Taking time to live well

January

NOOK

Cosy books to curl up with • Wearing PJs • Marmalade sandwich pudding
A feeling for sauna • Spice-baked cauliflower • Modern wassailing
Furniture rehab & houseplant rescue • Tarns, hares & tideline treasures

Natural materials, precision craftsmanship, every detail considered.
Timeless kitchen design.

Kitchens Furniture Accessories Lighting Paint Design services
neptune.com

A could-do list
January
Create a cosy hobby corner in your home
Have a winter barbecue on a crisp
and sunny afternoon
Send a friend a joke to cheer their day
Dig out old photos and create
a gallery of good memories

IMAGE: HOUSEPLANT WALLPAPER BY OHPOPSI (JANECLAYTON.CO.UK)

Wrap up warm for an early walk and
relish the quiet
Curl up with one of your
Christmas books

Try some of our ideas, make
up a few of your own, or just
read and enjoy!

PHOTOGRAPHY: HOLLY JOLLIFFE

New year is a good time to look back

the January 2014 issue was my first

and enjoy the journey to where you

as Editor – some of the team today

are now; we’re encouraged to make

were with me back then, too. It’s a

plans but the key is being rather

strange thing that a large portion

than doing, ideally in the comfort

of an entire decade of your life can

your own favourite nook. Warming

be fitted on one bookshelf. But when

food and drink, a book to curl up

I look at those volumes and reflect

with and some time to enjoy it, with

on the stories they contain, the

a foray outdoors when the weather

ideas and inspiration they’ve given

is encouraging, satisfy most of our

me and the paths I have followed as

basic needs in January. This winter

a consequence, I know that I would

retreat, where you can pretend that

not have done so many things that

the outside world doesn’t exist, is

give me pleasure without making

known as a ‘hibernacle’. The year to

this magazine. I hope you feel the

come can wait a little while longer…

same way. Thank you for reading

I’ve been looking back at my own

and a Happy New Year.

journey recently, as 10 years ago,

Lisa

EDITOR LISA SYKES

PS, You can join us later this month in our own hibernacle for
season 1 of our new podcast ‘Small Ways To Live Well’. It’s a
six-week companion to thriving in winter – read more on p63.

Spice
routes
YOU MAY BE STAYING HOME,
BUT TREATING FRIENDS TO
FOODS FROM AFAR CAN
INSTANTLY TRANSPORT YOU
TO MORE COLOURFUL PARTS
OF THE WORLD

Recipes & Photography CATHERINE FRAWLEY
Assisted by LISA JAMES

T

his is a dinner adorned with
precious jewels from the east.
Offer a warm welcome with Rose
& cardamom cocktails before
serving up a baked cauliflower
enhanced with turmeric and cumin and
a slow-cooked leg of lamb with a hint of
cinnamon. Side dishes of carrots and rice are
lifted with a warming mix of flavours, too.
Then, top it all off with a sweet and creamy
slice of tart. It may be cold and grey outside,
but an evening sharing exuberantly-spiced
food is armchair travel when it’s most needed. »

6

GATHERING

MENU
Rose & cardamom cocktail

Turmeric & cumin
baked cauliflower

Spice up your life!
These treasures of the
kitchen have done all
the travelling, so
you’ve only got to
make it to the table to
enjoy their delights

Slow-cooked lamb
Spiced rice with
saffron & apricots
Honey & harissa
roasted carrots
Sumac yogurt
Fig & custard tart

7

Move over cauliflower
cheese, there’s a new
sheriff in town. Tasty and
warming (but far easier
on the arteries), this baked
gem works as a side or
as the star of the show

Turmeric & cumin
baked cauliflower
Sunshine yellow and bejewelled
with pomegranate, cauli gets
its moment as star of the table.

Serves 4
1 whole cauliflower, leaves and
stalk removed
½ tsp cumin
1 tsp turmeric
1 tsp garlic granules
2-3 tbsp olive oil
FOR THE GARNISH:
200ml natural yogurt
3-4 tbsp pomegranate seeds
Small bunch coriander
1 Bring a large pan of water to the
boil and place the cauliflower upside
down inside. Boil for 5 mins. Drain and
steam dry for 10–15 mins, then pat dry.
Meanwhile, line a baking sheet with
greaseproof paper and preheat the
oven to 220C/Fan 200C/Gas 7.
2 Mix the cumin, turmeric, garlic
granules and oil together in a small
bowl. Place the cauliflower on the
baking sheet (right way up) and
brush all over with the mixture.
Season and bake for 25–30 mins, or
until the edges start to turn golden.
3 Transfer to a serving plate and
drizzle over the yogurt, pomegranate
seeds and coriander before serving.

8

GATHERING

Rose & cardamom
cocktail
Pretty as a flower with the right
mix of bitter and sweet flavours,
this is a warm welcome indeed.

Slow-cooked lamb
Give dinner a leg up by serving
tender lamb infused with a splash
of citrus and a hint of cinnamon.

Serves 4-6
Half a leg of lamb
1-2 tbsp olive oil
1 tsp ground cinnamon
3 garlic cloves, sliced
1-2 preserved lemons, sliced
3 dried limes, broken into pieces
(sold in Waitrose)
250ml stock
6-7 shallots, peeled and sliced
in half to fill the base of the pot
1 Start by preheating the oven
to 190C/Fan 170C/Gas 5.

2 With a sharp knife, criss cross the
top of the lamb. Mix together the oil
and cinnamon and rub over the lamb,
working the mix into the incisions.
Then stud the joint with the garlic
and preserved lemon slices.
3 Fill the bottom of a lidded pot
(or use foil to cover) with the sliced
shallots and rest the lamb on top. Add
the stock and black limes and cook,
covered, for 1 hr. Check, baste, and
cook for a further 30 mins covered, if
needed, before uncovering (basting
again) and cooking for 30 mins more.
4 Rest the lamb for 15 mins before
serving, either in the cooking pot
or transferring to a serving dish.
Cook’s note: The black limes are for
flavour and not to be eaten, so either
remove before serving or let eaters
know to look out for them.

Serves 2
100ml gin
8-10 cardamom pods, lightly crushed
400ml lemonade or tonic water
10ml aromatic bitters
A capful of rose water (it can be
overpowering so add more gradually
if you’d like a stronger flavour)
Edible rose petals to finish, optional
1 Add the gin and cardamom pods
to a glass jar and allow to infuse
for a few hours or overnight.
2 Strain out the cardamom and
add the gin infusion to a large jug,
along with the other ingredients,
stir and serve immediately. »

“Sharing flavours from around
the world offers armchair travel
when it’s most needed”
9

GATHERING

Spiced rice with
saffron & apricots
Golden in colour and full of fruity
and earthy flavours, this rice is
made for sharing.

Serves 4
40g butter
½ small white onion, diced
2 tbsp cardamom pods, lightly
crushed

1 star anise
1 cinnamon stick
Handful of almonds, roughly
chopped
Handful of dried apricots, cut in half
300g basmati rice
Pinch of saffron, dissolved in 2 tbsp
of warm water
500ml veg stock
Coriander, to garnish
1 Melt the butter in a large saucepan.
Add the onions and a pinch of salt
and sauté for 2–3 mins.
2 Add the spices (except the saffron),
the almonds and the apricots and
cook for 2–3 mins more, stirring often.
3 Add the rice and stir to coat. Cook
for 1 min before adding the saffron
water and the stock, then cook the
rice according to pack instructions.
4 Fluff with a fork (remove the
cinnamon stick and star anise if
you want. You also can't eat the
cardamom pods). Serve garnished
with coriander leaves.

Sumac yogurt
Tangy and ever-so-slightly sweet,
this works so well with the lamb.

Serves 4
300ml greek yogurt
1 tbsp runny honey
1 tsp sumac, plus a pinch to garnish
A few mint leaves, to garnish
Stir the honey and sumac into the
yogurt, and add a little salt, if needed.
Garnish with a pinch of sumac and
fresh mint leaves before serving.

Honey & harissa
roasted carrots
Providing a burst of colour and
packed with flavour, the humble
carrot stick has just grown up.

Serves 4
½ tsp cinnamon
2 heaped tbsp rose harissa paste
2 tbsp runny honey
1 tbsp extra virgin olive oil
500g carrots, peeled and
sliced lengthways
1 Preheat the oven to 220C/
Fan 200C/Gas 7.
2 Mix together all the ingredients
in a large bowl, add the carrots and
toss until the carrots are coated.
3 Transfer to a baking sheet, taking
care not to overcrowd the sheet
(use two if necessary). Roast for
18–20 mins, depending on the
thickness of your carrots. »

10

Three wines
to share
RIESLING, £15.99
This full-bodied white
wine balances with the
warmth of the spices
from the cauliflower,
making a combination
that complements the
flavours of both wonderfully.

ORGANIC RED, £15.49
This organic red wine is
made with 100% Bobal
grapes grown in the sunsoaked region of Valencia
in Spain. Its rich and
intensely fruity flavours of
black cherry, raspberry, and
blackcurrant, pair beautifully
with rich slow-cooked lamb.

PROSECCO, £13.99
Finish the meal with
a celebratory pop –
Sea Change Prosecco
will complement the
sweet, fruity dessert
with its delicate aromas
of peaches and pears.

Forget treacherous
journeys by land and
sea – nowadays, a
quick trip to the shops
is all that’s needed to
restock the spice rack

Wine pairings by Sea Change Wine. Sea Change
Wine doesn’t just taste good, it does good, too.
Every bottle sold helps support ocean conservation
projects across the globe. seachangewine.com

11

GATHERING

Fig & custard tart
Sweet, syrupy figs, creamy
custard and a buttery base makes
for an irresistibly moreish tart.

Serves 6-8
1 tbsp melted butter to grease the tin
1 sheet shortcrust pastry
2 eggs, plus 3 egg yolks
100g caster sugar
1 tbsp cornflour
300ml whole milk
300ml double cream
½ tsp fresh grated nutmeg
Vanilla pod, insides scraped out
4 figs, stalk removed and sliced into 3
Chopped pistachios (to garnish)

Oh bring us some
figgy pudding…
preferably with a side
helping of flavours
to evoke sunshine
and far-flung travels

THE SPICE TRAIL
The spice routes, also known as the maritime
silk roads, linked the east to the west.
Stretching from Japan, through Indonesia
and India, on to the Middle East and from
there, across the Mediterranean to Europe,
the routes date back to as early as 2000BCE.
Traded as ingredients and medicine, spices*
created wealth for those willing to make the
treacherous sea journeys. However, people
have fought to gain the power and influence
the trade offered, which led to colonialism,
as well as the beginnings of globalisation. The
trade may have changed, but the importance
of spices in our kitchens and culture remain.
*Enjoyed this taste of spice history? Read more
about them in TST 137 (November 2023).

1 Preheat the oven to 180C/Fan 160C/
Gas 4. Meanwhile, brush a 25cm
loose-bottom tart tin with the melted
butter, then line it with the pastry,
gently pressing the pastry into the tin.
2 Line the pastry with a sheet of
greaseproof paper and fill with
baking beads. Blind bake for 15 mins.
Remove the beads and the paper
and bake for a further 5 mins.
3 To make the filling, add the
eggs, egg yolks, sugar and cornflour
to a heatproof bowl and whisk. In
a medium saucepan, add the milk,
cream, nutmeg and vanilla pod.
Slowly bring to the boil, stirring
occasionally. Pour the milk mixture
into the egg mix whisking as you
go. Whisk thoroughly before pouring
into the pastry case.
4 Add the figs and bake the tart for
35–40 mins, or until the custard turns
golden and is firm to touch but with
a little bit of a wobble in the centre.
5 Allow to cool slightly before
removing from the tin. Serve warm
or keep refrigerated until needed.
Cook’s note: This will keep for
2 days in the fridge.

