Earlier this month Awesome Newcastle celebrated our annual End-of-Year event where, as is the tradition, we invited the general public along to hear three strong finalists pitch their (more polished) ideas from 2025 for a second time.

Along with our permanent board members, several guests joined us this evening including long-time guest board member James Barr of Xero and first time guest Phil Jordan of Scenic.

Our returning pitchers were Larissa Elliott from Under the Same Sun, Annette Squires and Val Watson from Arts in Recovery and Chris Jones with Livefree Project.

Larissa went first. She explained the changes she’d made since she first pitched earlier this year. Earlier this year she was hoping to create a kids book for families who have fly-in fly-out workers, and now she’s hoping to support families via an online connection group. She would use the money to get it off the ground, no pun intended.

Val and Annette went next. They pitched earlier this year as well, and again they explained how they run free art workshops for local people living with mental illness, and they do arts workshops for free. They would use the money for a heat press machine, so that they can copy and print artist designs onto T shirts, caps, bags, merchandise. They want to so sell them for profit so that Arts In Recovery can be more self sustainable, financially.
Our final finalist was Chris Jones from Livefree Project. Chris and her team have pitched several times in the past and also won back in 2023 at another EOY event! She explained the Livefree Program that helps feed our locals and it provides places where loneliness and hardship and struggle is met with open arms. The money would help them provide the meals and the vehicles of the food to have those conversations.

The board had a daunting task at hand but votes must be cast and at last we invited Phil to the stage to award the money to Larissa! Congratulations Larissa, we can’t wait to see where Under the Same Sun takes you this summer! Thank you to Chris, Val and Annette as well for championing your good causes for a second time this year.

Thank you to our board and our finalists and the community for such an amazing year with Awesome Newcastle!

On a bittersweet note, one of our original board members, Lois Donaldson from Wine Selectors has decided, after ten dedicated years of generosity, to step down from the Awesome Newcastle board. Thank you so so much for your time and energy, Lois.

We love you, Lois!

You never missed funding a single Awesome Newcastle since the start, and if we were more organised, we would have  awarded you a plaque or a trophy! In all sincerity, thank you for all you have done for Awesome Newcastle. You will be missed!