The Re:Make Team

Re:Make is delivered by us (John Bache and Mark Lever), and our network of craftspeople, artists, and other creative practitioners.

We've both lived big, international lives, gathering special memories, knowledge, and scar tissue, before finally (re:)discovering our Tūrangawaewae and true creative paths in our late fifties. We've been passionate storytellers of one form or another the whole trip to date, and are also united by personal experience, values, hopes, and dreams.

One of the many topics we've bonded over: the concept of living life according to the scale of a volume knob. While some people strive to facilitate an existence within a 3-7 band, we feel the more formative life lessons and experiences are to be had at the extremes of that 1 - 10 volume knob.

Now that we've figured out how we want to contribute, we're making up for lost time, seeing how we can help others live more creative and fulfilling lives as we've begun to, whilst working on our other ventures within the Naked Curious creative ecosystem.

Mark Lever

Creative lead

Mark is a highly-skilled designer and craftsman based in Matakana. The founder of SYML (considered furniture and objects, made to last) and Daedalic Lightworks (architectural brass hardware, sold exclusively through architects and designers), his studio is one of Re:Make's two home bases.

A former award-winning director, photographer, and chef, Mark guides participants through the core analogue craft programme.

Just as he does when working on his historic wooden yacht Nereides, he works slowly, precisely, and with a quality of attention that is itself instructive, providing a timely reminder of the value of fully concentrating on making things (that) last.

John Bache

Programme lead

John spent over two decades specialising in creative strategy and communications across the German-speaking world, where he worked with some of the world's biggest brands, and leaders in design, media, sport, and organisational transformation.

He has personally navigated redundancy and a myriad of other challenging experiences within the German corporate environment, and knows what it feels like to be a senior professional with no immediate answer to what comes next.

John is based in Wānaka, from where he's building the Naked & Curious creative ecosystem, hosts The Unmaking podcast, takes photographs, and spends his spare time playing and (re:)making in nature.