Today we're introducing you to IzziRainey, a small textile business based on a family farm in Norfolk.

Nicola: I’d love for you to start by telling us the story behind how Izzi Rainey started, and what it is you do?

Lara: Hi. IzziRainey is a small textile business based on Izzi’s family’s farm in Norfolk. We design and manufacture high quality homewares, stationary, kitchenwares and small accessory products. Izzi takes all of her inspiration for her designs from farm life and the Norfolk countryside. All of our products are made in the UK, and most are made by Izzi here on the farm!

Izzi and I have been friends since we were 13; just before we graduated, she mentioned that she wanted to start her own textile business back in Norfolk. I jumped at the chance to work alongside my best friend, and had always loved her designs, so in the summer of 2014, IzziRainey began! 

Nicola: Can you tell us about the different roles you both have in the business and why you think you work so well together?

Lara: Izzi is the sole designer for the business, she does all the marketing and makes a majority of the products that we sell here on the farm- she is the genius behind it all!  

I am more in charge of the day to day running of the business; managing our customer and trade customers, planning our fairs, the money side of things and general everyday tasks.

Nicola: Can you share with us how growing up on a farm in Norfolk has inspired the work you do today?

Lara: Izzi has lived here on the farm all her life; she has been showing her Highland cattle since she was six and has always been involved in the day to day running of the farm. This has been such a huge influence in her life and subsequently in her designs - all are inspired by her family’s farm, the surrounding Norfolk countryside and other local farmers' livestock. The farm is still very much part of everyday life here at IzziRainey.

Photo: Tom at Gnowangerup Cottage

Nicola: What do you love most about what you do?

Izzi: I love being able to combine my passion for design and for farming by being able to design prints that have been inspired by my family’s home and our idyllic surroundings here in Norfolk. By having our studio here it means I can still play a big role in the farm but also able to run IzziRainey too!

Lara: I love working with someone who is so creative, as I’m not. I find it so interesting seeing something start as a simple pencil drawing and end up as a finished product- it is always amazing seeing the journey of a product. I also love being able to work with my best friend- there are always lots of laughs!

Nicola: I’d love to know more about the process of how your work develops from initial idea to the final piece.

Lara: Izzi starts by collecting imagery and doing drawing of different ideas, these ideas are then translated into prints through a wealth of hand stamped techniques, which form the basis of all the fabric designs. These are then sent off to be digitally printed into lengths of fabric here in the UK. Even though the fabric is digitally printed it still retains the textural quality of Izzi’s original hand stamped prints. 

The fabric then returns to us to be made into the products that you see in the shops and online. Many of the fabric products are made here on the farm, however over the last few years we have begun to outsource some of the production too- just so we can keep up with it all! But everything is still made in the UK - British design and manufacturing is at the heart of our business.

Nicola: Can you tell us more about where you live, your workspace, and what a typical day for you both is like?

Lara: We live in the heart of rural Norfolk, and our studio is based in a converted old dairy.  We are very much in the ‘farmyard’ with Monty the Highland Pony next door and chickens wandering around too. Our studio is a hub of activity - it is where all the designing happens, products get made, orders get packaged plus lots more. 

Day to day, Izzi arrives at the farm about 7 to feed and check on all her cattle before we both start in the studio. Izzi will generally be making products, designing new prints, getting inspiration from local farmers for new ideas and I will be sorting orders, finding new places for our products to be sold and generally making sure the quality of our service matches the high quality of our products! Days obviously vary dramatically as Izzi may be needed on the farm or we may be out and about at fairs or seeing shops- we take every day as it comes! 

Nicola: And lastly, if someone reading your story were inspired to follow their own creative dream, what advice would you give them?

Lara: Just go for it - if you feel that you want to give it a go then you should. It is an invaluable process to go through and full of fun too. All I will say is never be afraid to ask questions and make mistakes. We have spent the last four years trying to learn as much as possible through talking to people and asking lots of questions- you learn so much from other people who have done it all already!

Visit the website, or follow IzziRainey on Instagram, Twitter and Facebook.

The scorching sun with its record temperatures are but a memory now.  I daydream out of the kitchen window wondering how the sunflowers are still standing. Like beacons they loom, desperately clinging onto the summer that was.

I reluctantly drag the window shut as a sharp chill blasts through the curtains, doors slamming around the house as if protesting at the obvious seasonal transition outside that can no longer be ignored. The sudden chill makes all the hairs on my arm awaken, that well-known marker of coldness will now walk alongside the shortening days no doubt.

But I can’t stand still. Wellies, waterproofs and hound. No matter what the weather, escape.  

Late afternoon lights start to appear at windows as I walk through the village. The familiar waft of wood smoke, rotting apples and damp reminding me of many times gone by.  A half-light world is now awakening, one of hygge corners, comforting crackling fires and a general slowing.

I pass the grey war memorial; red flashes of geranium flowers being pelted by raindrops brings me back to my senses.  I look back realising how far I have wandered, lost in my own thoughts. Quite fitting as is this not the time to be taking stock and hunkering down for the months ahead?  Glancing around, I wonder where the flowers and colour have gone, I am sure they were here yesterday. Gardens, window boxes and hanging baskets as far as the eye can see, now spent, tired and bereft of energy, nothing but desiccated skeletons stare back.

Where did summer go?

I wander on through the old iron kissing gate to the horse field, the clunk of metal on metal somewhat satisfying, testifying I am here again. Carrots for the horses, blackberries for me – a fair trade. How laden the hedgerow is with hips, haws and berries, their red dots staccato the now emptying branches.  A sign of a harsher winter to come perhaps? Do the birds and animals know this I wonder, as the white squirrel disappears up a sycamore now fashioning mottled leaves with black spots.

All I see is brown.

A muddy shroud seems to be taking over.  

That moment of summer's end.

It is here.

By Lisa from Mistletoe Oak

The last days of summer can be bittersweet, even more so this year when the UK has seen one of the warmest, sunniest summers for decades. Whether you loved or loathed the heat wave, saying goodbye to the long, halcyon days of summer can often make us feel a little glum. September and the onset of autumn can challenge us with a shift in pace that we don’t always feel ready for. Perhaps it would make us feel better to press the pause button and let the warmth and abundance of summer linger a little longer?

Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) allows us some welcome reprieve here, outlining a slower transition from summer through to autumn.  The Five Element theory describes not four, but five, seasons in each year. The fifth season is upon us now and is known in TCM as Late Summer, starting towards the last two weeks of August and continuing right up until the Autumn Equinox in September. This is a transitional time for the earth, after a hectic and bountiful few months of growth, nature can, at last, put her feet up and take a well-earned rest. If we are to live in harmony with the seasons, this is a time for us to follow suit. To relax, sit back and take stock of what we have enjoyed and achieved over the spring and summer months!

Keats wrote of autumn and famously conjured a season of mists and mellow fruitfulness. For me these words just as beautifully capture the essence of late summer. A time to be mellow, allow ourselves time to take a step back and appreciate the abundance of nature all around us. A time to nourish our body with the plentiful fresh produce summer provides and make the most of all we love about this season, before we push ahead into preparing for the colder months ahead. 

Even those of us long past school age can come face-to-face with those familiar back to school feelings when September rolls around. We may not be buying our new uniform and picking out pencil cases, but we probably all carry around the emotional imprint of that start of term feeling. If you notice an underlying feeling of anxiety and trepidation at this time of year, don’t worry, you are not alone. 

From late August onwards, parents everywhere jump into organisation mode as they ready their children for the new school year. The retail industry steps up a gear in preparation for a busier shopping season ahead. Recruitment picks up pace across most industries and parliament reopens for business. The wider world around us picks up speed and all too soon summer can seem like a distant memory. 

We can’t all practically opt out of the faster pace this month inevitably brings, but we can work on altering our own outlook and allow ourselves the space to ease out of summer a little more gently. Here are four simple suggestions for connecting with and supporting your emotions at this time of year. 
 

Here are four simple suggestions for connecting with and supporting your emotions at this time of year:

• Reflect – ‘This summer has flown by’ is such a common phrase at this time of year. Allow yourself permission to press pause and take some time to reflect on what you have enjoyed doing over the last few months. You might choose to look through and edit photos you have taken, make an online album or print the images you have captured over the summer. Perhaps sharing or giving them to the friends and family you have spent time with. If you write a diary or keep a journal, you might enjoy reading back through your entries over the summer months, taking some time to think about what moments made you happiest and why.

• Relax - Carve out some dedicated time for relaxation. Do this in whatever way suits you, without feeling guilty for it! Light a favourite candle, buy some new bath oil and take an extra long soak. Start a new book and dive into that for a few hours. Spend time walking outdoors in nature while the weather remains warm and the evenings are light. Whatever your favoured relaxation practice is, use your chosen time intentionally. Feel good about allowing yourself this precious space to check in with yourself. Think of it as a little self-care ceremony and a time to acknowledge the seasonal shift.

• Nourish - In TCM the late summer season corresponds with the Earth element. The spleen and stomach govern this season and in order to stay healthy, these organs need to be supported well with healthy and nourishing foods. Think about altering your diet to include more seasonal, fresh produce and give your digestive health the best support you can, in preparation for the winter months ahead.

• Inhale - Essential oils provide us with a wonderful, natural toolkit for supporting our wellbeing throughout all the seasonal transitions. I have selected three oils which are well suited for late summer and below is a guide to making a simple blend for diffusing at home.

Late Summer Uplifting Blend

• Patchouli Essential Oil (2 drops)

• Lemon Essential Oil (2 drops)

• Peppermint Essential Oil (2 drops)

Add two drops each of the above essential oils to a bowl of warm water or essential oil diffuser and breathe in.

Further resources:

Learn more about TCM and supporting your health in late summer:

• http://ancientfern.com/chinese-medicine-nutrition-season-late-summer/

• http://aprilcrowell.com/asian-medicine/late-summer-eating-with-the-seasons/

TCM and seasonal living:

• http://quietheart.co.uk/category/seasonal-living/

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Laura McMahon is the owner and maker at The Smallest Light. From her Welsh home workshop, Laura uses her love and knowledge of aromatherapy to create natural soy wax candles with essential oil blends that are uniquely crafted to complement the changing seasons. Follow her on Facebook and Instagram.

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Today we're introducing you to Jane, the owner of freelance embroidery business, Snapdragon. Find out more about her journey from cut flowers to building a community.

Nicola: Tell us about Snapdragon and the journey you took to starting your own business?  

Jane: My first proper job was curator of British Art at the University of Glasgow – it was a fabulous job but I worked in a basement office and in the winter I rarely seemed to see any daylight.  I gradually got more and more unhappy there until I took the plunge, left and retrained in horticulture.

The thing that I wanted most by this point was to be outside, so I started a cut flower business and named it Snapdragon, because that was one of the few flowers that escaped the slugs that first year.  I grew garden flowers and sold them from a green van from my garden gate and at markets.

Growing flowers in Scotland turned out to be a barmy idea – the climate is cold and wet, giving a very short growing season and, when I had masses of flowers, my regular customers tended to be away on holiday.

In 2005 I was asked to put together a show stand at the Country Living Magazine Christmas Fair in Glasgow and that gave me the opportunity to pivot the business and move into sewing.  I had been making things to bring in an income during the months that there were no flowers, but this moved my freehand machine embroidery onto a different level and formed the basis of the business as it exists today.

Nicola: I know your work is inspired by nature. Can you tell us why nature is so important to you, and how it influences the way you live and work?

Jane: Being in nature is absolutely at the centre of my life.  I have an auto immune disease which becomes worse with stress and I find that time outside in nature, noticing the seasonal changes, getting muddy, is the way that I can manage stress most easily.  My garden and the amazing scenery around us are also the inspiration for most of my designs and I am fascinated by the way forms and colours change week to week.

Nicola: I’d love to know what has been the biggest challenge, and the best surprise in running your own business?

Jane: The biggest challenge for me has been staying true to my style.  Over a period of about 8 years I gradually lost track of what was unique about Snapdragon.  I had begun to respond to what sold, what shops wanted more of, what was commercial.  Each little step, each compromise, took me a little bit further away from the core of my creativity until I became very bored with what I was making.  About 18 months ago I decided to completely change the business and go back to my design roots, changing not only the products that we sell but also the way we sell them.  I started a membership where people support the business with a monthly fee of £10 and in return get all the perks of ‘having shares in a studio’ – they can buy at cost price, there are members freebies, they get first dibs on limited editions.  

