Ten years ago, a small group of Arrowtown creatives set themselves an ambitious goal: to help establish their town as one of New Zealand’s leading centres for the creative arts and industries.

A decade later, the Arrowtown Creative Arts Society (ACAS) has plenty to celebrate.

Since forming in 2016, ACAS has staged around 70 arts events, built a supporter base of more than 1,000 people, and helped foster a creative community that now includes an Arts Trail featuring 19 studios and galleries.

This October, the society will mark its tenth anniversary with a sixties-themed celebration bringing together the benefactors, members and supporters who have helped make it all possible.

But the anniversary is also an opportunity to look back at just how much has changed.

From an idea to an arts destination

When ACAS began, its founders saw plenty of creative potential in Arrowtown, but little connecting its artists, practitioners and supporters.

Founding chairman and current board member John Lapsley recalls that the organisation began with a deliberately simple mission:

“To establish Arrowtown as one of New Zealand’s leading centres for the creative arts and industries.”

The group also chose an approach that was somewhat unusual for a fledgling arts organisation.

“We immediately set out to become self-financed, believing this gave us the chance of becoming a commercial arts entrepreneur,” John says.

ACAS has maintained a distinctly Arrowtown identity ever since, while bringing together people with experience across both the arts and business. Wherever possible, the society also aims to ensure its events pay their own way.

That model has helped ACAS turn ideas into an impressive range of experiences.

Seventy events and counting

Over its first decade, ACAS has staged around 70 events spanning exhibitions, talks, chamber music and large outdoor opera concerts.

Current co-chair Julian Knights, who joined ACAS in 2021 and has extensive experience on major arts and not-for-profit boards in New Zealand and Australia, says it was the organisation’s bias towards action that first stood out to him.

“It’s not a talk-fest. ACAS just gets on with getting things done.”

Among its most ambitious projects have been the society’s garden operas, large-scale outdoor events showcasing young opera performers, including artists who have gone on to build significant careers.

Julian credits a succession of people with helping ACAS reach its ten-year milestone, including Paul Rea, Bob Berry, Kelly Carmichael, John Lapsley, Sharon Leamy and Margot Robinson, who was instrumental in establishing the garden opera events.

But he believes the wider Arrowtown community deserves just as much recognition.

“Arrowtowners are people who join up and then turn up,” Julian says. “Visiting performers often remark on Arrowtown providing them enjoyable audiences.”

Sixteen local benefactors also provide important financial support to the society and its work.

A creative identity that keeps growing

Perhaps one of the clearest signs of change can be seen simply by walking through Arrowtown.

ACAS recalls that in 2016 the town had one serious retail gallery alongside numerous tourism-focused outlets. Today, the Arrowtown Arts Trail connects 19 studios and galleries, giving visitors another way to experience the town and discover the people creating there.

Earlier this year, that creative identity received recognition from much further afield when the New York Times travel section recommended Arrowtown’s Arts Trail to readers and described Arrowtown as an “artsy village”.

For John, it felt like an unexpected validation of the idea that started ACAS a decade earlier.

The society’s founders had looked at smaller creative destinations around the world, including Taos, St Ives and Sedona, and wondered whether Arrowtown had the ingredients to develop its own identity as a boutique arts destination.

Its natural setting, village scale and existing community of creative people provided the building blocks. The challenge was bringing them together.

Ten years on, ACAS has made considerable progress towards doing exactly that.

Celebrating the first decade, and looking to the next

On Friday 16 October, ACAS will bring its community together to celebrate the milestone with a sixties-themed anniversary evening for its benefactors, members and supporters.

It’s a chance to recognise not only what the organisation has achieved, but the many people who have contributed along the way.

And while ten years provides a good excuse for a party, ACAS certainly isn’t treating it as a finishing line.

“ACAS has achieved a great deal in its first ten years,” Julian says. “We’re looking forward to expanding all that during its second decade.”

For an organisation founded with a single-sentence mission and a small group of people determined to make things happen, the next ten years could be interesting indeed.