A comforting dinner
given extra oomph,
thanks to spice mixes
that boost flavour

HEATING STOVES
TH E E S S E N C E O F CO M F O RT

esse.com

The honesty box
THROUGH HER OWN SMALL BEACON OF GENEROSITY, LUCY
BRAZIER AIMS TO HONOUR SEASONAL JOYS. WE JOIN HER AS
A NEW YEAR BRINGS NEW RESOLUTIONS AND THE SHARING
OF EVERYDAY SUNSHINE IS ALL THE MORE WELCOME

14

PHOTOGRAPHY: LUCY BRAZIER; ISTOCK

SHARING

y first ever honesty box was in
the month of January, which
seems like a silly place to start,
considering the lack of fresh
produce and garden abundance.
It was motivated by my new
year’s resolution to set up my own honesty box
after a lifetime of saying I wanted to and not doing
it. Still, I wasn’t sure what I could offer during
a gunmetal grey, drizzly month when nobody
was venturing out – but where is the rule that
says I can only sell my homegrown gluts? There
isn’t one, and then I had an idea…
As the last notes of Auld Lang Syne fades away,
the local farm shop brings out trays of citrus,
vibrant and fresh among the marked down forlorn
Christmas leftovers of mince pies, striped candy
canes and packets of glittery reindeer food. These
luminous fruits are a welcome sight for tired,
over-indulged eyes. Pretty-in-pink grapefruits
for breakfast or to chop into a crisp winter salad.
Sharp lemons for a morning mug of hot water
and to zest into a simple Madeira cake. Leafy
clementines in wooden crates for snacking. If
I’m really lucky, I may find a few bergamot lemons
with their unique Earl Grey scent, but I have
to remind myself to use them rather than just
wander past the bowl and hold one to my nose.
Oranges are plentiful, too. The flesh cut into
segments and eaten with the juice dripping down
your arm, is a burst of sunshine. Then there are the
special oranges, by which I mean those grown in
Seville and bought for marmalade making*. Their
season is tantalisingly short, so I always stock
up and store a tray of them in my freezing lean-to
for fear of being too late to the preserving party.
Unsurprisingly, I decided my first honesty box
would be a homage to citrus, so I made a couple
of batches of Seville orange & whisky marmalade
and several jars of Pink grapefruit & bay curd.
The kitchen was filled with a reassuring steamy
sourness as I chopped, squeezed, soaked and
rolling boiled the sevilles and, in the gaps of this
magical process, I made a more meditative curd.
While marmalade can look after itself at various
points, you cannot leave a curd for a single second
or risk ending up with an eggy mess. I’m speaking
from experience. If you’ve never made it before I
urge you to try it, if only to eat it straight out of the
jar with a spoon. Although it’s also delicious on
toast, in yogurt, on ice cream, and as a cake filling.
As I was labelling the jars, the strangest thing
happened. The rain stopped for the first time in
days and the early afternoon sun edged out from
behind a gloomy cloud. It was a sign. I lined the

*Marmalade lovers might want to turn to the recipes on p36.

Pink grapefruit & bay curd
This is the prettiest curd in all the land. The softest
pink and sweeter than its lemony cousin, it’s
exactly the sort of treat we need in January. This is
a speedy version of a process that usually requires
a bain-marie (however, if it’s your first crack at curd
then it may be easier to use a bain-marie method).
Makes 2 x 250ml jars
100g butter
150g caster sugar
Zest and juice from 2 pink grapefruits
2 fresh bay leaves
5 eggs
In a pan, melt the butter slowly, then add the sugar,
stirring until it dissolves. Add the grapefruit juice
and bay leaves, stir and take off the heat. In a bowl,
whisk the eggs until combined. Put a sieve over the
pan of butter and pour the egg into the sieve. As
it drips through, hold the sieve with one hand and,
using a wooden spoon, stir the egg into the butter
with the other. Don’t be tempted to rush this. Once
the egg has sieved through, return the pan to
a very low heat and stir constantly
until the mixture begins to
thicken. This should take about
10 minutes. Remove the bay
leaves and decant
into sterilised jars. Store in the
fridge and use within two weeks.

“Unsurprisingly, I decided
my first honesty box would
be a homage to citrus”
jars up outside and chalked the prices on a piece
of roof slate propped next to them. I was hopeful
that neighbours and walkers would be enticed
out by the change in weather and spot my
preserves glowing in the distance. When it began
to get dark, I collected them in and was thrilled
to see a few jars had been bought. By the end of
the month, they were all sold. I decided to make
another batch and popped to the farm shop for
blood oranges with a new recipe in mind: Blood
orange & lime curd. And so it continued...
We’ll hear from Lucy again in March as she
assembles her Easter honesty box.

15

A

N

PR
AP

E C I AT I O N O F R
OSE
-RIN

GED P
ARAKEETS

ou’ll probably hear them before you see
them: a startling, abrasive screech that
cuts through the roar of traffic. Your first
glimpse might only be a flash as they zoom
through foliage or turn at the corner of the
street, as purposeful as commuters. But
if you can get close to one, you will see that the tone of
their feathers is not uniform, but ranges from acid green
to the glow of sunlight through a leaf. Their small, hooked
beaks are as orange-red as overripe papaya. The ‘rose-ring’
of their name refers to a band of gorgeous pink, and their
eyes are startling blue, encircled by hypnotic loops of
Day-Glo orange.
One day in 1968, Jimi Hendrix walked down Carnaby
Street with a birdcage in his hands. The cage contained
two rose-ringed parakeets named Adam and Eve. Hendrix
opened the cage door and the parakeets flew out, streaks
of psychedelic green against the grey London sky. Adam
and Eve made love, not war – today the capital contains
50,000 of their descendants.
That story is not true, of course. Neither is the one
about London’s parakeet population escaping from the
film set of The African Queen in the 1950s, or the one about
them fleeing George Michael’s house during a burglary.
The likelier, but less colourful, theory is that dozens or
hundreds of pet birds slipped their cages over the years,
and quickly found their niche in London’s parks and
cemeteries, coming together in garrulous roosts and
spreading throughout the city. But who wants truth
16

when you can have urban myths as rich as these?
Today it’s not just Londoners for whom these brash
South Asian birds have become almost as common a
sight as urban pigeons. The Big Smoke is too small for
them, and in recent years they have spread to almost
every county in England, and established colonies as far
north as Edinburgh and Glasgow. People often assume
they must be cold, but given that their native range
extends to the foothills of the Himalayas, it seems
that English and even Scottish winters are temperate
enough. Smart, resourceful and adaptive, they have
proved highly successful as an invasive species.
In terms of their impact on native birds, while
they might outcompete certain species in some areas
– woodpeckers for access to nesting sites, tits for food
on bird tables – the consensus among ecologists is that
it’s too early to tell. For now, at least, there is plenty
of food and greenery to go round. Despite occasional
predictions of an impending cull, the government have
quietly admitted that parakeets are here to stay. Like
grey squirrels and muntjac deer, they are already part
of the British landscape.
They have made great inroads into British culture,
too. Their image has been adopted on pub signs, a
brewery logo and a women’s rugby team – what greater
symbols of integration into British life could there be?
So next time you hear a screech as harsh as Hendrix’s
guitar, look up for that startling flash of green. It might
be another urban myth just waiting to be told.

ILLUSTRATION: ZUZA MISKO

Words: NICK HUNT

Unique
One-of-a-kind places to stay
in hidden corners across the UK.

Discover more...
uniquehideaways.com
@uniquehideaways

01736 230 140
hello@uniquehideaways.com

TIDAL
TREASURES
WILD WINTER WEATHER
STIRS UP THE SEABED AND
EXPLORING YOUR NEAREST
TIDELINE TO SEE WHAT THE
STORM HAS WASHED UP MAKES
FOR A FASCINATING DAY OUT,
SAYS VANESSA WRIGHT

he fury of a Hebridean storm
is captivating. Wind howls
down the chimney and windows
rattle as rain pummels the glass.
I watch as willow trees are bent
horizontal and puddles become
ponds. But I know it will pass. With every
gust, my anticipation builds. Beachcombing
in the aftermath of wild weather reveals
unending mysteries and surprises as fauna,
flora and flotsam are all washed ashore. The
sands shift and the tide turns; no two days
scavenging the shoreline are ever the same.
After the storm, the sea is as black as
onyx, the breeze bracing. Twisted tangles
of seaweed are strewn along the strandline,
the high-water mark where waves deposit
debris and driftwood with each receding
tide. I know that hiding among these coils
of kelp will be a wealth of tidal treasures.
My pace slows to match the ebb and flow
of the waves as I scan the shore with intent.

F O L K LO R E O N
THE SEASHORE
Storms stir up the seabed, yielding creatures
and curiosities often found in deeper waters.
Like sea urchin tests, the hard outer skeleton
of marine invertebrates, usually living up to
40 metres below the surface – an emblem of
protection, they were frequently placed in a
child’s cradle to ward off disease. Or delicate
sea potatoes, also members of the sea urchin
family, which bury themselves well below
the low tide mark. In 2018, hundreds of these
baseball-sized orbs washed up on a beach
in Penzance, Cornwall, after rough weather,
as brittle as crisps. »
18

If you go down to the
beach today, you may
be in for a big surprise.
Wild weather can bring
treasures to the shore,
making beachcombing
a real adventure. Will
there be a sea urchin
lurkin’ under seaweed?

OUTING

19

OUTING

Treasure-hunting hints
Check tide times: The ideal time
to visit is 2–3 hours before low
tide. The lowest tides, when more
of the beach is exposed, coincide
with the new and full moon.
Be prepared: Wrap up warm
and bring waterproofs. Carry
zip-lock bags for your finds
– and bacterial hand gel!
Be responsible: Collect natural
things sparingly as they provide
food and shelter for seashore
creatures. There are restrictions
on removing pebbles as these
prevent coastal erosion.
Give something back: Pick up
pieces of plastic on your visit.
Stay safe: Always check the
weather forecast. Keep clear
of cliffs. Don’t touch jellyfish, as
they can sting even when dead.

As I linger on the South Uist beach, the
tide pulls the sea back to reveal the wrinkly
creases of the beach beneath, resembling
an unmade bed. Caught in the folds, cowries
– said to be symbols of fortune – appear like
tiny smiles in the sand. At the edge of the surf,
wedged in the sand, I spy a peach-pink shell;
a scallop. Reminiscent of the setting sun, they
represent the journey of life and are often
carried as a talisman on pilgrimages; they
are even the waymarker on Spain’s famous
Camino de Santiago. With each discovery, my
knowledge of the animals that once inhabited
these calcium carbonate homes, and the
Celtic legends and lore they inspired, grows.
There’s a sense of wonder when imagining
how far some treasures have travelled, too.
Turbulent tides deliver coconuts and drift
seeds from the Caribbean, one of the most
prized being the rare sea bean from the
tropical liana, a long-stemmed woody
vine native to Central and South America.
Carried along with the warm Gulf Stream,
these glossy heart-shaped seeds wash up on
beaches in Scotland, Devon and Cornwall.
The same sea currents bring Loki’s candles,
scrolls of paper birch bark from Canada’s
coastline. Collecting a few of these wooden
corkscrews, I continue an age-old tradition
and use them as kindling. Loki is the Norse
god of shapeshifting trickery, so it is fitting
that in these islands largely devoid of trees,
these gifts from the other side of the world
have been lighting crofters’ fires for centuries.

COA ST TO COA ST
Scouring the shoreline after wild winter
weather helps me to get to know the nuances
20

of each beach. In sheltered coves, I collect
dainty pastel periwinkles while the exposed
west coast washes up trash and treasure
from the Americas. The same is true all over
the country. Shingle bays become a hunting
ground for sea glass, otherwise known as
mermaid tears, such as Seaham in Durham
where remnants from an Edwardian bottle
works litter the beach as smoothed rainbow
pebbles. Groynes and rocks act as anchors for
winter wash-ups, while ports and harbours
reveal man-made artefacts like coins and
pottery. East of Lyme Regis, where Mary
Anning discovered an ichthyosaur in 1811,
landslips have dislodged a Victorian rubbish
tip from the clifftop, pouring trinkets and
knick-knacks onto the shoreline. One man’s
trash is another man’s treasure!
Of course, all beachcombers live in hope of
stumbling upon real treasure, and parts of the
British coastline have become celebrated for
their precious and semi-precious gemstones.
The Amber Coast, between Felixstowe and

Once in a lifetime finds
Remarkable treasure that’s been
uncovered on the coast

PHOTOGRAPHY: ALAMY; VANESSA WRIGHT

Mammoth tusks: In 2013, after
an exceptionally low tide, lobster
fisherman Barry Mount found
a pair of mammoth tusks in
Herne Bay, Kent, .
Message in a bottle: There’s

something romantic about finding
a note inside a bottle. The world’s
oldest message survived 132
years before being recovered
in Western Australia in 2018.
Bombs: Two brothers found 18
unexploded World War 2 bombs
in 2014 while beachcombing
at Sandwich Bay, Kent, on
the lowest tide of the year.