The biggest surprise has been how changing the way we sell has transformed the feel of the business – this isn’t just with members, it has completely changed the way other people interact with me on social media too.  Going for radical transparency on pricing and behind the scenes decisions seems to have changed the way people see us.  I was very worried that it could be an incredibly stupid act of self sabotage.

Nicola: I know you moved to the countryside about fifteen years ago and now live in Loch Lomond National Park.  Can you tell us more about your home, your workspace, and what a typical day for you looks like? 

Jane: We bought our home because of a small bluebell wood.  We spent hours in the wood, about 15 minutes in the house.  The house itself is a 1980s bungalow – nothing special; when we bought it, it was fully of tiny rooms and we knocked 5 of these together to create a big open plan living space and put in big windows to give lots of light.  I work in a wooden cabin built in a field behind the house, and in a vintage Airstream Caravan (which we are restoring).  I have a team of helpers who print, pack and dispatch orders, allowing me to concentrate on designing and writing.

A typical day starts slowly – I am not a morning person.  I have coffee in bed and catch up on Instagram or read.  I start work at about 9 and tend to work until 4. Two days a week I am in the workshop, two days I am designing/writing and, ideally, I walk to the nearest village to work in a coffee shop once a week – this is a way of getting the things I procrastinate about actually done and the exercise is balanced by the cake. I switch the Internet off at 6pm and, though I may work after that, it is analogue things – designing, reading, journaling.  I have found that has made a big difference to my daily stress and also made me more productive.

Nicola: When you aren’t working on Snapdragon, how do you enjoy spending your time?

Jane: Gardening and walking.  When I stopped growing flowers commercially I had a few years where I didn’t really garden much – I think I was a bit burned out.  Now though I am back spending hours in the garden, growing flowers and vegetables.  I have big plans.

Nicola: And lastly, if someone reading your story were inspired to follow their own creative dream, what advice would you give them?

Jane: Build a community of people who love your style.  This is the major advantage that the small creative business has now – there is the world of social media full of people who are interested in what you are doing.  

When I was starting out I wrote a blog, a terrible, ugly, embarrassing blog – but the people who read that 15 years ago still remembered me and, when I wanted to go back to the roots of the business last year, they were the people cheering me on.  Building that community was the best investment in the business I ever made.

Head over here to get Jane's free guide to getting the best from cut flowers, visit her website, or follow her progress on Instagram.

One of the things about having anxiety is that it’s easier to close the door on my heart when things get to be too much.  Being highly sensitive means that it does not take much for me to find things to be too much.  The thing that gives the final push to the door of my heart might not even register in someone else’s mind.  But that is beside the point.  The point is not ever what registers to someone else.  I am not someone else.  My skin is not thick.  My heart is soft and resides on my sleeve.  I listen and feel…a lot.  And one of the things about having anxiety is that it’s easier to close the door on my heart when things get to be too much.  

One place where I go to feel immense peace, is the woods.  I am drawn to the narrow trails that wind between the ‘pine trees that start half way up’.  Also known as Lodgepole pines. The kind of trail that looks like a tunnel.  Often I reach out and touch one or both of the trees as I pass through.  This morning on my hike, I walked in between two beautiful pine trees whose branches and soft needles caressed my arms as I passed by.  I felt a bit like a car going through a car wash, being brushed clean.  I notice a lot on my hikes, but one thing that never ceases to grab my attention is when a tree tips or leans over in to another tree, forming an entryway.

 Sometimes, I leave the trail with the sole purpose of walking through it.   A tunnel.  An entryway.  Also known as a passage, a portal, an opening.  Opening.  I wonder if the reason I find so much peace in the woods, is because there is a literal meaning to the entryways that I pass through as I hike.  Paying attention to places that I can pass through, places of beauty that register deep in my soul, actually release the grip of anxiety and allow me to open.  The trails and tunnels open me to sights and smells and touches of nature, with each pass through I enter a new space.  A new section of the trail, or a new spot off of the trail.  With each entryway, a new room full of beauty to be noticed.  The woods to me feel like a castle from my childhood imagination, full of rooms, each room full of treasures.  Beautiful treasures that sparkle and shine, treasures that are warm and safe, treasures that are colorful and vibrant.  Each entryway leading to a new place to explore.  New sights, and sounds, and smells await.

 When I am walking the trail, I notice a lot.  Mushrooms, trees, frogs, butterflies, flowers-and that is just one room, then I notice an opening, an entryway.  I walk through.  And then I notice more.  A scent like honey, a cardinal, the sound of  racing squirrel through the undergrowth.  I pass through the opening, and I explore the beauty.  On the trail, none of the entryways have a door and they are always open.  On the trail, open.  Open.  One of the things about having anxiety is that it’s easier to close the door on my heart when things get to be too much.

 Exploring beauty softens me, soothes me, and opens me.  It releases the grip of anxiety that often squeezes my heart shut, making it so much harder to walk through the entryways offering me their treasures.  One place where I go to feel immense peace, is the woods because the trail is full of entryways to beauty, open for me to explore.
 

Stuck in a rut and looking for a new challenge, Katie Smyth and Terri Chandler left their jobs to start a flower business together.  The result of their collaboration was WORM London which now sees them design flowers for weddings, supper clubs and parties as well as working as floral stylists for magazines, books and TV shoots.

With stunning photography from Kristin Peters, Katie and Terri’s book Wreaths (published by Quadrille, £14.99) brings together 20 beautiful floral designs which can be created at home with a little insider knowledge and tutelage.  As a lover of all things floral or foraged, for me Wreaths brought together the joys of foraging with a long held desire to learn how to create floral pieces at home beyond a few stems in a cherished vase. 

‘There is nothing better than seeing the first daffodils of spring; lush, giant, peonies in early summer; the beautiful orange leaves on beech branches in autumn and lichen-covered twigs in winter.  No matter what the time of year, fresh flowers and foliage can be used to creating something special.’

From making a basic wreath shape from a vine to summer chandeliers and stunning meadow balls, Katie and Terri bring a modern approach to floral statement pieces.  Not only are the creations in the book glorious to look out but the practical instructions are step by step and easy to follow, offering the beginner a good place to start.  With just a small handful of tools and tips, you’ll be able to create your own floral artworks with no previous experience required.  There are tricks abound too from how to keep fresh flowers looking lovely for as long as possible to encouraging others to open a little faster so that your finished creation looks full and rich with colour or blossom.  The all-important premise seems to be about encouraging others to capture something special whatever the season and celebrate nature’s beauty.

