Tessa Nicholson

Tessa Nicholson is the author of Fifty Years, Fifty Stories: Marlborough the Region that Turned the Wine World Upside Down. Tessa is uniquely placed to write this book, having written about the wine industry from Marlborough since 1996. Tessa started her media career as a radio announcer before moving into general news reporting for the Marlborough Express. She edited Wine Press for 13 years and New Zealand Winegrower magazine for 11 years. Tessa wrote Jane Hunter, Growing a Legacy (2008) and later helped to research material for Allan Scott’s biography Marlborough Man (2016). Tessa and her husband Ross raised four sons in Blenheim. In addition to her wine industry journalism, Tessa is well known for her love of books, dogs and rugby. She has been a much-loved session chair with the Marlborough Book Festival since its inception in 2014, interviewing Witi Ihimaera, Dame Fiona Kidman, Diana Wichtel and Greg McGee, among many other greats of New Zealand literature. Tessa has a genuine interest in people, and their stories, and this shines through in her interviewing and writing.  She will be interviewed by her former Marlborough Express work colleague and good friend, the Stuff journalist Mike White.