Southwold, is named after discoveries of
fossilised resin from ancient offshore forests,
while further north on the Fife coast, Elie’s
Ruby Bay is named after precious red stones
found on the beach – actually a type of garnet,
washed out of the volcanic rock, which are
coloured by chromium rather than iron,
giving them a particularly vivid shade.
Legend has it there is a secret site on the Isle
of Harris which has even turned up sapphires.
Less polished but no less precious, eroding
cliffs on the North Yorkshire coast reveal thin
seams of midnight-black jet formed from the
fossilised remains of the modern-day monkey
puzzle tree. Search the shoreline near Whitby
after storms, but don’t be duped by lumps of
coal left over from beach barbecues – the real
deal is surprisingly warm to touch, remains
jet black even when dry, and doesn’t crumble.

SPILLS AND THRILLS
Shipwrecks so often spark the imagination,
and I can’t resist hunting for bottles filled

with the ‘water of life’ when visiting my
neighbouring island of Eriskay. It is here
that the SS Politician ran aground in 1941,
its spilt consignment of liquor inspiring the
film Whisky Galore. Despite searching high
and low, I am still to strike liquid gold.
Cargo from the weird to the wonderful has
washed up all around the British coastline.
It has been over 25 years since a rogue wave
caused the Tokio Express to lose over 60
containers while en route from Rotterdam
to New York, and with them, almost five
million pieces of Lego. There is a certain
irony that marine-themed plastic octopuses,
life rafts and seagrass continue to litter the
Cornish coast today. Residents of Devon,
however, really did hit the jackpot. After the
MSC Napoli suffered catastrophic damage
as she sailed along the English Channel in
2007, the ship was deliberately grounded
on Branscombe Beach. BMW generously
allowed those who salvaged motorbikes
from the wreck to keep them!

Beach bounty, such as
coconuts or Loki’s candles,
may have travelled from afar,
or may have been there all
along, as with periwinkles and
cowries. Local industry plays
a part, too, as people hunt for
sea glass in Seaham, and find
a washed-up glass float

21

Health and happiness are all about balance, but we know that
when things get busy it’s easy to forget to look after yourself. In
this second volume of our wellbeing bookazine, Flourish, we’ve
gathered some of our favourite ideas from The Simple Things
DQG2KPDJD]LQHV2YHUEHDXWLIXOSDJHV\RXFDQˋQG
ways to bring more joy and laughter into your day, or moments
of peace and calm. You’ll discover how to nourish your mind
and body with food, nature and new experiences and advice
on nurturing your relationships. We hope that reading Flourish
will remind you of what makes you feel good. Because,
as one of our wise contributors says, “You can’t
just keep pouring out like a teapot,
\RXȢYHJRWWRˋOOEDFNXSȥ

Order a
copy for £14
(plus p&p)*
picsandink.com

Our new wellbeing
bookazine from
The Simple Things
Postage prices on website.

CAKE
IN THE
HOUSE
This little loaf celebrates bergamot’s
incredible smell, and goes great with
a brew – and, as we all know, tea
makes everything feel better
EARL GREY LOAF CAKE
Makes 1 loaf
180g caster sugar
200g plain flour (gluten-free plain
flour will also work)
2 tsp Earl Grey tea leaves
1½ tsp baking powder
60g extra virgin olive oil
200g plant-based milk, such
as oat milk
160g icing sugar
Pinch of dried blue cornflower
petals, to decorate
1 Preheat the oven to 200C/
Fan 180C/Gas 6. Line a small 450g
loaf tin with baking parchment.
2 Add the sugar, flour and tea leaves
to a blender and blitz briefly.
Transfer to a large bowl and stir in
the baking powder.
3 Add the olive oil and plant-based
milk, and use a whisk to mix
the ingredients together until
fully combined.
4 Pour the batter into the lined
loaf tin. Bake in the centre of the

oven for 30–35 mins until golden and
the top of the loaf is set and springs
back when gently pressed with your
fingertips. Remove the loaf from the
tin and cool on a wire rack.
5 Slowly mix the icing sugar with
a small amount of water in a
measuring jug until it is fully
combined and smooth.
6 Drizzle the icing on top of the
cooled cake (still on the wire rack

with the baking sheet underneath to
catch the drips) and leave to set for
30 mins to an hour. Decorate with the
blue cornflower petals.
Cook’s note: This cake keeps at room
temperature in an airtight container
for up to five days.

Extract taken from A New Way to Bake
by Philip Khoury (Hardie Grant).
Photography by Matt Russell

23

My day in cups of tea
We chat to Monmouthshire-based Poppy Wall, founder of natural fragrance
business Eym to tell us about her day in cuppas – and even (whisper it) coffee…
Rise and shine, can we get you a cuppa?

Let’s lift your spirits – kettle’s on, what do you fancy?

Controversial, but we’ll allow it! Tell us about home

Do you have a mug of choice?

POPPY WALL is the
co-founder of 100%
natural fragrance brand
Eym. Her simple thing is
getting into bed with fresh
sheets, a good book, and
lighting Eym’s Rest
candle. eymnaturals.com

24

creating small moments in people’s days where we
might help lift their spirits, or soothe their busy mind.

Can mine be a coffee? That first coffee is probably one
of my favourite things. I’m always woken up early by
one of my three children, Marlowe, Casper and Uma.

I’d love a Pukka chamomile, vanilla and honey tea.

We live in an old farmhouse in
Monmouthshire that we’re doing
up. I love how peaceful and cosy it is,
and how it’s surrounded by nature.

My favorite is really symbolic, by KANA London. I
bought it from The Basics Store, the first ever pop-up
that we were part of. That was where it all began for us.

Do you have a daily routine?

I try to get my head down before the kids get in from
school. We’ve just got a puppy, so I have a lunchtime
walk. I use it as my time to be present and absorb my
surroundings – it’s often when I have my best ideas.

Yes, I love a routine! Mornings are
often a dash getting the kids off to
nursery and school. But once I’m
home, I make myself a second coffee
and get to work on emails. My
husband and I founded Eym, a
natural fragrance brand. We only use
100% natural fragrance – just
essential oil. I love the idea of

Does your afternoon differ from your mornings?

And what about the afternoon snack situation?

A chunky choc chip cookie and another Pukka tea
at 4pm. This is my lowest energy point of the day.
What are you most looking forward to right now?

We’ve some new products coming out that I can’t
wait to share. I’m really excited about this year.

January
SEASONAL THOUGHTS TO HELP YOU ENJOY THE MONTH

THINGS TO NOTE AND NOTICE

Field work

JANUARY IN
THE SKY

Tarns
Derived from tjörn, the Norse word
for ‘pool’, tarns are small mountainside
lakes, that look beautiful and are even
more impressive once you understand
how they are formed. Essentially, they
are caused by ice erosion. Corries
(hollows on mountainsides) form as a
cirque glacier develops inside, eventually
scraping the hollow into a large ‘bowl’
that gets deeper as it’s eroded by ice.
When the glacier eventually melts,
water forms a lake in the corrie, which
becomes the tarn. Some are permanent
features, while others appear seasonally.
Most tarns in Britain are found in the Lake
District, with almost 200 to see. Spend a
weekend Tarn Bagging* to explore some
of the more beautiful examples, such as
Tarn Hows, Easedale Tarn and Blea Tarn

Daylight hours: 8 per day.
Full moon: 25 January,
aka the Wolf Moon.
New moon: 11 January.
Planets to spot: Mercury’s
at its furthest apparent
distance from the sun,
making it a great time
to get the telescope out
to see if you can spot it.
– the most photographed tarn in the Lake
District. Stop between tarns for a warming
pick-me-up of soup straight from the flask
and be sure to say loudly as you finish up:
“Well, let’s get moving again. After all, one
good TARN deserves another!”

Local lore
PLOUGH MONDAY AND STRAW BEARS
Plough Monday has marked the start of the agricultural year since
the 15th century. On the first Monday after Epiphany, rather than
return to the fields, agricultural workers instead got dressed up and
dragged a plough from house to house, collecting money. (Anything
to avoid going back to work. Some things don’t change.) Among
them would be musicians, a boy dressed as an old woman – the Bessy
– and a man dressed as the Fool. And if you think that sounds like
a ramshackle bunch that you wouldn’t want banging on your door
in early January, you’ve not met the Straw Bear. The Saturday
before Plough Monday saw a man, covered head-to-toe in straw,
begging door-to-door through towns. If you live in Whittlesey, near
Peterborough, you might want to baton down the hatches on Straw
Bear Saturday, as the tradition is still practised there. It’s enough
to make you look forward to heading back to work after all…
26

*Tarn Bagging is the act of visiting as many Lake District tarns as possible. Ideally, you’d have a quick swim in each, but at this time of year
maybe bend the rules and simply dip your hand in (they’re notoriously chilly) or skim a stone across it instead.

Nature spot
MOUNTAIN HARES
A sight for sore eyes on snowy
uplands, mountain hares are
native to Scotland, unlike brown
hares, which were introduced
to Britain by the Romans.
What? In winter, they pop on
a white coat for camouflage
in the snow. They’re a little
smaller than brown hares
and have black ear tips.
Where? Most common in the
Scottish Highlands. In England
you’ll sometimes see them
in the Peaks and Upper
Pennines, and in Wales
in Snowdonia.
When? Easier to spot as
the snow melts, look for
them zig-zagging
wildly across
the landscape.

NOTES

THINGS TO PLAN AND DO

A DAY OUT:

Birdwatching

Banish all thoughts of twitchers and musty
mackintoshes; birdwatching is ‘having a moment’,
so an outing that blows away the cobwebs is just the
ticket. While the trees are still skeletal and the skies
big, it’s a great chance to spot birds in more detail.
Before you head out you’ll need a birdwatching kit.
Think binoculars, a notebook and pencil, and a field
guide – Collins Bird Guide is a good buy, or Birda is a
free app for your phone. A phone camera is useful to
snap any birds you want to identify later. Pack snacks
and drinks, too – you don’t want to have to go off in
search of a sarnie just as a wood warbler appears.
Finding your local RSPB reserve is a good place
to start as they may have their own hides and
knowledgeable staff, but you can plough your
own furrow location-wise if you prefer.
Don’t forget, 26–28 January is the RSPB’s Big
Garden Birdwatch (rspb.org.uk) so you’ll have an
opportunity to bring birdwatching home and use
your new skills from your kitchen window, too.

MINI ADVENTURE
Go Skiing

KITCHEN TABLE
PROJECT

WORDS: IONA BOWER. ILLUSTRATIONS: CHRISTINA CARPENTER; SHUTTERSTOCK

Make your own lip balm
Soothe sore winter lips with your
own lip balm, customised from
your kitchen. You’ll need: A glass
bowl, small jars for the balms,
beeswax pellets, shea or cocoa
butter, sweet almond or coconut
oil and your favourite essential oil:
• Put 3 tbsp of wax pellets, 2 tbsp
of body butter and 1 tbsp of the
oil in a glass bowl. Microwave for a
few seconds at a time until melted.
• Stir all the ingredients together.
• Add 10–20 drops of your
chosen essential oil and mix again
(orange, lemon and peppermint
add a little flavour, too).
• Carefully pour into containers,
pop lids on and leave to set.

JANUARY PODCAST
Stopping to notice
Do you delight in ordinary,
everyday magic? This
podcast celebrates those
moments you might
miss, using a special
way of recording, so
it’s as if you’re right
there in real life. A
beautifully crafted
brief escape from
the world to enjoy.
freshairproduction.
co.uk/podcast/
stopping-to-notice.

Embrace the January weather and bring a bit of
Chamonix to Chelmsford or Méribel to Melton
Mowbray by going skiing – but just for the day.
If you’re lucky enough to live near a real ski
resort (mostly in Scotland and Cumbria) you can
enjoy the real thing when it snows, but there are
many dry slopes and snowdomes across the UK,
from Manchester to Tamworth. Find a list on Ski
Club of Great Britain’s website, skiclub.co.uk.
Dry slopes tend to be a bit cheaper and more
plentiful, while the advantage of a
snowdome is that you’re skiing
on ‘real’ snow, albeit from snow
canons, so it’s more atmospheric
(and softer on your bottom when
you fall). You can hire equipment
at the venues – just dress for the
weather and wear long trousers
and sleeves to protect your limbs.
Beginners can book a lesson, or
if you’re confident, just go for it
and enjoy the cold air whistling
past your ears as you descend.
Then home for après ski (raclette
optional but very much advised).