‘It is incredible what a morning spent in nature can do not only for your sense of wellbeing but also for your appreciation of the natural world.’

This isn’t a book that focuses on traditional floristry.  It’s more about being inspired by the blooms and branches around us and finding those which inspire us to make.  It’s about producing something personal to you.  As someone who never seems to be able to go on a walk without bringing something home, this really appealed to my inner magpie.  Whether you are looking to create a centrepiece that’s fresh, foraged or dried or perhaps a wreath or rustic floral wall hanging or maybe even a geometric wall shape, this gem of a book has so many beautiful ideas to help awaken your inner florist and encourage a little more of the natural world into our homes to be admired. 

For more inspiration, follow Katie and Terri on Instagram @wormlondon

Today we hear from Jade and Charlie at Black Barn Farm, a place where fair food, farming and business collide to create something truly unique; prepare to be inspired.

Nicola: I’d love for you to start by telling us more about Black Barn Farm, who you are and what it is you do?

Jade: Our farming communities are decaying, threatening our nation’s food security. We have lower seed and soil biodiversity, higher suicide rates among farmers, longer paths to market, lower profits to growers, obesity/health issues, higher levels of food waste yet higher levels of food scarcity, and more disconnection from our food and to our rural communities than ever before. Yet we ALL eat and have the ability to consider food choices and how they impact our health, farmers and rural communities. By farming in a regenerative way we can have the most impact of all on the health of our soil, community and selves.

Both Charlie (my husband) and I were fortunate to enjoy country childhoods. We both grew up on small farms with parents who revelled in producing their own food. 

I was especially fortunate to live in a very rich fertile part of our State where both Winters and Summers are relatively mild. My parents grew virtually all their own food, used permaculture principles as their guide and bartered for things we couldn’t make or grow ourselves. They strived for intentional simplicity and while it made us feel like the ‘weird hippy kids’ it sowed deep seeds and  I yearned to have my hands in the dirt even in my teens. 

When Charlie and I planted our first real veggie garden, we watched as the small scale apple and pear growers bulldozed their three/four/five-generation apple farming heritage into the ground because there was no one to take over the farms, and no one wanted to buy the land with trees on it. This broke our heart and made us want to reinstate the growing practices in our own area. 

We spent ten years researching small scale farm models which incorporated direct paths to market, opportunities to connect with our eaters and were diverse enough to minimise the vagaries of mother nature. Those ten years allowed us to search for the right property and save enough money to buy it. We have been on our 20 acre property in Stanley, Black Barn Farm, for two and a half years and in that time have begun our educational workshop programme with open days, grafting days, community lunches, and educational lectures with schools and universities.

We have undertaken our irrigation infrastructure  and soil regeneration programme both of which are key to allowing us to plant the 1500, mixed variety, orchard trees  - grafted on site over the past two Septembers as well as the 2kms worth of cane berries, which are all lined up for planting this Winter.

Our plan is to open the orchard in January 2020 as a pick-your-own orchard which offers 6 months of harvest and workshops/events to really engage people with the excitement and delight of growing your own food. We want to bring celebration back into people's association with food and reignite their love for it. Unless you love something, you will not fight for it and unless you understand it, you cannot value it, and if you don’t value it you willingly waste it.

Our business has six diverse aims: 

EAT - cafe on site all supplied from the kitchen garden

LEARN - 12 annual workshops and open days

STAY -  on-farm accommodation 

GROW - nursery selling all varieties that we have in our pick your own orchard including the understory plantings (due to open in August)

PICK - pick-your-own seasonal fruit and vegetables available from late Nov - late May every year. (due to open in Jan 2020)

CONSULT  -  the banner under which we both undertake an enormous amount of community connection and education. 

We now share this story all over Australia so other community food enterprises can be inspired to have a go at creating their own community which values food.

We’ve also launched ‘co-op living’ – 12 events annually, teaching people to reconnect to their food and to each other.  We have movie screenings, community pot luck dinners, morning tea gatherings and workshops in things such as fermentation, grafting, compost creation, sourdough making and seed saving.

We have driven the collaboration of 14 government agencies to come together to create a local food strategy in our region.

And finally last year we launched "Greener Grass Camps", which is a school camp programme which connects kids to their food in a really fun, interactive, hands on way.

Nicola: Can you tell me about the Black Barn Farm Orchard philosophy and why it is so important to you?

Jade: We feel strongly that food is a sacred, celebrated wonder, not a low cost, easily wasted commodity. Because of this philosophy, we are determined to create a space which people are drawn to for connection, learning, belonging and respect for the people and place. Our Black Barn will be the physical building which connects people to place and place to food production.

From a food growing perspective, we believe healthy, nutrient dense food comes from trees and plants which are grown in super healthy soil and this takes time, biomass, biodiversity and carefully managed disturbance to the ground.

We are a permaculture based horticulture operation which emulates patterns in nature to holistically and sustainably integrates the physical and social needs of people and the ecosystem.

We use permaculture principles in all our growing which means we don't use synthetic chemicals ever, rather we use compost, mulch, worm juice and home made teas to encourage good microbial rich biodiverse soils which support healthy plant growth. We mimic the natural growing system wherever we can with lots of woodsy under-material, inter-plantings and never over-plant which allows the plants to breath and minimise fungus growth. We have a very diverse orchard and vegetable garden which minimises pest management and although its not a problem yet, we anticipate we will need to net our berries to protect against birds.

Nicola: I'd love to hear more about the nursery and your future plans?

Jade: Each year we have grafted and taken cuttings (and will continue to do so) for 600 mixed species trees (peaches, pears, cherries, persimmons, figs, currants, apples and crabbe apples). We have also grown 1000 understory plants each year (marjoram, coriander, garlic, tagasaste, marigold,  chilves, Cow-pea, Clover, Siberian Pea-shrub, Amarynth, Zinnia, Comfrey, Borage. These are for the orchard rows and mimic the natural eco-system but provide a diversity of attributes such as nitrogen for the soil, natural growing or decomposing mulch, insect attraction for pollination support.

