2023 Starship Tea Towel

Put a spring in your step with a refreshing glass of Starship Soda, a new recipe from Ruby Seeto, perfect for sipping on during the warmer months ahead. Ruby has shared how to make her zingy sweet and sour Soda on her Wallace Cotton tea towel design for 2023, to raise funds for Starship Children’s Hospital. The new tea towel design is bright and fun featuring lime slices and red chillies, a colourful addition for your kitchen and ideal for gifting.

Ruby’s Soda Tea Towel will be available to purchase in-store and online with $6 from the sale of each tea towel being donated directly to Starship.

SHOP STARSHIP SODA TEA TOWEL

Fundraising for Starship

Working together since 2009, we’ve raised over $700,000 for the Starship Foundation. These funds have supported vital projects including improvements to the Neurology ward, a refurbishment of the Phlebotomy Laboratory, establishing an ovarian cryopreservation banking protocol to benefit young cancer patients and the upgrade of the Children’s Emergency Department staff tearoom.

Proceeds from the sale of Ruby’s Starship Soda Tea Towel will help fund a project close to Ruby’s heart – a child cancer research project named ‘Kōrero Pono: understanding the experience of child cancer whānau’. Each year, over 150 Kiwi children between the ages of 0-15 are diagnosed with cancer. Kōrero Pono aims to provide critical insight into whānau experiences of child cancer services and use these insights to support improvements to support service improvements across the country.

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Finding Inspiration and the Design Process

We love working with Ruby to help make her beautiful and unique designs come to life. Here’s what Ruby had to say about the inspiration for her 2023 Starship Soda Tea Towel and working with our team.
“Last Summer, the chilli plant Mum planted in our garden was dripping in chillies. Dad, our resident chilli lover, was very happy! I loved the way the red chillies popped in the garden and thought they’d pop even more on a tea towel. The next step was to find a recipe and after a bit of hunting, landed on a delicious pineapple, lime and chilli drink recipe. A bit of fine tuning and a few rounds of taste testing later, the Starship Soda was created. It’s so yummy and refreshing, with the perfect amount of kick from the chilli.

I then hand draw each design and send it over to Anna and Zoe at Wallace Cotton to work their magic and turn my design into a graphic. We then meet to choose the tea towel print colours together before going to print - one of my favourite parts of the process!” Ruby Seeto.

Q&A with Ruby Seeto

Q: Can you share a memorable moment from your many years of working with Wallace Cotton?
A: There have been lots of great times during my 14 year partnership with Wallace Cotton. One surreal experience was getting the opportunity to be a keynote speaker at a leadership conference with Gemma Flynn. That was pretty cool!

Another special moment is from a few years ago. We’d set up a stall at the hospital to sell tea towels in the lead up to Christmas. Dr Philip Morreau visited our stall to purchase some tea towels and told me he’d been Ruby’s surgeon. When I responded saying that I am Ruby, he couldn’t believe it! I’d grown up!! That felt like a real full circle moment.

SHOP STARSHIP COLLECTION

Partnering for good

We believe that a small gesture can make a big difference. We love partnering with people and organisations who have a passion for helping others and the environment. We’re proud to have been working with Ruby since 2009 and to have collaborated with Live Ocean to help raise funds for several marine environment projects. Read more about our partnerships for good.

PARTNERING FOR GOOD