PHOTOGRAPHY: ARTMARIE/GETTY IMAGES

A simple thing...
It’s hard not to feel a bit sad when the
Christmas decs come down. So why
not leave some of your favourites up,
for a while longer. Just let naysayers
know about the medieval custom of
keeping them up until Candlemas
(that’s 2 February). But do you really
need the excuse? After all, in the
midst of winter, it’s always cheering
to have nature’s boughs and berries
on show and to enjoy the magic of
lights twinkling out of the darkness.

1

MY ISLAND*

VANCOUVER ISLAND
WINTER STORMS, RAINFORESTS AND A WARM, RESILIENT COMMUNITY.
JORDYN GIESBRECHT WELCOMES US TO CANADA'S WILD WEST

2

3

MY ISLAND

*There’s no better way to get to
the heart of a place than through
the people who live there. This
month, we asked photographer
JORDYN GIESBRECHT (@jordyn.
giesbrecht) to take us on a tour of Vancouver
Island. You may feel inspired to visit, but for
now relax and enjoy some armchair travel.
How long have you lived on Vancouver Island?

I moved to Ucluelet on Vancouver Island just over six
years ago. I grew up in Calgary, Alberta, surrounded by
the Rocky Mountains, but the expansiveness of oceans
always called my name. I travelled to Australia after high
school and, after returning, made the move to Vancouver
to be close to the ocean. I soon outgrew the hustle of
the city, and sought a quiet refuge by the sea. Vancouver
Island on Canada’s Pacific coast was a natural answer
to that call of the wild.

4

What makes your island unique?

When people picture an island, the image is often of
clear aqua water and dazzling sun. Vancouver Island is
not, often, that place. It’s rugged and raw, with crashing
coastlines, moss-covered trails and dripping rainforests.
But there’s always beauty in the unexpected. To live
on Vancouver Island is to embrace nature in its rawest
form. It’s messy and chaotic but unapologetically so.
The people here adapt. We embrace the cosiness of
an open fire at a local café, and when the cafés shut
during the off-season, we host curry nights with our
neighbours. We live here expecting the power to go
off – sometimes for days at a time. It’s that resiliency
and care for this place and its wild ways that makes
it such a beautiful place to live.
5

What’s it like in winter?

Quite frankly, it’s dark. On a stormy night, you can
be surrounded by grey skies and water, and for the
unsuspecting visitor, it can be a challenge to embrace.
However, you soon see beauty in the storms crashing
against the lighthouse, in the drenched rainforest
sprouting mushrooms or the quiet, expansive
beaches where you won’t encounter another soul.

WORDS AND PHOTOGRAPHY: JORDYN GIESBRECHT

What is special about this time of year?

Ucluelet has some of the most surreal and beautiful
storm watching spots in all of Canada. It’s still a bit
of a hidden gem but if you decide to venture outside
in wild weather at this time of year and hit a trail,
you’ll see nature at work in all its wondrous ways.
What time of day do you most enjoy?

I love the first light in the morning, especially at home.
Through our window, we can see a glimpse of the winter
sunrise over the inlet and it really welcomes the day.
It’s easy to rise when the sun rises, which makes you feel
like you don’t waste a minute of the fleeting winter light. »

Opposite page: 1 The
call of the wild; views
over the Tofino inlet
have a natural draw.
2 The rugged Tofino
marshes. 3 Vancouver
Island appeals to those
with a love for the
great outdoors. 4 With
nature this majestic,
locals are reminded
that the trees were
inhabiting Vancouver
Island a long time
before they were.
5 The Surf Shack
at Cox Bay provides
a warming snack to
accompany a spot of
winter wave-watching.
6 Roy Henry Vickers’
gallery in Tofino

6

31

MY ISLAND

1

What’s the nature like?

You can see wildlife year-round. Walking our dog in the
morning, it’s not uncommon to see a grazing deer or an
eagle perched in a tree. It’s truly remarkable to live in
a place where you’re enveloped in nature’s inhabitants.
It reminds you that you’re a guest, and there were people,
wildlife and trees here long before you were. There’s an
immense sense of respect for nature amongst the locals,
and a true appreciation that we can call this place home.
Where’s your favourite outdoor space?

Long Beach, between Tofino and Ucluelet in the Pacific
Rim National Park. It’s an incredible wave to surf in,
an activity we embrace all year round, but it’s also just
a really stunning beach, great for gathering with friends
or taking long solo walks, depending on your mood.
What outdoor pursuits are popular?

Cold water surfing is popular in Tofino and Ucluelet.
It’s busy in summer, but the winter is when you get the
best waves. In rare winter storms, you can even surf in
the snow. Vancouver Island is also speckled with hiking
trails for all levels; walking in nature is a way of life here.
What are the colours of Vancouver Island?

In the winter, light becomes limited, but it’s remarkably
beautiful when it makes an appearance. The winter
sun softens and diffuses the light, making it a dream for
photographers, like me. For the most part, the colours
of the island are cool: deep blues and rainforest greens.
Tell us about the people who live there
2

1 Kennedy Lake,
near Ucluelet, is the
island’s largest lake
and well worth a road
trip. 2 Maybe the
cold has got to these
die-hard surfers, but
some will take their
boards out whatever
the weather! 3 But
luckily, Lisa at SoBo is
on hand with some
warming fayre

Calling Vancouver Island home means having some
resilience in your bones. Its inhabitants are rugged,
ready to face the elements and it’s something I’ve sought
to embody since living here. I hardly look at the weather
forecast anymore, you simply open the door and dress
according to the elements of the day. Vancouver Island
is actually one of the mildest places in Canada and our
summers are warm and sunny, but come rain or shine
people will be out and about living daily island life.
I admire my neighbours gardening in the rain, my son
splashing in every puddle on the way to daycare or the
sopping wet floors of the local grocery store in a storm.
It’s not that we face storms fearlessly, it’s that we accept
the wildness of nature and adjust to its temperament.
What’s the food like on the island?

As with most islands, there’s plenty of seafood. Spot
prawns, fish and chips, mussels and clams are all
specialities and restaurants feature foraged ingredients
such as mushrooms, kelp and berries. In the winter, my
friends and I head out to dig the beaches for fresh clams
and mussels followed by a clambake over an open fire.
Where’s your favourite beach or place to swim?
3

32

For a swim, Little Beach in Ucluelet. It’s a great little
bay that is relatively sheltered (for our standards) so the

MY ISLAND
4

water warms up quite a bit in the summer. In the winter,
it’s also great for a cold dip; the lower temperatures keep
the water crystal clear so you can see the kelp beds and
sea-life that are seldom seen in the summertime.
Tell us about your favourite cultural experiences

We carry a deep respect for the people who have called
this land home long before us, the people of the territory
of
(Ucluelet) First Nation, Hesquiaht,
Ahousaht, Tla-o-qui-aht, Toquaht and Tseshaht.
A visit to Vancouver Island is not complete without
experiencing their deeply rooted cultural traditions.
Some of my favourite places to learn more about the land
I live on include Tsimshian artist Roy Henry Vickers’
gallery in Tofino, built to represent a northwest coast
longhouse, or Naas Foods, an indigenous-owned kelp
business that’s starting kelp farm tours in spring of 2024.
5

Which of the tourist attractions do locals also like?

One of the most spectacular things that you can do here
is a whale watching tour; choose one that keeps a
respectful distance. Another special way to see marine
life up close is to book a kayaking tour. While the wildlife
isn’t guaranteed, the trip is always worth the paddle.
What’s been your most interesting discovery?

Vancouver Island North, which has similar communities
to Ucluelet, such as Port Hardy, Port Alice and Port
McNeill. It’s surrounded by some of the best wildlife
watching and hiking on the island.
What do you miss most if you’ve been away?

The community. I have never lived anywhere that
I felt more at home, and more seen. Waves from our
neighbours, genuine curiosity in the queue at the
grocery shop or a catch-up with a friend over a trail
walk with our dogs: no place feels more like home.
Where would you recommend somebody to stay?

The Shoreline, which is run by an incredible female-led
team out of Tofino and features adorable A-frame cabins.
Or, in Vancouver Island North, the indigenous-owned
Kwa’lilas Hotel in Port Hardy.
Where would you live if you couldn’t live here?

It’s the community we’ve created that keeps me here.
Our friends and circle of neighbours is so tightly woven,
it’s a really beautiful thing to experience. If I couldn’t live
on Vancouver Island, I’d love to experience a similarly
small coastal town somewhere in Ireland. So apparently,

6

4 The calm before
the storm. The
Island’s unpredictable
weather can make for
some bracing vistas.
5 Although milder
than much of Canada,
reading between
the lines, we think
packing a reliable
raincoat is advisable.
6 Having a whale
of a time! Getting out
on the water to spot
these magnificent
mammals is a must

“Vancouver Island’s speckled with
hiking trails for all levels; walking
in nature is a way of life here”
33

1

MY ISLAND

SN
FOR AP IT
L AT
ER

1 Pick up local gifts and
refill your beauty and
cleaning products at The
Den. 2 Nothing ‘beets’
the Goldstream Farmers’
Market. 3 Pluvio focuses
on foraged and seasonal
produce, with plenty
of wine to accompany it.
4 Top views of Tofino

2

COULD-DO
VANCOUVER ISLAND
Jordyn’s favourite places on the island
FAVOURITE SHOPS
Foraged, Ucluelet
My own vintage shop specialising in home
goods and clothing for all genders. It’s also a
community space where people can gather with
friends over tea. foragedshop.com
The Den, Ucluelet
Great for gifts, it’s a female-owned refillery
where I fill all my cleaning and beauty products.
My friend Diane knits beautiful toques (beanie
hats), which are sold here. thedenucluelet.com
Merge Goods, Tofino
A cute little shop that carries its own line of
clothing and self-care products. shopmerge.ca

FAVOURITE RESTAURANT
Pluvio Restaurant & Rooms, Ucluelet
Run by Warren and Lily, who focus on foraged
ingredients and seasonal dishes. pluvio.ca

FAVOURITE CAFÉ
3

Yayu Cafe, Ucluelet
I can’t go a week without their warming vegan
mac and cheese. They also make delicious
matchas, smoothies and coffee. yayucafe.com

BEST LOCAL BREWERY
Ucluelet Brewing Company, Ucluelet
This local staple, based in an old church, is
a great meeting spot for the community. They
host local music nights, too. uclueletbrewing.ca

FAVOURITE MARKET
Goldstream Farmers’ Market, Langford
Located just outside Victoria and packed with
local artisans that call this area of Vancouver
Island home. goldstreamstationmarket.ca

FAVOURITE HOTEL
The Shoreline, Tofino
We love the cosy atmosphere and their outdoor
hot-tub and sauna. theshorelinetofino.com

WAY TO SPEND AN HOUR
Surfing and enjoying the beauty of the ocean
– even if there are no waves and I’m just sitting
on my board, taking in the magic of it all.

BEST VIEW
There’s a hike in Tofino just off Cox Bay that
boasts a panoramic view of Tofino and its
surrounding islands. There’s no place quite like it.
4

34

MORE THAN JUST
A COUGH DROP
Made in Switzerland with 13 Swiss Alpine herbs.

Only natural
colours

With Fair Trade
Honey

GOOD THINGS TO EAT

That’s my jam
APPROVED BY PADDINGTON, THESE ARE MARMALADE
RECIPES NOT TO KEEP UNDER YOUR HAT
Recipes: PHILIPPA VINE Photography: ANNA RUBINGH

Not just the preserve
of breakfast, marmalade
can add a zesty hit to
a whole host of dishes.
Orange-ya glad we’re
here for the inspo!

36

Simple orange cake
with marmalade &
blood oranges
Keep it simple – and citrussy – with a
cake that delights thanks to a touch
of cocoa and lashings of cream.
Makes 1 cake
5 large eggs
150g caster sugar
65g butter, melted
100g plain flour
50g cocoa powder
FOR THE FILLING:
2 tbsp marmalade
300ml double cream
6 blood oranges, peeled and sliced

1 Preheat the oven to 180C/Fan 160C/
Gas 4. Meanwhile, line the base of
three 20cm cake tins with baking
paper and lightly butter the sides.
2 Whisk the eggs and sugar together
until pale and foamy (it’ll take a few
minutes to achieve this). Fold in the
melted butter using a large metal
spoon. Sieve in the flour and cocoa
powder, then fold carefully into the
mixture, taking care not to beat out
any of the air.
3 Divide the batter into the prepared
tins and bake for about 15 mins, or
until the mixture is slightly shrinking
away from the sides.