We deliver a workshop around this (which has sold out within days for three years running so we will continue this until demand fades) and then we plant into our nursery area for 12 months. Because many of the varieties we are growing are hard to find heritage varieties, they are much sought after and because our growing practices are ethical, we have found there is a strong growing market to support this.

Nicola: I’d love to hear more about the workshops and events that you run?  Can you tell me more about whom they are for and what it is you wish to teach others?

Jade: The audience is very dependent on the particular workshop. But to generalise, those who are attracted to Black Barn Farm are those with a deep yearning desire to connect to other like minded, simple living folk. They are seeking skills to mimic our production approach, they are looking for ideas to build their own community, they are looking for support to grow their own food. 

In the coming 6 months we are offering a wider range of events including:

• Introduction to Permaculture (in conjunction with a permaculture education expert)
• Mid Winter Wassail Ceremony (invited guests)
• Mid Winter Orchard planting (invited only)
• Mid Winter Heritage Tree Sale and orchard tour

We love our events because it gives life to what can otherwise be a little lonely and isolating existence on the farm. Sharing our journey and our knowledge is something we both reap a great deal of satisfaction from. 

Nicola: Your work and life is obviously inspired by nature.  Can you tell me why nature is so important to you, and how it influences the work you do? 

Jade: Biofilia is a concept which is integral in each and every one of us, however I have a very high need for connection to the outside, natural world. I was fortunate to spend vast blocks of time as a child literally living in the elements. My dad was an artist and we spent a great deal of time on camp with him while he painted or locked outside the house during the day while he painted in the Studio. We also grew all our own food so our deep rhythmic understanding of the seasons, the influence of weather, the connection to the cyclical nature of each year was bedded down very early and both my brother and I have continued this pattern of living with our children now entrenched in annual growing, preparing/readying, eating, storing, valuing the food we grow as a direct descendant from the type of weather we have experienced that season. 

Our way of life is simple, predominantly outdoors and extends from the boundaries of our farm to the roadsides where foraged foods are found, the nearby bushland where we wander for bushwalks, the also nearby pine forests where we hunt for mushrooms, the not too far away mountains where we escape to on especially warm days, the abundant rivers we swim in weekly , our own dam which we frequent every day while its warm, the haybales we scramble on, the bird book which each of us reaches for even if we know the name of the bird we just spotted, the wood we grow and cut for our warmth,  the hay we grow to feed the stock and the remaining straw we use to mulch our vegetable beds. 

Our year here is very much defined but the distinct seasons, and our daily patterns are endlessly evolving so there is rarely time for any day to become mundane.

Charlie: Nature is the most important thing in everyone's life, it's just that most don't realise or appreciate it. Irrespective of who we are, the level of importance nature has for each of us is a matter of fact not personal interpretation. Nature provides the means for each of us to exist, it literally provides the air we breath, the water we drink, the food we eat and regulates the atmosphere we are dependent on. Modern society has been able to obscure this fact to our increasingly urban population, however each person sitting in an apartment is still reliant on each of those ecosystem services to deliver the means required for their existence, even if the urbanite can't see, smell, hear or taste the very ecosystem or piece of nature that provides those essential services.

Nature is the largest influencer of our work at Black Barn Farm,  we seek to understand the pattern of relationships that exists in a natural forest so we can design a similar package of processes and patterns within our orchard system.

Nicola: And lastly, if someone reading your story were inspired to follow their own creative dream, what advice would you give them?

Jade: Start where you are, with what you've got and be willing to make mistakes - some of your most magnificent discoveries will be through adversity, trial and error. Further to this, don’t be afraid to follow your instinct...even if it differs from what your spoken ‘goal’ is.

We have had a very clear long term plan for more than 20 years and while the path has meandered here and there as I’ve followed my instinct, made mistakes and been surprised by outcomes, it has never wavered from the end goal which we are lucky enough to be united on.

In response to what your community needs: collaborative efforts are incredibly powerful and from little things big things grow, so do your research and just start!  Sow that seed and watch it grow.

Also, you can only move as fast as the community you are working within, so be sure to really understand their "WHY" so you can speak to it and bring more people on the journey with you.

You can find Black Barn Farm on their website or follow progress on Instagram.

Waking in winter is strange, it always feels too dark still to rise, the air too close, hands pressing down and whispering, urging you to stay a while longer. It takes lengthy and gentle persuasion to coax myself out of these warm solaces I have made, carefully unwrapping blankets like peeling back layers of wrapping paper. Stumbling around with shivering limbs and fuzzy eyes, those dark mornings didn’t even feel real sometimes. Summer mornings though bring another kind of unreality. Pastel hues, brighter than you might imagine, that tease you out from sleep before you even knew you were ready. 

I remember camping in the summer, waking early and still enveloped in the soft dyed light that peered through coloured canvases. I wriggled out from the tangle of sleeping bags amongst the murmuring of quietly pulled zips. Half falling out of the tent’s door, I stepped into the light. Just before it was light really, like I was looking at it through a layer of water. And there was water, a low hanging mist that dangled playfully around my feet, twisting up the just emerging colours. It danced in between the overgrown grass in the rambling campsite, amongst the nodding heads of wild flowers, the childish dot to dot of vibrant tents and chairs, of flags with trailing bunting. It was soft but not like the quieting winter morning, much more open. The cornflower blue was just beginning to spread in the sky over the barely fading pinks and reds, those blushing hues of sunrise. They were making way for the sun to find its place once more as it began to stretch out its legs again and somewhere far off, or maybe not so far, I remember hearing a camping kettle begin to whistle. Another early riser.

Walking though the fresh, cool grasses I skirted round the nodding wild flowers that still stood tall between the tents and watched the swallows that ducked and soared around the sleeping campers. I found myself almost tiptoeing as I walked, unwilling to disturb this peace that I had accidentally found myself in. To my right I heard the gentle humming of bees, to my left the whispering of branches in trees as the breeze caught them. Just the previous night we had heard an owl singing in it, gathered together in the tent, hushing one another while we worked out what it was. I skipped over tent ropes, pushed my hair from my face, and began to hear already the sounds of others waking. Soon the fields would be full of voices once again, the simpler quiet of the early morning almost forgotten but, of course, it would be here again tomorrow waiting patiently to shake off our sleep once more.

