiode på Magzter GOLD for å få tilgang til tusenvis av utvalgte premiumhistorier og 9000+ magasiner og aviser.
Allerede abonnent? Logg på
PRETTY WOMAN
Dial up the joy with a mood-boosting self-care session done in the privacy of your own home. It’s a blissful way to banish the winter blues.
Hitting a nerve
Regulating the vagus nerve with its links to depression, anxiety, arthritis and diabetes could aid physical and mental wellbeing.
The unseen Rovals
Candid, behind the scenes and neverbefore-seen images of the royal family have been released for a new exhibition.
Great read
In novels and life - there's power in the words left unsaid.
Winter dinner winners
Looking for some thrifty inspiration for weeknight dinners? Try our tasty line-up of budget-concious recipes that are bound to please everyone at the table.
Winter baking with apples and pears
Celebrate the season of apples and pears with these sweet bakes that will keep the cold weather blues away.
The wines and lines mums
Once only associated with glamorous A-listers, cocaine is now prevalent with the soccer-mum set - as likely to be imbibed at a school fundraiser as a nightclub. The Weekly looks inside this illegal, addictive, rising trend.
Former ballerina'sBATTLE with BODY IMAGE
Auckland author Sacha Jones reveals how dancing led her to develop an eating disorder and why she's now on a mission to educate other women.
MEET RUSSIA'S BRAVEST WOMEN
When Alexei Navalny died in a brutal Arctic prison, Vladimir Putin thought he had triumphed over his most formidable opponent. Until three courageous women - Alexei's mother, wife and daughter - took up his fight for freedom.
IT'S NEVER TOO LATE TO START
Responsible for keeping the likes of Jane Fonda and Jamie Lee Curtis in shape, Malin Svensson is on a mission to motivate those in midlife to move more.