4 Allow to cool then turn out onto a
wire rack until completely cold. Peel
off the lining paper and place one
of the sponges on a plate.
5 Spread with a thin layer of
marmalade. Whip the cream until it’s
just holding its shape, then spread a
layer of the cream over the second
cake and place (cream side down)
on top of the marmalade. Spread a
little more marmalade and cream and
place the final sponge on top. Finish
with a thin layer of cream on top and
decorate with the blood orange slices.
Cook’s note: This cake can be gluten
free by using plain gluten-free flour. »

Roast chicken thighs
with marmalade &
sweet potato
A one-pot wonder – you’ll want to
get out for a bracing walk, just so
you can return to this winter warmer.
Serves 4
2 garlic cloves, crushed
Small knob of ginger, grated
1 tbsp honey or dark sugar
2 tbsp soy sauce

2 tbsp olive oil
2 red onions, peeled and finely sliced
2 sweet potatoes, peeled and cut
into wedges
4 large chicken thighs, skin on and
bone in
2 tbsp marmalade
3 star anise (optional)
1 red chilli, halved, deseeded and
finely chopped (optional)
1 Preheat the oven to 200C/Fan
180C/Gas 6.
2 Mix the garlic, ginger, honey, soy
sauce and olive oil in a small bowl.

3 Add the onions and sweet potatoes
to a large roasting tray and lay the
chicken thighs on top.
4 Score the skin of each chicken
thigh, season with salt and pepper
and pour over the soy sauce marinade
before spooning a little marmalade
on top of each thigh.
5 Sprinkle the star anise and red
chilli around the tray, if using, and
add 2 tablespoons of water. Roast for
45 mins, or until the chicken is cooked
through and the skin is golden. Add
a splash of water if the sauce is on the
dry side. Check seasoning and serve.

GOOD THINGS TO EAT

The Dundee story
Dundee is the home of the marmalade
that we know and love today, with a rich
history dating back to the 18th century.
While marmalade was already made in
Spain and Portugal, it was more solid.
However, it was Janet Keiller – who,
along with her son James, ran a small
confectionery shop in Seagate, Dundee,

in the 1760s – that updated the recipe,
adding peel and making it looser after
James bought seville oranges from
a Spanish ship sheltering from a storm.
It was only when Janet’s grandson,
Alexander, inherited the business that
they opened a marmalade factory in
the mid 1800s, producing it commercially
in recognisable white ceramic pots. »

Marmalade
This old family recipe has a lower
sugar content, so while it takes
longer to set, it’ll be super citrussy,
just like the classic Dundee version.
Makes 12 jars
2kg seville oranges
2 ltr water
2kg preserving sugar
Juice of 2 lemons
1 Put the whole oranges in a large
preserving pan and cover with the
water. If necessary, weigh the oranges
down with a plate to keep them under
water. Bring to the boil, cover. Heat the
oven to 140C/Fan 120C/Gas 1 and
place the pan in the oven overnight.
2 When ready, lift the fruit into
a colander over a deep plate to
drain. Retain the liquid in the pan.
3 Allow the oranges to cool, then cut
in half and scoop out the pips and
flesh and put into a small pan. Cut up
the rind and add to a mixing bowl.
4 Pour 150ml of the cooking liquid
into the pan with the flesh and pips
and boil for 10 mins.
5 Sieve into the bowl with the peel,
then transfer the juice and peel to the
preserving pan, along with the sugar
and lemon juice. Stir over a low heat
until all the sugar has dissolved, then
bring to the boil. Boil rapidly, stirring
constantly, until setting point* is
reached (this takes about 15-20 mins).
Cool in the pan for 10 mins, then pot
in sterilised jars, seal, and label.
*To check when setting point has been reached, drop a little of the marmalade onto the back of a plate that’s been chilled in the freezer.
Return to the freezer for 1 min then push the marmalade with your finger – if it wrinkles, then setting point has been achieved.

39

Marmalade bread &
butter pudding
Marmalade sandwiches are great,
but they’re even better when baked
with egg, cream and sugar.
Serves 4
3 large eggs
110g sugar
300ml milk
300ml double cream
8 slices of sourdough bread or
white bread, crusts removed
Butter, softened, for spreading
Seville orange marmalade
1 Preheat the oven to 170C/Fan 150C/
Gas 3 and butter a 1.2 ltr baking dish.
2 Whisk the eggs and sugar together
in a bowl. Meanwhile, add the milk
and cream to a saucepan and gently
bring to a simmer. Once simmering,
remove from the heat and pour over
the beaten eggs, whisking as you
go to make a smooth custard.
3 Spread each slice of bread with
butter and a generous layer of
marmalade before sandwiching
together with another slice of bread.
Cut your four sandwich rounds into
triangles and arrange in the dish. Pour
over the custard and leave for 20 mins.
4 Place the dish in a deep-sided
roasting tray and pour in hot water
to come halfway up the sides of
the baking dish. Bake for 45 mins,
or until the pudding is just firm and
starting to colour. Serve with cream.

40

GOOD THINGS TO EAT

Coconut
marmalade slices
Slice up to have a citrus-coconut
piece to hand – works for any time,
any place, anywhere.
Makes around 20 slices
200g plain flour
25g icing sugar
50g polenta or cornflour
150g butter, cold and diced
1 egg
FOR THE TOPPING:
200g caster sugar
75g ground almonds
110g desiccated coconut

200g butter, softened
Zest of 1 Seville orange
125g polenta or cornflour
2 large eggs
2 heaped tbsp marmalade
1 Make the pastry by putting the flour,
icing sugar and polenta (or cornflour)
into a large bowl or food processor.
2 Add the diced butter and either rub
it in with your fingertips or, if using a
food processor, pulse until the mixture
resembles fine breadcrumbs. Add the
egg and mix again until the mixture
comes together to form a dough.
3 Preheat the oven to 200C/Fan
180C/Gas 6 and grease and line
the base and sides of a 23cm x 33cm
tin with greaseproof paper.

4 Roll out the pastry and carefully line
the tin (if it breaks, just patch it back
together with your fingers). Prick all
over and bake blind for about 15 mins.
Leave to cool while you make the
topping. Meanwhile, reduce the oven
temperature to 170C/Fan 150C/Gas 3.
5 For the topping, beat together the
sugar, almonds, coconut, butter, zest
and polenta (or cornflour), then beat
in the eggs.
6 Spread a thin layer of marmalade
over the pastry base and spoon the
topping carefully over the top. Bake
for 30 mins, or until golden brown
and set. If the bake starts to brown
too much during cooking, cover
loosely with foil halfway through.
Once cool, slice into wedges.

41

WISDOM

“Talk to everyone because
whoever you speak to
teaches you something and,
in turn, they learn from you”
Whether it’s objects, the people around us, or even ourselves, The
Repair Shop’s Jay Blades believes that we find true value when we
learn to work with what we have
Interview: KAREN DUNN

witch on BBC1’s The Repair Shop, and each
episode follows a comforting, well-worn path.
Cherished objects are brought back to life
through the meticulous patience, care and
skill of craftspeople, reflecting the love and
value bestowed on them by their owners. Host
and furniture restorer Jay Blades is an invaluable
part of The Repair Shop shed’s unique atmosphere,
but his personal path that brought him here has
been anything but smooth.
However, fiercely proud of his roots, Jay feels the
struggles he faced growing up – from experiencing
racism to being written off by teachers due to his
undiagnosed dyslexia, falling in with the wrong crowd
to finding himself homeless – have all made him the
man he is today. “Growing up being Black in Hackney
there were times where people cross the road, hold
on to their handbag tighter, all that kind of stuff.”
Now, instantly recognisable, with his glasses and
flat cap, “people walk over to get a selfie because
they’ve seen me on TV,” he smiles.
“Life is all about realising there are difficult
things you can’t avoid, but the reality is, they’re going
to make you better, stronger. It’s going to give you
more character and make you into the person that
you’re supposed to be. You just don’t know it yet.”
TA L K I N G S H O P
After dropping out of education and several scrapes
with the law, it was volunteering that turned Jay’s
life around. At 19 he got a job at Cyrenians Homeless
42

Behind every great
man… is a gramophone
– and, as Jay
believes, the hurdles
that they’ve had to
overcome to get here

Hostel in Oxford, working with young delinquents and
people with mental health issues. It was a revelation
to Jay and he thinks more people should do the same.
“Volunteering puts your life into perspective. I think
everybody should do it,” he insists. “It gave me my
purpose. I realised I was good at speaking to all types
of people, getting them to open up and making them
feel comfortable. I could help and direct them.”
Despite being told by teachers at school that he
“wouldn’t amount to anything,” Jay still had a passion
for learning and, at 31, enrolled at Buckinghamshire
New University to study criminology. It was only then
that he was diagnosed with dyslexia and a reading
age of 11. However, university left him better able
to organise his thoughts and communicate them.
It was also at uni that he met his now ex-wife Jade.
Together, they started two charities. At the first, Street
Dreams, he found himself learning to decorate a desk
alongside disadvantaged teenagers. That’s where he

caught the bug for furniture restoration, and a second
charity followed – Out Of The Dark – to train teens in
crafts. His life was good, he was building a community
and was passing on skills. However, as it had done
before, things changed quickly. The charity lost
funding, his marriage broke down, and so did he.
“I never used to ask for help. I was a community
worker that was supporting families, dads, children,
teenagers, the whole shebang, so I didn’t feel like
I could ask those people for help,” explains Jay.
As his life crumbled, he found himself homeless
and contemplating suicide, but was taken in by Thelma
and Cass, the parents of a friend, who cared for him
and welcomed him into the Caribbean community
in Wolverhampton. Thelma and Cass changed his life
and he realised that he had to let people in, in order
to help. “That taught me that you should reach out no
matter what and speak to people. I had put the onus on
being this tough guy. The reality is I’m not tough. I’m

vulnerable. Showing people your weaknesses allows
others to show their strength in supporting you.”
He’s used the metaphor of having the skills to fix
a piece of furniture with those required to rebuild
someone who’s broken. And it was around this time
that TV came calling. A short film made about Out
Of The Dark had caught the eye of producers, and
they approached Jay. He started as The Repair Shop’s
resident upholsterer before he was made its host.
The show is described as a ‘heart-warming antidote to
throwaway culture’, and it’s here where Jay’s wisdom
really shines: not only in his furniture knowledge but
also his compassion for people. “Coming into the TV
world in my 40s was a good thing. I’m able to speak
to people and get the best out of them, because I’ve
lived a life,” he says. “I can talk to anyone, even
a King. Prince Charles’s visit to The Repair Shop
was a lot of fun and the funny thing is that he and
I, odd couple that we are, might just keep in touch.” »
43

WISDOM

PUTTING IT ALL
TOGETHER
Jay’s lessons for life
One of my favourite sayings
is, “I’m not what I’ve done,
I’m what I’ve overcome.”
Clockwise from top:
Can we fix it? When it
comes to the Repair
Shop team the answer
is surely yes they can;
Jay has got your
(chair) back, not only
with his restoration
skills but also by
sharing his know-how

44

Open up to as many different
experiences as possible. Put
yourself in situations where
you don’t know what’s going to
happen because that’s how you
learn about life and yourself.
If you want something you’ve
never had, you will have to do
something you’ve never done.

When the going gets tough,
when we’re feeling utterly down
and discouraged, we need to
remember to accept what is,
let go of what was and have
faith in the road ahead.

to help us with, whether that’s getting an accountant
or the mechanic who fixes your car. To do anything
in life you need a trusted team.”
Having spent most of his adult life as a teacher and
a mentor, Jay insists this is something everyone can
do if they just open themselves up to others. “Talk to
everyone because everybody you speak to teaches you
something and, in turn, you teach them,” he says. “I’ve
never believed in preaching to the converted. It makes
a lot more sense to reach out to people who don’t agree
with you. It’s the only way to try to change their mind
– or to give them a chance to try to change yours.”
Jay’s book, Life Lessons: Wisdom And Wit From Life’s
Ups And Downs (Bluebird), is out now.

