The Two of Us: Mid-winter Christmas team

Gabrielle on Paulina

Paulina and I have known each other from when we worked together at Mills Reef. Back then I never would have imagined that we would one day go into business with each other.
The original idea of the Tauranga Mid-Winter Christmas Market was Paulina's. Every year in winter she would think how perfect it would be to have a cold Christmas market like the ones she knew back in Europe.
In 2008 I was in Europe and experienced a taste of what the Christmas markets are like there. They are wonderful. The whole community comes together and wanders around the beautifully decorated stalls to buy Christmas treats and goodies. This is what we are trying to recreate in the Historic Village.
Paulina approached me and asked whether I would like to help her with this project back in May 2010. It has been a lot of hard work but we're sure that the end result will be more than worth it.
Paulina and I work really well together; we have found that we make up for each other's weaknesses in many areas. I am quite an "attention to details" person, which we often have to laugh about when I get all technical about our designs.
The first thing we are going to do once the market opens on Saturday is have a celebratory glass of mulled wine together.
Paulina on Gabrielle
I have known Gabrielle since 2009. We used to work together in a restaurant in Tauranga. Now I am the general manager of Classic Cuisine, organising anything from small morning teas to big-scale gala events.
When I decided to organise the Mid-winter Christmas event I needed help and who better than the highly efficient Gabrielle who is now completing her degree in management studies.
Me, being brought up on the other side of the world and Gabrielle, the visiting Kiwi had a lot of ideas and together we knew we could organise the perfect festival.
We both want to bring together the community and make the festive spirit last until Christmas. So as boring as it sounds, we complement each other, have a lot of laughs and even if we meet in private as friends it always ends up being about the Tauranga Mid-Winter Christmas Market.
During the last 14 months we learned a lot about each other. However, it wasn't until a couple of weeks ago that we found that we have more than the Tauranga Mid-Winter Christmas Market.
We have discovered that we have a similar sense of humour, two great partners who get along really well and we both enjoy a good trim mocchacino. We are both exploring our options and have great ideas for future events in Tauranga. We are sure that the community will see more of us and what we have to offer.