What could be simpler than designing a handbag? Any six year-old with a few felt pens could do it. But designing the perfect boardroom handbag that doubles as a backpack, using the finest leather, made by the best craftsmen that catches the eye of the world’s fashion media? Ahhhh, now that takes creativity, innovation and one determined Kiwi, as it turns out.

To understand how Jacqui Gilbert operates, you only have to listen to her reason for leaving Telecom in her 20’s. “It didn’t capture my imagination and I love working for things that make me dream.” She finishes this sentence with what sounds like a self-conscious laugh but it doesn’t sound silly to me and it explains a life lived with passion and curiosity.

A Wellingtonian, who majored in psychology and political science at Canterbury University, Jacqui worked for a few years but “I’d always wanted to do an MBA somewhere because I really wanted to have the chance to see how I stood against the rest of the world.” She was drawn to Cambridge in England because...you guessed it, “I loved the innovation and the history.” That was 2013 when she was 31.

Not one to sit still for long, Anna Petchell has a CV of adventure to envy. From TV to the high seas and protecting our planet, Anna is an inspirational Kiwi.

Hailing from a farm in Kiwitahi in the Waikato, Anna studied communications and went on to work as a Camera Operator and Floor Manager on shows like Police Ten 7 and TV3 news. Leaving New Zealand nine years ago, she moved to London after being made redundant and had planned to work for the BBC, but chose to travel instead.

Leaving home for a life of travel, and then at sea on super yachts, Anna has clocked up more clocked up more than 60 countries, 10,000 nautical miles, learned six languages (basic), and made countless friends around the world.

That has seen her “live” all over the Mediterranean, the Caribbean, the East Coast of USA, the Bahamas, Bermuda, and in the Auckland Viaduct. “Home is wherever the boat ends up – which was sometimes the middle of the Atlantic.”

Like many of us Rebekah Heineke didn’t plan on moving to London.

Five years on she’s still here and a few career moves later she’s set up her own business to build a community focused on fun, fitness and body positivity.

Like many of our network members she has an infectious energy and that real can-do positive attitude that so many Kiwis have.

Growing up in Auckland she dreamt of being a teacher and she naturally flowed into nannying, first in New Zealand, and took her experience to Monaco in the South of France.

London was the last place she imagined moving – all she’d heard was it was grey, rained a lot and was overpopulated. She says: “It was only when I moved to France that I visited a friend in London and fell head over heels in love with the city! It wasn't like any place I'd ever been to before.”