PHOTOGRAPHY: COURTESY OF RICOCHET/THE REPAIR SHOP; JAY & CO

F U R T H E R E D U C AT I O N
TV has undoubtedly opened doors for him, but Jay
believes strongly that if you’re provided a platform,
you need to use it to do good. In 2015, he founded his
“baby” Jay & Co, a furniture restoration company with
the aims of both bringing “damaged beautiful vintage
furniture back to life and to train disadvantaged young
people in a fascinating trade.” Likewise, as Chancellor
at his old university, he was able to ask them to
reinstate the furniture and restoration course, while
as an ambassador for The Princes’ Foundation, he
helps inspire people to both teach and learn crafts.
Jay knows first-hand how valuable these skills are,
both for our society more widely and in the lives of
the people his work touches – he’s a strong believer
in the self-esteem that comes from being able to fix
or make something – and to be able to stand back and
take pride in what you’ve achieved. In fact, he was
awarded an MBE in 2022 in recognition of his work
promoting heritage craft and restoration in the UK.
Jay admits he couldn’t cope with his incredible
workload if it wasn’t for the team that he’s built around
him and his wife, Lisa. “As I’ve got busier, I’ve had to
take more of a back seat at Jay & Co and delegate more.
That’s fine because I’ve got a great team,” he says.
“I know my strengths and my weaknesses. We
all have jobs that it would be better to get someone

Anything you achieve in
the race of life can feel a lot
sweeter if you began that race
way behind the starting line.

Allow your

When you’re ready to sew, it’s easy to get started!
Sew all types of projects with the great selection
of stitches, choose either the 30 or 60 stitch version.
Fully computerised with stitches and settings at the touch
of a button. These models have lots of easy to use features
which make sewing a pleasure and with aluminium die cast
bodies you can be assured of Janome’s robust build quality.
Perfect for beginners and more experienced sewists,
with an auto needle threader, smooth feeding of fabric,
lock stitch to finish off all your ends and hard covers
for storage…make the right choice first time!

230DC

360DC

The world’s leading sewing machine manufacturer

janome.co.uk

LOOKING BACK

MOUNTAINS TO CLIMB
BATTLING LONG SKIRTS, NOT TO MENTION GREAT HEIGHTS
OF PREJUDICE, WOMEN HAVE ALWAYS HEADED TO THE
BIGGEST OF HILLS FOR THEIR ENJOYMENT. WE FOLLOW
THEIR DIFFICULT JOURNEY OVER THE PEAKS

Words: RACHEL HEWITT

46

Women have always been
abundant in the mountains

n 1865, according to Charles Dickens no less,
mountains were a Man’s World, solely populated
by the Alpine Club’s all-male members, ‘scientific
men’ and ‘human donkeys’ (male porters and
guides). It was a view that prevailed for well over
a century. In 1969, when American climber Arlene
Blum applied to join an expedition in Afghanistan,
its male organisers rejected her on the basis that a
woman’s presence was ‘unpleasant’ amid ‘the easy
masculine companionship which is so vital a part of
the joy of an expedition.’ (The following year, Blum
was permitted to join a high-altitude expedition as
far as base camp, if she’d ‘help with the cooking’.)
Though women have been deliberately excluded
from much of the history of mountaineering, we
mustn’t be fooled into believing that, as one scholar
mistakenly puts it, ‘few women… were climbing’
mountains in the past. Women have always been
abundant in the mountains.
Making great strides:
Lucy Smith and
Pauline Ranken on
Edinburgh’s Salisbury
Crags and (above)
Lizzie Le Blond at
Piz Morteratsch,
Switzerland – and all
done wearing skirts

DELICIOUS FREEDOM
Across Western Europe and North America, the idea
that mountaineering might be enjoyable – rather
than hard but necessary labour – began around the
turn of the 19th century. By the 1850s, tourist resorts
had been set-up in mountain villages. In the brief

‘Golden Age of Alpinism’ that followed, lasting until
the mid-1860s, relatively small numbers of men and
women enjoyed improved access to the mountains,
without having to endure hordes of other tourists.
In this period, British climbers such as Leslie
Stephen (father of Virginia Woolf) and Lucy Walker
made pioneering first ascents of peaks previously
thought ‘inaccessible’, including (in Walker’s case)
Switzerland’s Balmhorn.
Then, a mass-market mountain tourist industry
exploded. Thomas Cook started operating tours to
Switzerland and Karl Baedeker published frequently
updated guidebooks. Thousands of women started
mountaineering. Some had been deterred previously
by men’s tendency to ‘magnify all dangers’ (as travel
writer Eliza Cole put it in 1859). But joining an
organised holiday to a well-researched destination
helped female travellers – like Jemima Morrell, who
took Cook’s tour – to see that many such dangers
were ‘imaginary’.
This era sparked some remarkable careers. Chief
among them was Anglo-Irish society wife Elizabeth
Burnaby (later known as Lizzie Le Blond), who
fled to the Alps in 1881, escaping a life of stifling
domesticity and mental ill-health. Within a decade
she became world-famous for first winter ascents,
first female ascents, and first overall ascents of
some of the Alps’ most challenging peaks. Lizzie
coupled her climbing prowess to a career as a
writer. She photographed and filmed, and became
a professional speaker, as well as being co-founder
and first president of the Ladies’ Alpine Club.
Women wrote about the ‘delicious freedom’ they
enjoyed as they ‘scrambled and leaped and laughed
and raced’ outdoors, as poet Frances Havergal put it
in 1881. In contrast to the gender codes constricting
their usual lives, they could behave like ‘downright
boys.’ At a time of typically limited female education,
19th-century female travellers could learn about
topography, geopolitical history, archaeology and
more. Mountaineering could provide economic
opportunities, too, as Marie Paradis discovered after
1809, when she used her status as first woman to
ascend Mont Blanc to publicise her tea stall at the
mountain’s foot. And it could offer a taste of fame.
When sisters Jane and Mary Parminter, plus a female
cousin and friend, climbed Mont Buet in 1786, the
mountain became widely known as Parminter Peak.
A N E A S Y DAY F O R A L A DY
The first female mountaineers found that men were
often respectful of their achievements. But as the »
47

disciplining and toughening-up white middle- and
upper-class men. Robert Baden-Powell thought
of the Boy Scouts’ raison d’être as rescuing boys
from weakness and ‘girlitis’. Around the turn of
the 20th century, there was a sea change in almost
every active pursuit, in which men banned women
from sport. When the first modern Olympic Games
took place in 1896, the founder Pierre de Coubertin
described its purpose as the “exaltation of male
athleticism.” Women being energetic in their own
right was “against the laws of nature,” he claimed.
Such views infected the mountaineering world.
The Swiss Alpine Club had welcomed female
members since 1863: in 1907 it kicked them out.

numbers of women in the mountains grew, and they
broke more records, these attitudes changed.
Mountains were valued as spaces for reinforcing
traditional masculinity. Dickens wrote about how,
in the wilderness, a man could prove ‘to himself that
he is neither effete nor effeminate.’ In the mountains,
middle- and upper-class men could work with their
hands and be alone – unlike in their domestic lives
which, they complained, were dominated by women.
Such men saw the influx of tourists into ‘their’
territory after 1863 as a ‘vulgarisation’, and Leslie
Stephen observed that once ‘inaccessible’ peaks,
where men tested their macho mettle, were declining
into ‘an easy day for a lady.’
In the late 19th century, such anxieties intensified.
Sport and outdoor activities were invested with
48

T H E M O U N TA I N S A R E F O R A L L
As the clubs recorded and disseminated members’
achievements, they created a version of
mountaineering history as male-dominated as the
clubs themselves. After the 1880s, male authors
increasingly refused to name female climbers in the
Alpine Journal, anonymising them as simply ‘English
ladies’. The achievements of female pioneers such as
Lizzie Le Blond faded to obscurity, to the extent that,
when Japanese mountaineer Junko Tabei sought
advice from Kyūya Fukada in the late 1960s, the male
mentor mused “Hmm… Are there any mountains
that women can climb by themselves?” (In 1975,
Tabei became the first woman to summit Everest.)
For women facing additional prejudices – on the
basis of class, race, disability, sexuality and/or age
– exclusion can be even more forceful. Historically,
African-American women’s freedoms outdoors
have been particularly restricted. Sophia Danenberg
– in 2006, the first Black woman to summit Everest
– speaks about the “lack of role models for people
of colour in the climbing community.”
With a lack of equal access to active pursuits,

PHOTOGRAPHY: ALPINE CLUB PHOTO LIBRARY, LONDON; GETTY IMAGES; KULTUR ARCHIV; LADIES SCOTTISH CLIMBING CLUB

The achievements of pioneers such
as Lizzie Le Blond faded to obscurity

LOOKING BACK

From Ben Nevis (far
left) to Oregon (left),
the hills are alive with
women climbers. Here,
Annie Smith Peck
wears more practical
attire than the skirts
on show on Mont Blanc
in about 1886 (below)

SKIRTING
RESPECTABILITY:
THE DRESS OF
A 19TH-CENTURY
WOMAN CLIMBER
As Ginger Rogers did everything that Fred
Astaire did, but “backwards and in high heels”,
Lizzie Le Blond out-climbed most men, while
in a woollen skirt. In the 19th century, women
climbers had to tread a difficult line between
respectability and practicality. Floor-length
skirts had benefits, such as letting legs be
stretched widely and pockets big enough
to house small tents. They could be used
as blankets (or even as a sledge, as one
mountaineer found), and women could
urinate discreetly within their folds. However,
they also became horribly heavy (and smelly)
in the rain, snagged on branches and brought
rocks raining down on lower companions.
Ingenious adaptations were made to reduce
these difficulties. Eliza Cole stitched rings
around her hems, allowing her skirt to be
pulled up like a roman blind. Skirts were
created that could be converted, by means
of a line of buttons, into wide-legged trousers.
But many women gave up on them and faced
the inevitable censure. Some climbers wore
skirts in populated areas, then left them under
a rock, and continued up the mountain in
knickerbockers. Meanwhile, others wore
short skirts or tunics over puttees or leggings.

In Her Nature: How Women Break Boundaries
In The Great Outdoors by Rachel Hewitt
(Chatto & Windus) is out now.

women and girls lose so much: confidence, health,
a sense of strength and belonging in our own bodies
and in the world at large. But the obscurity of female
mountaineering role models today is not because,
historically, women didn’t climb: it is because
their stories have been deliberately eclipsed. In
rediscovering their achievements, it helps assure us
today that – as Irish mountaineer Frederica Plunket
put it in 1875 – “the mountains have room for all.”
49

COMPETITION

W IN A
ND
WEEKE
AWAY

Win a weekend getaway in
Whitstable, worth up to £785
YOU AND UP TO THREE GUESTS COULD EXPLORE THE DELIGHTS OF
THIS CHARMING TOWN, COURTESY OF WHITSTABLE HOLIDAY HOMES

W

ith the winter weather
hitting home, and a new
year stretching before us,
few things can be more
uplifting than planning your next seaside
getaway. If you’re searching for inspiration,
Whitstable, on the north Kent coast,
makes an excellent spot for a blissful break.
Experience the serenity of this picturesque
town as you take leisurely strolls along the
beach, marvel at the candy-coloured beach
huts and discover its unique charms.
Whether you’re after a romantic retreat
or a fun adventure with the family,
Whitstable Holiday Homes can help you
find accommodation to suit. Take Sunset
Cottage, for example – a beautiful property
located on Whitstable’s West Beach. Its
first-floor balcony provides guests with
breathtaking sunsets, while the tasteful
decor creates a cosy atmosphere. Guests can

50

make the most of one king-size double
room and one twin room, a living room,
kitchen, family bathroom, downstairs
cloakroom and courtyard garden. Not
only does the cottage have direct beach
access, it’s also just a short stroll from
Whitstable’s high street and harbour.
With 28 stunning properties to
pick from, you’ll be spoilt for choice,
with options ranging from beachfront
breaks to dog-friendly stays. Whitstable
Holiday Homes’ owner Gail even offers
personalised recommendations on the
best places to visit, eat and drink. So
whatever kind of getaway floats your
boat, you’ll know you’re in good hands.
For more information on Sunset Cottage,
visit whitstableholidayhomes.co.uk/
sunset-cottage. You can also follow
Whitstable Holiday Homes on
Instagram: @whitstableholidayhomes.

HOW TO ENTER

For your chance to win a two-night
weekend stay (for up to four people
and one dog) at Sunset Cottage,
enter at: thesimplethings.com/
blog/whitstable2024 by the
closing date of 14 February 2024.