I am a lover of winter but these summer mornings have a place in my heart that goes deep. It’s these mornings in the light that still hold the soft singing of a kettle on an open stove, a beckoning up and onward, an invitation to gently shake off the winter slumbers, to rub my eyes and step out once again.
 

Hannah Franklin

Find Hannah writing at 'Sifting for Treasures' here

Picture this: a forest barely begun - just 25 years in the making - and a vision to create a festival celebrating the beauty, the power, and the wisdom of trees. Billed as an intoxicating experience where music, art, philosophy and sustainability weave together into an unforgettable, exhilarating weekend, the inaugural Timber Festival was a celebration of not only trees, but also all woodland culture, and the transformative power of forests.

I was invited to find out more by the festival organisers, Wild Rumpus; full disclaimer: my friend and I attended for free, but all opinions in this post are my own.

Friday began with an incredibly hot pitching of the tent before we immersed ourselves in the trees, with an outdoor performance of The Lost Words, by Robert Macfarlane and Jackie Morris: Seek Find Speak. (If you haven't heard of the book, it's a stand against the disappearance of wild words we often use in childhood: dandelion, conker, willow, otter... words that sadly no longer feature in the lexicon of our own children.) Led by a charm of Goldfinch performers, we were guided to Seek the words hidden in the branches, in the undergrowth, in the shady glades; Find the lost word in that location; and Speak it aloud, sometimes reading the spell-poems from the pages of the book, sometimes watching the Goldfinches enact its meaning.

The performers engaged not only the excited children following their enchanting calls, but also the whole troop of adults; for an ex-English teacher, and a committed logophile, it was brilliant.
 

Other strange but wonderful highlights from the weekend included 'In the Eyes of the Animal', an immersive virtual reality experience that allowed us to see through the eyes of four woodland creatures. It lasted only a few minutes, but felt like I was on another planet. Definitely an eye-opener. 

The performance from Canopy of Stars was also mesmerising, complete with a final storytelling session with plenty of audience participation! 

The talks on offer were wide-ranging, and we'd highlighted everything we wanted to go and see before we went (highly recommended!). Particularly entertaining were Stuart Maconie's keynote speech and Robert Macfarlane's reflections on how music and landscape are connected. But it was Sarah Spencer's 'Think Like a Tree' workshop that I found most enlightening. You might have read our post last month where Sarah introduces the concept, but following her advice in person, and listening to her wisdom, was truly worthwhile.

There were many other weird and wonderful things going on over the course of the weekend: The Dream Antelopes (above) and the Museum of the Moon (below) being just two examples. What we loved was being able to dip in and out of these without feeling too pressured that we were going to miss them. In fact, the feel of the whole weekend was slow and relaxed, and it was the calmest, most peaceful festival I've ever attended. 

Sunday closed and we left with willow stars that we'd made that day, nature pendants we'd created the day before, and a sense that the forest, the woods, and trees, really do have the power to transform our moods, our vision for the future, and our lives.

If you're interested in attending next year, you can sign up to the eNews at www.timberfestival.org.uk to be the first to hear about dates and early bird release tickets.⠀⠀
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Collaboration Note:  Thank you to Wild Rumpus and Timber Festival for inviting us to attend.  Images courtesy of Timber Festival. All words and thoughts are my own. 

Curiosity is the cornerstone of any creative mind.

An inquisitive nature that refuses to take things at face value.  A soul that looks deeper into the world around them and spends time reflecting, thinking, processing.  Curiosity is a blessing (and can also be a curse) but is also a trait that garners immense riches when applied to life outdoors.

It is curiosity that forced me outside into my garden on chill winter mornings in November, as I chronicled the tiny changes in the garden at a time of year I used to consider ‘dead’.  It is curiosity that has seen me poring over the tiniest of flowers and plants in the garden, as I become romantically entwined with a specific plant, rather than worrying about the state of the lawn.

But it is also this inquiring soul that has seen me start to amass a rather wonderful collection of curiosities, as I build a nature table made up of objects that are natural, beautiful and full of intrigue.

‘Cabinets of curiosities’ date back to c. 1600, and were collections of objects whose categorical boundaries were yet to be defined in Renaissance Europe.

As we move into more modern times, these became collections of many different forms, from archaeological and religious relics, to works of art, antiquities and of course, objects of natural history.  And for the curious mind, the outdoors offers a rich bounty of different curios to feed the soul and fire the creative within all of us.

Interestingly enough, these were rarely actual cabinets, with the term more loosely referring to an area of a room.  Alas; the curious mind digresses…

In a world where real meaning is often being eroded through apathy, technology (or both), there’s something wonderfully human about collecting different objects from the outdoors.  They require slow, considered saunters to discover them; a natural curiosity applied to a walk or time outdoors, free from the frenetic demands of modern life.

They are tangible, unfiltered and real, and I urge every one of you to start building your own nature table, or natural ‘cabinet of curiosities’ to stimulate the mind and nourish the soul.

On one level, they are aesthetically pleasing.  From the delicate veined patterns of last year’s hydrangea leaves, to the vivid hues of green and yellow lichen, there is a natural nourishment that comes from having a collection of natural ‘objects d’art’ to look at.  They may be ‘everyday’, but every day they also give forth new views, perspectives and thoughts.The delicate strength and sheer variety of materials in a bird’s nest, or the smooth lines of unidentified vertebrae: these objects bridge the curious mind to an uncensored and raw reminder of the real, natural world around us.  To hold these objects is to connect with nature in a way that is getting lost through smartphone sanitisation.

And lastly, they each represent something of true meaning.  I still remember the sheer excitement on my daughter’s face when we found an abandoned ram’s horn when pottering about near a stream.  The empty crab shell, colours jaded now, that represents a time of sheer joy and connection on a beach on Anglesey.  These things are far more than a collection of interesting objects: they are markers of meaning.

We live in a consumer society where we’re constantly told to amass, multiply, and collect.  That human desire to collect is not to be denied.  I just urge you to indulge that motivation in a way that (for me at least) feels infinitely more rewarding, stimulating, and indulging of our natural curiosities.

A nature table is a thing to be embraced.  And even if you live in the heart of a city, there are a thousand different objects just waitingto be found if you’re curious enough to seek them out.

Fancy sharing your collected finds? Use the hashtag #countrysidecuriosities on Instagram and we'll share our favourites!

