Following a nearly five-year engagement, the wedding had been a long time coming as the couple had originally planned to marry in 2022 but postponed it due to the country’s Covid restrictions at the time.  

“13.01.24 Worth the wait. ”, Ardern wrote on Instagram, next to a stunning wedding photo of herself and Gayford at Craggy Range vineyard. 

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A post shared by Jacinda Ardern (@jacindaardern)

Ardern wore a fitted ivory sleeveless, cowl-neck halter gown with a high neckline and low back by New Zealand fashion designer, Juliette Hogan – who is reportedly a close friend of Ardern. Her shoes were from Mount Maunganui designer Chaos and Harmony, the New Zealand Herald reports. 

The couple’s daughter, Neve, walked down the aisle with her father, wearing a dress made from Ardern’s mother’s wedding dress. 

Details of the event were kept private, but it’s believed only family and close friends, as well as a handful of Ardern’s former political colleagues were invited. Among them were Ardern’s successor and former prime minister Chris Hipkins. 

During her emotional remarks to reports when she resigned as prime minister in January 2023, she had said, “To Clarke, let’s finally get married”. 

Ardern’s resignation shocked many as she stepped down after five-and-a-half years as prime minister, citing burnout by saying she did not have “enough in the tank”. 

“It’s about knowing when you’ve got what it takes and what is needed to lead, but also have the courage to know when you don’t,” she said.

During her time as PM, her leadership style earned international recognition for navigating the country through a number of crises, including the Covid-pandemic, a horrific mass shooting in Christchurch and the White Island volcano eruption.

One year since departing politics

After stepping down from Prime Minister, a job she called ‘the greatest role of my life’, Ardern has been continuing her advocacy work and enjoying more family time. 

In April 2023, she was appointed a trustee of the Prince of Wales’ environment award, the Earthshot Prize, which was created by Prince William to fund projects that aim to save the planet.

Ardern said since Earthshot’s creation she had believed in the prize’s “power to encourage and spread not only the innovation we desperately need, but also optimism”.

Since resigning as PM, she’s also temporarily joined Harvard University after being appointed to dual fellowships at the Harvard Kennedy School. And she’s taken an unpaid role in combating online extremism. 

In June 2023, Ardern was made a Dame Grand Companion for her leadership through a mass shooting and pandemic. This title is one of NZ’s highest honours. 

That same month, Ardern also announced she’d be writing a book on being ‘your own kind of leader’. There’s much anticipation for the book as she’s promised to expand on her unique style of leadership. 

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A post shared by Jacinda Ardern (@jacindaardern)

Since departing parliament, Ardern has kept a low profile on political matters but has shared a bit of her life on social media, noting her precious time spent with family. 

In an adorable birthday post on Instagram last July, she wrote: “Can’t remember the last time I had a birthday that was quite as normal as this one. Tea and toast in bed, work, and dinner with my loves. Feeling very lucky today…and just a little older. ”

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A post shared by Jacinda Ardern (@jacindaardern)

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In December 2019, Marin was elected as the youngest head of state, though that record has since been claimed by conservative Austrian Chancellor Sebastian Kurz. 

On her Instagram post, the Prime Minister thanked her all-female wedding team:

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Lämmin kiitos onnitteluista Kiitos myös upeille naisille, jotka teitte päivästämme unohtumattoman. Kiitos hääpäivän ikuistamisesta @amandalehtolaphoto, hääpotretista @minttusaarni, puvusta @anniruuthofficial ja @pinyamiu, kukista Tanja Lähdeaholle @floramore_oy ja vihkimisestä Eiralle. Kuva: Amanda Lehtola

A post shared by Sanna Marin (@sannamarin) on Aug 2, 2020 at 12:36pm PDT

“Thank you also to the wonderful women who made our day unforgettable,” she wrote. “Thanks for capturing the wedding day, for the wedding portrait, for the bridal gown and the flowers.”

“I am happy and grateful that I get to share my life with the man I love. We have seen and experienced a lot together, shared joys and sorrows, and supported each other in the bottom and storm. We have lived together in our youth, grown up and grown older for our beloved daughter. Of all the people, you’re the right one for me. Thank you for being by my side.”

The newly-weds’ permanent home is in Tampere, a Kaleva district in Southern Finland. Since the beginning of the COVID-19  pandemic, they have lived at the Prime Minister’s official residence.

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Eilen sanoimme toisillemme tahdon. Olen onnellinen ja kiitollinen, että saan jakaa elämäni rakastamani ihmisen kanssa. Olemme nähneet ja kokeneet yhdessä paljon, jakaneet ilot ja surut, ja tukeneet toisiamme tyvenessä ja myrskyssä. Olemme eläneet yhdessä nuoruutemme, varttuneet aikuisiksi ja kasvaneet vanhemmiksi rakkaalle tyttärellemme. Kaikista ihmisistä Sinä olet minulle se oikea. Kiitos, että olet vierelläni. Kuva: @minttusaarni

A post shared by Sanna Marin (@sannamarin) on Aug 2, 2020 at 4:16am PDT

Marin leads the country’s centre-left Social Democrat party and has been heralded as a new breed of ‘Millennial’ leader. Notably, for her use of social media, environmental activism and gender-egalitarian policies have caught the world’s attention.

Earlier this year, she announced plans to give fathers the same amount of paid parental leave in a new policy that grants 164 days or nearly seven months paid leave to each parent, for a total of 14 months. A pregnant parent would get an additional one month’s paid leave before their parental leave starts. 

