Become a Friend of
Featherston Booktown
Let’s Be Friends
Become a Friend of Featherston Booktown and help fund the Festival, and our Children’s Book Voucher Project. Help us promote literacy and inspire imaginations with your annual membership donation.
$100 Family/Individual • $200 Business
If you’d like to donate more, we’d love that. Just enter the amount you’d like to donate when you register.
You’ll fund the Children’s Book Voucher Project
This gets us right to the heart of the matter. When you become a Friend of Featherston Booktown, your tax-deductible membership donation will directly fund The Children’s Book Voucher Project. A $100 membership buys five book vouchers for children, and a $200 membership buys ten book vouchers.
Each year during the Featherston Booktown Karukatea Festival we give out 1,500 book vouchers to all of the primary-aged school children in South Wairarapa. Children can redeem their $20 vouchers at Featherston, Martinborough, and Greytown bookshops, and at the booksellers’ stalls in Featherston during the Festival. For some children this is the first time they’ve had their own “money” to spend. Often, it’s the first time they can choose a book that they really like and want to read.
You’ll fund the Festival
You make the Festival happen. After the Children’s Book Voucher Project is funded, your membership donations help us secure popular writers, illustrators, and workshops for the Festival.
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Benefits for you
To say thanks for being a great Friend, you’ll also receive:
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Official recognition on our website
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An invitation to future Programme Launch Parties
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Earlybird access to event tickets
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A chance to meet Festival presenters
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A monthly Featherston Booktown Newsletter
Your membership donation is good for one year from 1 January through to 31 December. We won’t pester you to commit to more than one year at a time; we appreciate that personal circumstances change year to year.
The Friends of Featherston Booktown are a lively group of supporters who underpin our efforts and who are the driving force to help make Featherston Booktown one of New Zealand’s most valuable cultural events. Join us!
Friends of Featherston Booktown 2025
Individual and Whānau Friends
Alan Smith
Anastacia Kirk
Anne Hynds & Derek McCluskie
Beverley McNally
C R & E M Kay
Catharine Franks
Charlotte Berney
Craig Linkhorn
Danielle Pullan
Deirdre Drysdale
Emily Greenberg & Katie Beattie
Gay Monteith
Heather Drysdale
Hilary Beaton
J N Vickers
Jan Stephen
Jennifer Clark
Jo Cormack
Joanna & Julian Ludbrook
John & Gail Thomason
John Lawson
Josephine Lowe
Julie Elstone
Kate Tucker
Liz Stringer & Robbie Morrison
Martin & Tania Connelly
Mary McCallum
Mike Butterick
Paddy Maloney
Penny Griffin
Reuben Johnson & Willow Sainsbury
Robyn Ramsden
Romain Busby
S M Sheriff
Scilla Askew & Robert Carew
Sharn Riggs
Shirley Vollweiler
Tracy Watkins
Wendy Campbell
Alan Wendt & Dean Knight
Andrew Morrison & Deborah Barratt
Bessie Sutherland
Burton Silver
Carole Bourdet
Celia Wade-Brown
Cora Trevarthen
Dan & Adele RIchardson
Daphne Geisler
Elizabeth Patchett & John Taber
Fraser & Margie Donald
Hallwass Family
Heather Hutton
J Maher
J Tolerton
Jason Osborne
Jenny Neligan
Joan Hinton
Joanna Baldwin
John Broeren
John McKinney
Judy Dell
Kate Maher
Liz Mellish
Maarten Weavers
Mary & Peter Biggs CNZM
Michael Burrows & Kate Mahoney
P A & J M Stuart
Paul & Mary Mason
Pete Roberts
Robyn Hambleton
Roger Steele
Ruth Shaw
Sarah Uruski
Shara Hudson
Shirley Roberts
Tana Klaricich
Waione Te Paa
Business Friends of Featherston Booktown 2025
Major Funders 2025
Key Partners 2025
Friends of Featherston Booktown come in all shapes and sizes. They’re keen on things from rugby to cooking and roller derby to ballet, and range from home-makers to dog-walkers, cafe waiters to road workers, lawyers to public servants and everything in between. They come together to support Featherston Booktown to be part of something larger than themselves, contributing to the local community and engaging young people in something positive.
Featherston Booktown’s driving purpose is to position Featherston, the first town over the Remutaka Hill in the Wairarapa, as a world-famous, prosperous and innovative destination for lovers of books and literature. Encouraging children and adults alike to not just open a book, but to love reading or be inspired to put pen to paper and write; to provoke creativity and broaden minds to drive fulfilment and happiness.
Each year we host the Featherston Booktown Karukatea Festival weekend in May. We also stage many events throughout the year, gathering together our nation’s most acclaimed writers and thinkers spanning many genres to share their experiences and engage young and old.
"I took four of my grandchildren to Chicken and Frog to choose a book each for their Christmas present. A great time was had by all.
The gift of books is something special. Thank you for the opportunity to give book vouchers to children.”
- Sue W.