TERMS AND CONDITIONS: Competition closes
at 11.59pm on 14 February 2024. One winner
selected at random from all correct entries.
Prize must be taken before 24 October 2024
and excludes school or Bank Holidays. Subject
to availability. The winner is responsible for
transport to and from Sunset Cottage. The winner
cannot transfer the prize or swap for cash. The
winner may be required to participate in publicity.
Details of our full T&Cs are on p125 and online at:
icebergpress.co.uk/comprules.

IDEAS

THE

comfort

ZONE

WHEN THE WORLD OUTSIDE FEELS A BIT BLEAK, WHAT
CAN BE BETTER THAN ESCAPING INTO A GOOD BOOK?
ENJOY A SUNNY SOJOURN, CRACK A FIENDISH
MYSTERY OR SINK BACK INTO A CHILDHOOD FAVOURITE
– ALL WITHOUT HAVING TO LEAVE YOUR ARMCHAIR
Words and photography: MIRANDA MILLS

PERIOD DRAMA
A Lady’s Guide To Scandal
by Sophie Irwin (HarperCollins)
A light-hearted read for fans of the
Bridgerton series. Sophie Irwin’s Regency
romance also gives a nod to Jane Austen’s
Persuasion with a Bath setting and its
plot of former lovers thrown together
after years apart.
Young widow Eliza, the Countess
of Somerset, has inherited a fortune,
under one condition: that no scandal is
associated with her name. Notoriously
docile, no one expects Eliza to attract
gossip, but a move to Bath opens her eyes
to a new way of life. Yearning to become
a professional painter, Eliza’s future is
thrown into jeopardy when she realises
she’s in love with two very different men:

CHILDHOOD FAVOURITES
Anne Of Green Gables by L. M.
Montgomery (Virago Modern Classics)
When the chill and drizzle of January
are really starting to kick in and you're
in need of a little pick-me-up, it’s time
to self-prescribe some quality time
with a soft quilt, a hot water bottle and
a favourite childhood classic. It’s hard to
find a book that offers more life-affirming
joy than Anne Of Green Gables. As a lonely,
unwanted orphan, Anne Shirley’s world
is transformed when she’s accidentally
adopted into the home of an elderly
brother and sister living on Canada’s
Prince Edward Island.
Anne’s loving, plucky character captures
the hearts of her new family and friends
– as well as those of generations of readers
since the novel was first published in
1908 – and L. M. Montgomery’s lyrical
descriptions of the beauty of PEI are just
as memorable as Anne’s Shirley’s bright
red hair. This strong sense of place and
fully rounded, unforgettable characters
(you’re not alone in recalling Matthew’s
Christmas gift to Anne whenever you see
a dress with puffed sleeves…) make Anne
Of Green Gables a timeless story, and
an enduring source of comfort and joy.
ALSO TRY: A Sky Painted Gold by
Laura Wood (Scholastic). Set in Cornwall
in 1929, this coming-of-age story is filled
with Gatsby-esque parties, the tang of sea
salt in the air and the heady excitement
of a young girl's first love.

one, a flame from her youth and the
other a poet with a scandalous reputation.
With a focus on female friendship and
agency, this novel offers plenty of amusing
dialogue and ballroom-antics for the
modern reader, coupled with a love story
that provides an uplifting antidote to any
winter blues.
ALSO TRY: Venetia by Georgette Heyer
(Arrow). A witty love story, featuring a
beautiful heroine with a strong sense of
humour and a particularly dashing hero,
from the doyenne of Regency romance.

“AN UPLIFTING
ANTIDOTE TO ANY
WINTER BLUES”

IDEAS

A TOUCH OF SUNSHINE
The Enchanted April by Elizabeth
von Arnim (Virago Modern Classics)
Escape to sun-soaked Italy through
the pages of this endearing novel that
brims with friendship, humour and
a touch of magic. One miserably wet,
winter’s day, Lotty Wilkins spots a
newspaper advertisement addressed
to ‘Those who appreciate wisteria and
sunshine.’ Whose attention wouldn’t
be caught by such a phrase, especially
at the end of a bleak British winter?
Lotty reads on, and discovers that a small
Italian castle is available to rent in April.
Unable to forget the picture of herself
in the Mediterranean sunshine, Lotty
determines somehow to rent the castle.
Three other women agree to split the cost,
and their holiday proves transformative
to each of their lives. Marriages are
strengthened, love and friendship are
found and loneliness banished. Reading
The Enchanted April, with the scent of
wisteria hovering bewitchingly in the air,
offers an experience of armchair travel
that comes second only to the real thing.
ALSO TRY: My Family And Other
Animals by Gerald Durrell (Puffin).
This autobiographical book is a hilarious
account of Durrell’s childhood spent
in the stunning environs of Corfu. »

COSY CRIME
4:50 From Paddington
by Agatha Christie (HarperCollins)
Crime wouldn’t necessarily be your
immediate go-to for a comfort read.
But, in their neat solutions to difficult
problems, and where a sense of order
is reached in a chaotic world, they offer
an escape from the messy reality of life.
For a gentle whodunit that still offers
a satisfying brain tease, Agatha Christie
is an excellent choice. The ‘Miss Marple’
mysteries, featuring Christie’s famous
sleuth, have a particularly cosy feel, and
4:50 From Paddington is one of the best.
A friend of Miss Marple’s arrives for
a visit in a terrible state: on her train from
Paddington, she witnessed a woman being
strangled in a passing train (this may not
sound that comforting, but keep reading!).

As no corpse is discovered, the police
refuse to investigate, but Miss Marple
believes that a crime has been committed.
Feeling her age, she asks for help from the
young, intelligent Lucy Eyelesbarrow, who
wrangles a job as housekeeper at a large
country house in the area. Through their
alliance, Miss Marple and Lucy uncover
surprising secrets, and arrive at the truth
of what happened on that fateful train
journey in a particularly satisfying ending.
ALSO TRY: The Unexpected Inheritance
Of Inspector Chopra by Vaseem Khan
(Mulholland Books). In this Mumbaibased mystery, Inspector Chopra’s
retirement is complicated by the arrival
of a baby elephant bequeathed to his
care and an accidental death that
Chopra is convinced is, in fact, murder.

IDEAS

COMIC CLASSICS
All Creatures Great And Small
by James Herriot (Pan Macmillan).
James Herriot’s memoir of his life as a
Yorkshire country vet in the 1930s is the
literary equivalent to a walk in bracing
country air. You end the book feeling
refreshed and rejuvenated, with your
spirits lightened and the knowledge
that spring is on its way.
Laughter is, after all, the best medicine,
and All Creatures Great And Small is a
comic classic. Herriot knows when a
tell-tale detail or fragment of dialogue will
leave you wiping away tears of laughter.
The animals doctored in this book are
just as memorable as the taciturn farmers

that Herriot encounters, not to mention
his eccentric colleagues. Every character,
though, is described with the author’s
signature kindness. At the heart of the
memoir lies a dual love story: Scottishborn Herriot not only succumbs to the
beauty of the Yorkshire Dales, but also
falls head-over-heels for the daughter
of a local farmer.
ALSO TRY: Three Men In A Boat by
Jerome K Jerome (Alma Classics). Three
friends (accompanied by Montmorency,
the dog) decide to take a holiday, boating
along the river Thames. Much hilarity
ensues, along with a fascinating insight
into Victorian England.

“THE SPIRIT OF
GUMPTION AND FUN
IS EVER PRESENT”
RURAL ESCAPES
The Lark by E Nesbit (Dean Street Press)
Edith Nesbit is famed for her children’s
books, such as The Railway Children, but
her adult novel The Lark deserves to be
much better known. Jane and her cousin
Lucilla discover that their guardian
has gambled away their inheritance
and fled the country. All he has left them
is a cottage in the country and £500.
Rather than giving in to despair, the
young women decide to view the situation
as ‘a lark’ or adventure, and set about
trying to earn their own way in the world,
despite the limitations placed on women
in 1920s Britain. Lucilla and Jane try their
hands at setting up a market garden – a real
cottage enterprise! – as well as running a
guest house, with mixed results. All ends
happily, and the spirit of gumption and
fun ever-present in this novel makes
for easy, but also inspiring, reading.
ALSO TRY: The Darling Buds Of May
by H E Bates (Penguin). A heartwarming
tale about a lovable family, farm-life
in Kent and what it truly means to live
‘the good life.’

Miranda Mills is the founder of book
and lifestyle blog: mirandasnotebook.com

One
Skin Food
sold every
10 seconds*

FEED YOUR SKIN
Weleda Skin Food intensely nourishes dry skin using the power
RIQDWXUH0DGHZLWKFHUWLĬHGRUJDQLFSODQWVDQGQDWXUDORLOVWR
SURWHFWDQGLQWHQVHO\QRXULVKGU\VNLQOHDYLQJ\RXUERG\DQGIDFH
QDWXUDOO\VRRWKHG/RYHGE\PDNHXSDUWLVWVFHOHEULWLHVDQGEHDXW\
HGLWRUVRQHWXEHRIWKLVFXOWFODVVLFFUHDPVHOOVHYHU\VHFRQGV 

NOURISHING BY NATURE
Naturally nourishing for dry skin

Feed your skin with Weleda Skin Food.

&HUWLĬHGQDWXUDOVNLQFDUH

$YDLODEOHIURPVHOHFWHG%RRWV+ROODQG %DUUHWW6XSHUGUXJ
ORRNIDQWDVWLFFRP\RXUORFDO:HOOEHLQJ$GYLVRUDQGZHOHGDFRXN

6XVWDLQDEO\DQGHWKLFDOO\VRXUFHG

*Source: Sell-In Cubeware, Q4 2022

PROUD
H O M E M LY
ADE

TRANSFERABLE SKILLS
GIVE FURNITURE A NEW LEASE OF LIFE WITH
STENCILS, WALLPAPER AND A DAB OF PAINT
Project & photography: JOANNE CONDON

WEEKEND PROJECT

TRANSFER DAY
This photocopy transfer technique
offers countless possibilities for a bit
of makeover magic.

You will need:
Wood filler and scraper (optional)
Sanding block
Photocopied images or illustrations
(the copy needs to be from a large
photocopier or laser printer, rather
than your home inkjet printer)
Scissors
Scrap wood for practice
Painter’s tape
Mask and gloves
Cellulose thinner (we got ours
from halfords.com)
Cotton pads
Acrylic sealer or water-based varnish
(we got ours from allfinishes.co.uk)
FOR THE DIPPED LEGS:
Paintbrushes
Primer
Satinwood paint
1 Before you begin, remove any
hardware and sand all wooden
surfaces thoroughly so that
they’re free from any finishes.
2 Cut out your photocopied design
so that you have just the area you’d
like to transfer. It may be worth
having several copies so that you
can practise the technique first.
3 Start with a small piece of your
design and some bare wood. Place
the paper on the wood, printed side
down, and secure with painter’s tape.
4 Wearing a mask and gloves in a
well-ventilated area, soak a cotton
pad with the cellulose thinner. Apply
the thinner to the back of the paper,
pressing down with a twisting motion.
5 The paper will start to become
transparent. Work your way around
your design, using the same twisting
motion as in step 4.
6 Peel back the paper to see how the
design has transferred onto the wood.
Repeat steps 4–6 to do a few test
prints until you feel confident enough
to start on your piece of furniture.

Dip your toe into
upcycling by
giving this stencil
and paint-dipped
effect a try

2

6

8

9

7 Cut out your design and put it in
place, making sure the printed side is
facing the wooden surface as before.
Secure it in place with painter’s tape.
8 Again, wearing gloves, apply the
thinner using a cotton pad, just as in
step 4. If you’re doing this on a vertical
surface, you may find it easier to
lay the piece down on the floor. Peel
back the paper to reveal the print.
9 While the ink dries, repeat steps 7–9
on the next section of your piece of
furniture until your design’s complete.

Leave to dry for a day or two and then
apply a coat of acrylic sealant or a
water-based varnish to one of your
test prints to make sure that it doesn’t
lift the ink from the wood. You can
then apply the sealant or varnish to
your finished piece and replace the
hardware. Finally, use painter’s tape,
primer and a satinwood paint to
create a dipped effect on the legs.
Maker’s note: Always work in
a well-ventilated area and wear
a mask and gloves. »

57

ON A ROLL
Why stick to walls? Adding wallpaper
to furniture is a great way to bring in
colour and pattern, just like this jolly
new look for a chest of drawers.