She has used social media influencers to spread important information through the internet and according to Politico, her country remains the only one in the world to have defined social media as “a critical operator.” In 2017, Marin frequently documented her own pregnancy on Instagram.

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Vauva on pian 1 kg painoinen. Sokerirasitustestissä käyty. Ensi viikolla neuvola. #viikko27

A post shared by Sanna Marin (@sannamarin) on Oct 19, 2017 at 2:25am PDT

In June, she saw an 85 per cent approval rating among Finnish citizens. 

During the COVID-19 pandemic, Marin was praised by her exemplary leadership by implementing measures to curb rising infections and managing one of Europe’s lowest COVID-19 rates. She also ordered school closures, restrictions to museums and public gathering establishments, and the country’s borders. Other nations with the lowest rates of COVID-19, including Germany, Taiwan, New Zealand and Iceland, were all countries that are governed by female leaders.

In June, Finland invoked its emergency powers unveiling a €15 billion (AUD$23.6 billion) package to boost its economy. This week, Marin has released plans to conduct tests at the border, following the easing of travel restrictions. She has also set up a working group which began operating at the end of July to plan testing solutions for airports, harbours and the land borders with Sweden and Russia.

As of today, Finland’s population of just under 5.6 million has had 329 deaths and 7,453 cases. 

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The day I realised my 80-year old mum and 92 year old father-in-law might not get a ventilator should they need it. And the day I discovered my son Sam had been exposed to the virus after his flat mate in London fell sick three days after Sam caught a flight home. That was terrifying, too.

Yet through all those days, I didn’t really cry. Like most people, I felt anxious, angry, disoriented and confused at times, but I didn’t cry. Until yesterday. I howled. I cried for so long I didn’t think I’d be able to stop. I scared the dog. My eyes were sore and my nose ran like a tap. Every time I thought I’d stopped, the tears welled up again.

The thing that finally broke me wasn’t, on the surface, even a big deal. It was my daughter’s phone call, telling me her worries about trying to plan her wedding. She got engaged last year, and their big day was planned for early 2021.

Like many prospective brides, she’s been excited and full of hopes and plans. She hasn’t complained at all about the hardships that have devolved heavily on her generation: in many cases, far more than their more financially secure elders.

Perhaps they don’t have such a fear of dying from COVID19, but they do have the highest rate of job losses; the prospect of trying desperately to pay rent with no money and no savings; and the prospect of a world in deep depression for years with no guarantee of the early return of the generally prosperous world their parents and grandies enjoyed.

What she wanted to tell me was that she’s frustrated she can’t book her flowers, her wedding cars, or her photographer. That she can’t visit dress shops to try on gowns, or meet with caterers. That she can’t even enjoy a meal or coffee with friends and family to go over plans and share the excitement.

That she and her fiancé don’t even know whether Australia will be open for weddings in early 2021, since a re-opening of the economy might be quickly followed by further closures should the virus re-surface. And then, she’d have made her plans and paid deposits and sent out invitations for nothing.

Compared to others, my life is rosy. I’ve a wonderful long-term partner, my three kids are well and doing okay, and there’s nobody in my immediate circle who’s having (that I know of) problems they can’t handle. I live in a country that’s basically dealing with coronavirus well (after a rough start), and I have a comfortable home, fresh air and space to walk, and some savings to try to get through hard financial times.

My daughter, too, knows her problems are essentially trivial. She works for a large company and has a secure job and safe home. She didn’t ring to make a big fuss, but to have a minor whinge to her mum, and throughout our conversation she repeated that she knows she’s lucky, and that ultimately, her problems aren’t important.

So what was I crying about? I think it was the realisation that our kids – all our kids, however young or old they are – are now living in a world we never had to face at the same age.

Many of the smaller ones are missing their friends and grandparents and can’t understand why they’re not at kinder or school and have lost the weekend sport, dance lessons and birthday parties they used to have.

Teenagers are missing the experiences they deserved to look forward to: the close relationships and mutual struggle of Year 12; the sports success and school musicals and trips; the first loves and first concerts and first comedy shows and first 16ths and 18ths and other celebrations and rites of passage.

The twenty-somethings are being denied their first jobs after graduating; the achievement of moving out of home; their graduation ceremonies: even the right to plan a wedding or a first international trip.

On top of all that, of course, some children are in unsafe homes with hugely stressed, financially crippled parents or guardians, and we can only imagine what some of them are going through.

I don’t think we’re paying these losses enough attention. Older Australians are mired in their own problems and, yes, many of these are enormous. Yet we’re forgetting that whatever our current woes, we HAD the inestimable luxury of those good times our children are now being denied, and mostly took them totally for granted.

It never entered our heads anything would interfere with our right to those experiences and growth opportunities. And having had that time ourselves, we need to reflect on what it means for the mental health of our own children that the lives they had a right to expect are now on hold. For who knows how long?

I’m under no illusions that this is a first world problem. Those locked down in India and other places right now are doing it far tougher, and so, indeed, are the many Australians who are without work; who are in danger from violence or abuse; who are in jail, in detention, or live in communities where they can’t keep themselves safe from the virus; or who are scared as they’re elderly or have illnesses and disabilities which make them vulnerable. I don’t forget or diminish their greater struggles for a minute.

But I also reserve the right to have a decent cry for my own child, who deserves a big beautiful wedding with all the trimmings and now doesn’t know if she’ll get it, or when.

Let’s spare a thought for young Australians who are doing it tough right now, who have very little public voice to complain about their lost dreams and plans. They matter too.

And Laura: we’ll get you that wedding, and it will be as beautiful as you are.

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