Everyone loves a little friendly competition, and so it proved in the first edition of “Thrift Wars”, where we celebrated our favourite personal, pre-loved and classic pieces. Take a look at the best of the best retro and repurposed items from our team.

These entries just go to show that great design always stand the test of time.

Videosport Pong console - Jon Coates, Senior User Experience Designer

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In the 80s, Jon’s dad turned up to his new office and found a whole load of junk that included this Pong console. You know the one … bog-basic 2D graphics … two ‘bats’ you could only move up or down.

Many happy days followed until his dad threw it away for-no-reason-at-all! Jon was so distraught, he spent the next 15 years trying to find another one hand-built in NZ. He eventually succeeded.

He’s really stoked with his fine - it’s not working right now, but it soon will be.

New Zealand Rugby League scoreboard - Antoinette Le Vaillant, Senior Designer

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Antoinette rescued the scoreboard numbers used at Carlaw Park – the spiritual home of Kiwi rugby league – just before it got demolished in 2008.

“I was taking a snooping around – with the groundkeeper’s permission of course – when I caught my eye on these signs. I’ll never forget because a possum jumped out from nowhere and across my back. So I scrambled to pick up 10 numbers as quick as I could and got out of there. Each one represents a little piece of Kiwi history money can’t buy – they’re a great conversation starter.”

Retro furniture - Simon Smith, Digital Design Director

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Simon found these chairs on Trademe, and at a later date, his dad spotted the table to match. Brilliant.

The table had been used for painting so it was a mess. That was the bad news. The good news was his dad lovingly restored it all, removing the paint, getting the nicks out and then adding a stain.

Simon gets pretty excited about mid-century design, so he’s pretty stoked with the result which now takes pride of place in his kitchen.