Steampunks strut their stuff to mark NZ suffrage

Elaine Rawson aka Penny Lane (left) and Vivenne Shepherd aka Cayte Shepherd. Note Shepherd's cuffs are made from pencils, for women to sign the Suffrage Petition.

Suffrage Day celebrations reflect the blending of old and new worlds that created social conditions enabling New Zealand women to get the vote 125 years ago today. In Whangarei, a gala event will also celebrate the fantastical mix of eras reflected in the fashion statement called Steampunk.

On Saturday, the Kraken's Lair Steam Punk Picnic and Suffrage Strut will be held at the Town Basin; the picnic at the Folly from 12pm followed by the promenade around the area starting about 1.30pm.

Organiser Cayte Shepherd, aka Vivienne Shepherd, said members of the public are invited to dress up in punkish Victoriana if they fancy.

''It's a family event, it will be fun, come along,'' she said. ''If the weather is inclement we will lunch at The Quay and strut when the weather clears.''

During the Suffrage Strut — the name hinting at the sinfully smug pride New Zealand should feel about its world-first human rights legislation — Shepherd will share some choice quotes made mainly by the real Kate Sheppard leading up to the September 19, 1893, signing of the Electoral Act.

Conditions in New Zealand were tough for the majority of women, many still in the pioneering and settlement stage. Their lives were also hampered by the problems of morality and social ill that came with a male-dominated, booze-addled frontier of the Empire.

Added to that were other problems related to the Empire, such as a male-only political sphere and relocated gender, class and education biases - but the fit was looser in a newly forming world. Here, a band of determined women and their male supporters prised the crack open using the democracy of the day.

In that drive for social reform, over 50,000 women - a quarter of the European women living in New Zealand - sign petitions calling for the women's ''franchise'', or the right to vote.

''The patriarchal, hierarchical society hadn't been fully set up yet. New Zealand really did offer new opportunities,'' Shepherd said.

Back ''home'' in Britain where the majority of settlers came from, women didn't get the vote until 1919 and then only those aged 30 and older.

''It was a violent struggle there. Suffragettes were imprisoned, they were killed. Here it was peaceful, respectful, it used the laws and parliamentary system,'' Shepherd said.

And the Steampunk connection? Many changes in the late 18th and early 19th century Europe that took apart family, social and community traditions and put back them together differently were related to the Industrial Revolution, epitomised by steam power and some fantastical machinery.

''It's also about steaming it up, mixing things up,'' Shepherd said.