Today we're introducing you to Francey Bunn, beekeeper, creative, and the owner of Tea and Wildflowers.

Nicola: We’d love you to start by telling us about Tea and Wildflowers and your creative journey so far?

Francey: Tea and Wildflowers is the name of my small business selling honey and beeswax products with potential to include handmade and old things in the future.  I came up with the name to fit with the idea of plant based living and to conjure the magic of my everyday. Childhood memories of long sunny afternoons with tea and books in our South London garden have stayed with me. The garden was packed with fruit trees and we enjoyed its bounty throughout the year: open tarts and mousses in the summer and jams and jellies to take us through to the next harvest. 

One year our apricot tree broke under the weight of fruit and my mother made so much jam.  I'd been wanting to keep bees for ages; it's a craft I feel I'm suited to because I love the summer and enjoy new knowledge and skill sharing. Beekeeping is about so much more than honey. Hanging out by the hives watching these beautiful insects take flight and return home laden with pollen on a golden afternoon is so joyful.

I put back my plans when we adopted our first dog an unruly GSD who took a while to settle and then four years ago I joined the local beekeepers' association hived a swarm or two and now have six colonies. Each of my queen bees has a name from medieval literature; Guinevere, Aliénor and Isolde were the first three I kept in the apiary nearest home. Hopefully the colonies will expand again this year; I usually inspect the hives as soon as we get temperatures of about 10C, typically a nice sunny day in March. I'm nervous to see if the colonies have survived especially when we've had snow and freezing conditions. I try to inspect the frames without too much disruption and am praying for the biscuit coloured slab of brood that proves the queen bee is happily laying eggs. If all is well I'll just put the hive roof back on and make weekly inspections thereafter.

Sometimes a small intervention is needed to keep the colony happy. I never rush things and often go back the following day after I've had a long think about what to do for the best. There's a lot of lifting of wooden boxes and as I have my hives in three different locations I drive round quite a bit and I have to be organised with my kit. I don't normally take frames of honey from the hives until July when I feel confident about surplus levels. The honey I sell is raw, filtered once only and comes from a single hive; a truly artisan product. I talk to the bees quite a lot, telling them about what's going on in my life, encouraging them and thanking them for sharing and we toast the bees with honey cocktails at our family harvest supper in October to show our appreciation.
 

Nicola: From where do you draw your inspiration?

Francey: I draw inspiration first from the landscape around me: small farms, green pastures, hills, valleys and woodland are part of my DNA and I need this kind of setting to prosper. I'm inspired too by women and men who have gone before me, from my own family and others I know through their writing and creativity. As a child I loved to read about adventurers like Laura Ingalls, Amelia Earhart and Grey Owl. I didn't become an aviator but I do my own version of Little House on the Prairie and of all the road trips my husband and I have made, it's the great wildernesses of the Pacific Northwest that continue to nourish us.

Perhaps most influential of all is my French heritage, stories from way back about growing vegetables, making cheese and drinking tisanes are my personal treasure trove.
My creativity runs through a collection of projects, harvesting honey, candle making, dyeing cloth and using herbs for health and well being, and they all have plants as their starting point.

Nicola: Can you tell us about the process of your work, from initial idea to the finished product?

Francey: I could usefully tell you about my candle making here. As a beekeeper I have quite a bit of wax at the end of the season and as I love candles I thought I'd try making some. I started with hand dipping which is the most made by hand method but the results weren't pleasing so I started researching moulds. I found a pine cone mould I thought looked pretty realistic and then considered some of my vintage baking tins. The sweet floral aroma of the beeswax persuaded me to sell my candles online and locally and they've been a runaway success. I needed to source more beeswax which I was able to do locally as I know quite a few keepers so this make is sustainable; I have plans for pharmacy jar candles this year.

Nicola: Can you tell us about where you live, what your workspace looks like and what a day in your life is like?

Francey: We've lived in a small village just north of the Cotswold Edge for a long while now and I'm grateful for the warm Atlantic breeze that sweeps up the Severn and Avon valleys keeping us above freezing temperatures for most of the year. My garden isn't vast and I've planted it to echo the surrounding landscape, trees and hedges and grass at different levels. There is a woodland area under some mature birch trees which I look out to from my little studio or summer house as it's known. I'm very fond of the old brick wall which runs the length of the garden. It belonged to the farm buildings serving the Manor House across the road: a lovely antique next to our modern house. A few visitors have commented about the absence of flowers in my garden. I'm happy with shades of green and brown with a few white pelargoniums to dress the porch in the summer.

I'm not a morning person so my day doesn't really start till after 9 but I often stay up late. You might have guessed that I'm a tea drinker and I have a different brew according to my mood.  My favourites are verveine, mint and lemon balm, all from the same plant family. I try to have a window of creativity in the morning and one in the afternoon when I might pour some candles, visit my hives, go on foraging walks and style photos to use on my website or for Instagram. Fun admin tasks like planning, ordering supplies and catching up on IG tend to be an evening thing. If I have a longer piece to write I do that in my PJs as I eat my morning porridge.


Nicola: When you aren’t creating what do you enjoy doing?

Francey: I like to spend time with my children which these days often involves the internet. My son lives in Arizona and I love chatting to him on Sunday evenings, his Sunday morning.  My daughters are quite a bit closer in London and Oxford and it's lovely to exchange visits and texts with them so regularly. They tell me they like to read about what I'm up to on Instagram and we swap ideas and recommendations all the time.

Swimming is my first choice for exercise, the feeling of being in water is so restorative and mindful. I'm a regular at the Cheltenham Lido in spring and summer and in winter I use indoor pools. My favourite swims though are in the sea but I have to be on holiday for those as we live about as far away from the coast as is possible here in the UK.

Nicola: We’d love to hear more about your love of photography and all things hand-made, and how you incorporate both of these into your daily life?

Francey: I can't really separate photography from writing, both tell stories and I like to use them together. I guess Instagram has made me see it this way. I love photos that tell parts of stories which we then fill in. I have a new website coming online this summer. I want to extend my IG, make it bigger and deeper. Concept wise it's a kind of grimoire but more natural secrets than supernatural ones. My first posts are about foraging, teas and tisanes and a short story about a beekeeper. I write because I am but it can be hard sometimes when the words are heavy and I'm just not getting my ideas across. Light is everything for a good photo so I know the places in the house and garden and the times of day that are more promising.  As with writing I keep trying things out, make small changes and try again.

