Wellington
New Zealand's windy harbour-side capital
Wedged between a sparkling harbour and steep green hills at the southern tip of the North Island, Wellington is New Zealand's compact, creative capital, famous for its wind, its coffee, and its film industry. Often dubbed the coolest little capital in the world, the city of around 420,000 packs cafes, galleries, government, and a celebrated craft-beer and dining scene into a tightly hemmed downtown. As the seat of Parliament and the home of the national museum and the studios behind The Lord of the Rings, Wellington blends political weight with a bohemian, walkable charm.
The city rings a near-circular harbour on Cook Strait, the turbulent passage separating the North and South Islands, with hills rising so steeply from the waterfront that houses cling to slopes reached by cable car and winding lanes. It straddles an active fault line, and the funneling effect of the strait makes Wellington one of the windiest cities in the world. The compact centre, built partly on land reclaimed from the harbour, gives way quickly to bush-clad ridges and a rugged, exposed south coast.
The New Zealand Company landed its first organised settlers here in 1840, and the growing town took over from Auckland as the national capital in 1865, chosen for its central position between the two main islands. Earthquakes have repeatedly reshaped the harbour and the city. In recent decades Wellington has reinvented itself as a hub of film, technology, and the arts, anchored by Te Papa, the national museum, and by a government quarter that keeps the small city at the centre of national life.