Lara began dancing at the age of 3 with Paula Hunt at Wellington Dance Academy, where she trained in RAD Ballet and NZAMD contemporary. Lara came to Marsden in Year 7 and pursued multiple sports, but chose to focus on her ballet training as she got older.

This led to her being accepted into the Scholars and Associates programme at the New Zealand School of Dance, which enabled her to further her training before going full time at the school when she was 15.

It was important to her to complete NCEA Level 2 and Marsden helped her achieve this over two years via correspondence with her teachers. Whilst at the NZ School of Dance, Lara was taught by incredible tutors and was exposed to many great guest tutors from around the world.

In her third year at the New Zealand School of Dance, Lara was invited to dance with the Royal New Zealand Ballet for a season, which ultimately led to her being offered a contract midway through the 2019 – a very exciting moment after years of hard work and commitment. She then became the first Friedlander Scholar at the company in 2020. 

Since then, Lara has been touring the country with various different productions, performing corps de ballet and soloist roles in shows such as Bold Moves, Sleeping Beauty, A Midsummer’s Nights Dream, Giselle and Paquita. Lara is grateful to have had such memorable rewarding experiences of performing in her home country and she is proud to have followed her own path and have a career that enables her to do what makes her happy. 

 

Title photo: Stephen A'Court.
Texst photo: Ross Brown