Handmade things make my heart sing and I buy from small producers like Winchcombe pottery or I browse Etsy, but to be honest I don't buy much, I just look after the things I already have and sometimes reinterpret them with paint or dye. I like a pared down aesthetic so clutter is not my friend.

Nicola: And lastly, if anyone reading this would love to follow their own creative dream, what advice would you give them?

Francey: To anyone who's just started out on their creative journey and I'm not very far down that road, I would recommend a few things; scheduling short and long term goals, so last year it was setting up my shop on Etsy, finding local stockists and getting some kind of brand identity going, and this year, I've got some help with my Instagram and with my new website. It's so important to invest in yourself too because early success will give you the feeling of achievement you need. Working with others is also great for development. I've recently started a shared project with Heather, a herbalist I met on the Creative Countryside Winter Gathering in January (check her out on IG @northstarnomad); we are exchanging letters about dyeing cloth and growing honey plants like buckwheat, phacelia and quinoa to provide pollen and nectar for bees. I've made a start with dyeing linen using walnut shells and avocado skins. Seed sowing so I'll have some strong plugs to plant around the hives is next up. It was Heather's suggestion too, that we share some reading and we've chosen Braiding Sweetgrass by Robin Wall Kimmerer to take us through the next few weeks.

I feel I need to say more about reading and how books including fiction are so important in the creative journey.  Whenever I have an idea, I develop it through reading and conversations with folk who have done something similar.  Only then can I start to work independently and make something of my own.

Follow Francey on Instagram, find her on Etsy or visit the website

Have you ever experienced one of those moments when something is said, and you know, for whatever reason, that it’s hugely significant, even though the reason for this might not be immediately apparent? I remember one of those moments now, only because it has finally gained the context that allows it to make sense, kind of like blinking yourself out of a dream and into the wakeful clearness of the day.

This particular moment happened at university, in a packed lecture hall during a lecture on Wordsworth’s 'Tintern Abbey'. Not only did the poem immediately establish itself as a firm favourite (even to this day vying for the position of absolute favourite with Keats’s 'To Autumn') but something else seemed to strike a chord when the lecturer, discussing Wordsworth’s walking tour and views over the landscape, said: “When you leave here today, remember that whatever you look at, someone, somewhere, either owns it or controls it in some way.”

For years after, that sentence swilled around loosely in a dark, neglected corner of my memory until eventually my interests meandered through the world of angling and its writers, spilling over into a more panoramic interest in nature writing and the wider natural world beyond the seas and estuaries and rivers I knew so well. Suddenly, a whole new world opened up to me: George Monbiot’s theses on “rewilding”; the often parochial, intimate observations of Deakin and Blythe, the country-crossing ramblings of MacFarlane and the ecologically-tinted wilderness wanderings of that great modern-day voyageur Sigurd F. Olson, to name just a few. I became fascinated with my own self-built grand fantasies of “wild secluded” Canadian wilderness and the “deep seclusion” of remote Scottish highland forests, lamenting the fact that there were no such comparable things near to me, vowing that ‘some day I would...’, a burgeoning sentence whose wide open spaces were filled with a rolling sequence of overblown, romanticised ambitions that would arrive and then disappear almost as suddenly, carried away upon their own energy as twigs in a stream.

But then, something happened. With further reading, came an awareness of the deeper themes and arguments that ran across decades and continents, leading me onto some strange assimilation of all these factors, and it was whilst I computed all of these ideas and influences into my own understanding of the natural world that the old phrase from my university lecture that seemed so long ago finally found a niche into which it could click, where it began to cast light upon these new ideas, kick-starting a new process of understanding.

I quickly realised that the phrase “natural world” belonged within quotation marks. Why? Because I could no more define it than could anyone else. My understanding of the “natural world” is uniquely my own, and thus, should be taken with a pinch of salt by anyone other than me, as should anyone else’s version. Perhaps the “natural world” as society has come to understand it is a concept that doesn’t actually exist. Maybe it never existed in any one true, idealised sense. This revelation was finally hammered home when, as chance would have it, I returned to the source of my early fascination, re-reading Lyrical Ballads, this time in preparation for teaching it to A-Level classes of my own.

I devoured the book quickly, looking for remembered phrases and lines as I might scan for friends on arriving at some party. There they were, tripping off the tongue once more until, that is, I returned to Tintern. The powerful words and images were still there alright, as majestic and poetic as ever they had been on my first reading years before; they had lost none of the Romantic power. But there, nestled alongside them were other more subtle things that I had long since forgotten, or perhaps missed entirely in the first place. For all of the seclusion and tranquillity and restorative power, there was also a calm and unfussy acceptance from Wordsworth, present in the “plots of cottage-ground”, “orchard-tufts”, “hedge-rows” and “pastoral farms” that were framed by “wreaths of smoke/Sent up, in silence, from among the trees”.

Here was a genius of the English pastoral, searching for silence and solitude and quiet contemplation, and having to find, instead, a negotiated version of the natural world. In a landscape as used and farmed and tamed as the British countryside, even the great searchers who had come in search of their own idea of nature had been forced to settle upon the version of it that was afforded them by the other people and purposes with whom they shared it: Wordsworth’s vision of Tintern; Keats witnessing the seasons change in the fields and granaries. Even the great Robert Frost could only find a road “less traveled by” in his American landscapes rather than one never before walked upon.

And here it was, laid bare in black and white lines of iambic pentameter: it is okay to negotiate. I don’t need someone else’s wilderness when I can find solitude whilst fishing an empty beach at dusk; I don’t have to hike through some distant forest when I can walk the slopes of the hills behind my home, following my well-worn route through its tree-tunnels; I can hear birdsong and wind-sifted leaves in Margam Country Park, a beautiful green space once owned by the Talbot family, and only ten minutes drive from my home, just as well as I can anywhere else. 

To some, this might be unacceptable. Maybe they are not prepared to settle for less, needing the raw confrontation of “Nature, red in tooth and claw”, but that is for them to search for and discover on their own terms. Good luck to them. I am perfectly happy to give a little, working with my negotiable nature, so that I can continue to receive so much in return.