You will need:
Chalk
Screwdriver
Electric sander and sanding block
Primer
Paintbrushes
Good-quality wallpaper
Satinwood paints
Artist’s brush
Scissors
Mod Podge or wallpaper paste
Dry sponge (optional)
Craft blade
Ruler (optional)

2

3

7

58

1 Before you begin, remove the
drawers and number them in chalk
on the underside of each one so that
you can put them back correctly later.
If there are handles, remove them.
2 Prepare and prime the main
carcass and the drawer fronts. Put the
drawers back in place and plan where
you’re going to put the wallpaper.
The primer will prevent the wood
from showing through. Paint the areas
that will not be papered and leave
to dry. Any decorative trim may
need painting with an artist’s brush.
3 Remove the drawers again and
line them up in order, with the drawer
fronts facing upwards. Place a length
of wallpaper over the top and use
your thumb and index finger to lightly
crease the paper around the edge of
each drawer front as a cutting guide.
4 Cut around the crease line (not
directly on the crease), making sure
you have enough paper to cover each
drawer completely. You can always
cut any extra paper away later.
5 Check the wallpaper manufacturer’s
instructions. If they tell you to paste
the paper, take a large brush and
apply Mod Podge or wallpaper paste
on the back of the paper in an even
coat: not too thick, as this may cause
bubbling, but enough to cover the
paper. Set aside briefly to soak up the
glue. However, if you’re instructed to
paste the wall, apply the Mod Podge
or paste directly to the drawers.

6 Apply the paper to one drawer at
a time. As you lay down the paper
from left to right, continuously
smooth it down with the palm of your
hand and apply a little pressure to
remove any air bubbles. This can also
be done with a dry sponge if you’d
prefer. Smooth out the paper until the
drawer front is covered. Repeat with
the other drawers, then leave to dry.
7 With a sharp craft blade, carefully
cut away the excess paper – you
may find it helpful to use a ruler. Make
very short cuts, as running the blade
along the paper may cause it to rip.
8 Use the same method to cut around
the drawer trim, if necessary, and
reattach the handles. To keep the
paper from tearing, pierce small
holes with the craft blade first. Finally,
wipe off the chalk numbers and
put the drawers back in place.
Maker’s note: You could also try
lining the inside of the drawers
with the wallpaper for a nice surprise
whenever you open them.
Taken from Furniture Flips
by Joanne Condon (CICO Books).
Photography by Joanne Condon

Blackdown, builders of magical spaces
for you to make your own...

blackdownshepherdhuts.co.uk
info@blackdownshepherdhuts.co.uk | 01460 929774 |

PHOTOGRAPHY: IVAN GENER/STOCKSY

Ga mi n g...

T h e Si m ple T h i n g s w a y.

SUBSCRIBE
Available on Apple=LQLR
Bar nes & Noble, Pres sRe a der
Sa ve money with a year’s
s u b s cri pti o n (12 i s s u e s).
The choice is si mple.

TIPPLE
OF THE
MONTH
Fill up a flask and head out on
a winter wander, knowing you
have something warming to hand.
SMOKED SBITEN
This Russian drink contains hints of the
scents found on a walk and balances tea
tannins and fruity sweetness with a touch
of warming spice.
Makes 1 flask
5g loose-leaf lapsang souchong tea
100ml honey

62

250ml fruitier-style red wine
250ml blackberry jam
1 chilli slice
1 cinnamon stick, halved
2 cloves
1 thumb unpeeled ginger, sliced
¼ fresh nutmeg
100ml VSOP cognac
Foraged pine, to garnish
1 Make a pot of tea with the lapsang
souchong and 300ml water, let it brew
for 2 mins and then strain.
2 Add the tea, honey, wine, jam, chilli,
cinnamon, cloves, ginger and nutmeg to
a pan. Bring to the boil and stir for 2 mins,
then allow to cool. Pass through a sieve.
3 Add the cognac to the flask, then
heat the strained Sbiten base mixture
until just below the boil, and decant
into the Thermos. Serve in cups along
your walk, ideally garnished with some
fresh pine (cleaned, and ensuring it’s

not yew) foraged from your rambles.
Bartender’s note: You can vary the
spices and the booze easily here – it
also works as an alcohol-free drink with
the same warming, restorative qualities.
The quality of your ingredients really
affects the taste, and the real stars
of the show are the honey, tea and jam
– a forest honey and a local jam will carry
the complexity of brambles better.
From Mr Lyan’s Cocktails At Home
by Ryan Chetiyawardana
(White Lion Publishing).
Photography by Kim Lightbody

Small
ways
to live
well
Join us for season 1
of our new podcast, a
six-week companion
to thriving in winter.
Small Ways To Live
Well is hosted by
Editor, Lisa Sykes,
who will be sharing
tea and cake with
colleagues and contributors
from The Simple Things. There
are six episodes in Season 1:
The Hibernacle, each oǺering
a diǺerent take on thriZing in
winter. They’ll go out on Sunday
afternoons, from 21 January.
Subscribe Zia your podcast app
so you don't miss an episode.

Here at The Simple Things we
believe winter is not something
to be endured but embraced.
However, we need help; a tonic
for the coldest and darkest
months – from Twelfth Night
through to the Ārst daƼ of
spring. Welcome to 'The
Hibernacle' – a winter retreat
where Ƽou can pretend for a
time that the outside world

doesn’t exist. It’s not about
hiding under the duvet but
putting real life on hold for a
while and adjusting to a slower
pace to rest and energise
ourselves for the Ƽear to come.
Season 1:
The Hibernacle
is supported by
(harnwood StoZes.
charnwood.com

Stitch
in time
IT’S LITTLE, EVERYDAY
MOMENTS THAT MAKE UP
OUR LIVES. EMBROIDERY
ARTIST JORDAN CUNLIFFE
RECORDS THESE MOMENTS,
AND ENCOURAGES US TO DO
THE SAME, MINDFULLY,
STITCH BY STITCH

Stitches represent
daily moments in
our lives for Jordan.
From left: ‘Sleeping
and Waking’,
‘Life Stories’ and
‘Grandad’s Sweater’

64

here is something empowering
about putting your story out into
the world. I think as humans we
have an innate desire to leave our
mark: that urge to write our names
in freshly fallen snow, or in the
sand at the beach. The graffiti in the underpass
or written on the back of a dusty van, it all
comes down to the same thing; “I was here.”
I look at cave paintings and wonder at the hands
that made them thousands of years ago. My
embroideries are my cave paintings: I hope that
they continue to tell my story long after I am
gone. I use the umbrella term ‘data visualisation’
for the work I make. Although that might sound
quite clinical, it’s the best way I’ve found to
describe my work: a blend of storytelling and
meticulous documentation.
I’m an embroidery artist, born and still living
in Lancashire, a place built around the cotton
textile industry. I’ve found textile connections
scattered all over my family tree, spanning
generations. One of my very early memories
is of cross-stitching personalised bookmarks
on chunky aida, sliding notes to mum while she
was on the phone to make sure I was spelling
all the names right. After university, I began
to hone my textile craft. Amid a creative block,
I started stitching, then I started to count those
stitches, then I started to think; ‘what would
it look like if I made a stitch for every day of
my life…’ and so it began. I began to use stitches
to represent data: always based on the personal,
always trying to tell a story. For example, my

PHOTOGRAPHY: MICHAEL WICKS; ISTOCK

REFLECTION

piece ‘Daily Routine’ tracks a week of my time
minute-by-minute. I used different coloured
threads to denote sleeping, working and
commuting. While the data that it shows is
unique to me, I hope that anyone can recognise
their own story within the threads. Although
each stitch has a designated meaning, the
appearance is fluid, marking the undulations
of a life. As you look at it, you might notice
similarities; maybe you can sympathise with
the longer commute on a Friday evening or
recognise the periods of interrupted sleep.
Another project, ‘Grandad’s Sweater’, looks at
how my life and my grandad’s have intertwined.
Individual stitches represent individual days of
our lives, so it is ongoing. There is no deadline
or endpoint, it is a living document. As I add
more stitches as time passes, it is being built
up little by little, just like the life it represents.
Rather than the ‘big moments’, I’m driven
by such quieter, everyday moments that make
up a life, and trying to capture them in stitch.
The act of making them opens opportunities
for mindfulness and reflection. It allows time
for gratitude. Looking back at stitched moments
can remind us of all the goodness we have
experienced. I think of my embroideries as little
time capsules, tangible objects that I can hold
in my hands and be transported back to the
different stages of my life. The Greeks have
a term, ‘meraki’, which means that you put so
much of yourself into your work, that you leave
a part of yourself within it. My works become
an extension of me. Being able to hold these

“Looking back at stitched
moments reminds us of all the
goodness we’ve experienced”
memories in my hand is a wonderful thing.
Slowly but surely, I am compiling an archive
of all my precious moments, captured in thread.
The beauty of stitching lies in its simplicity;
there is no need for complicated techniques or
expensive equipment. Portable and tidy, it can
be done almost anywhere – you also can’t really
get it ‘wrong’, nothing is permanent… you can
always unpick. I would encourage everyone
to simply pick up a needle and thread and
start to stitch. Record anything and everything
that matters to you; make stitches to mark
the passing of days, random acts of kindness,
how many times you stop what you are doing
to talk to the cat, anything. Just begin, see
where it takes you and find joy in the journey.
If embroidery isn’t for you, there are so many
other ways that data visualisation can find its
way into your day-to-day. Lists, doodles or tally
charts, anything you do to keep a record of your
time is so worthwhile, especially when it comes
to acknowledging the goodness all around us.
A way of enjoying the small moments – how
they build up to be a bigger picture of your life.

Jordan’s book Record, Map & Capture
In Textile Art (Batsford) is out now.

65

PHOTOGRAPHY: EIJA HUHTIKORPI/DEEPOL/PLAINPICTURE

A simple thing...
It’s snowing! Resist the urge to
worry about train timetables and
the like, and seize the moment
as a child would. That means
snowballs, snowmen and snow
angels, with as much gleeful
running, stomping and whooping
as you fancy, leaving it to the last
possible moment to return home
and thaw out. After all, normal
service will resume soon enough.

M USIC T H E R A PY
We know instinctively that
music has the power to soothe
us, but researchers from
McGill University in Montreal,
Canada, have found that
listening to your favourite
music – particularly if you find
it moving – can be as potent
a painkiller as taking a pill.

100m

IN P O L E P O SITIO N

trees planted was the
aim when the Kenyan
government declared a
national ‘tree planting
holiday’ in November.
Every Kenyan was
encouraged to plant two
seedlings as part of the
country’s plan to plant
15 billion trees by 2032.

A remote Arctic island has become an invaluable home for polar bears

T

here are a few places in the world
that are truly remarkable for their
biodiversity and Wrangel Island,
in Arctic Russia, is one of them. Formerly
home to a remote Soviet weather station,
it’s now the breeding habitat of Asia’s only
snow goose population, is an important
feeding ground for grey whales as they
migrate from Mexico, it boasts the largest
population of Pacific walrus, and provides
the northernmost nesting grounds for

68

over 100 migratory birds, including the
peregrine falcon. But perhaps the most
striking of all the island’s inhabitants are
its polar bears.
Described as a polar bear maternity
ward, the abandoned village of Kolyuchin
has been occupied by the bears, which
shelter in the empty buildings. The
island’s remoteness allows the polar
bear population to thrive – increasing
in numbers in every count since 2007.

G O O D T O GR O W
Hull is set to become the first city
in the UK to give its residents ‘the
right to grow’ on unused council
land. It’s hoped the initiative will
not only provide healthy food,
but will also boost mental health
and revive neglected spaces.

BETTER NEWS

Excellent women
Making the night sky no limit

COMPILED BY: JOHANNA DERRY HALL. PHOTOGRAPHY: DANIEL CHU OWEN/TRAVELLING TELESCOPE; @RACHELSUZANNEILLUSTRATION; MINDEN PICTURES/ALAMY

MINING T H E P O T E N TIA L
Former mines can help in the shift to clean energy

T

hough largely hidden from
sight, the legacy of the
UK’s mining history lives
on in more than museums. In fact,
these relics of a carbon-heavy
past are pointing the way to a net
zero future. Geothermal energy
experts have been utilising the
thousands of miles of abandoned
tunnels that riddle the earth
underneath former mining areas.
Many defunct mines are
flooded with water, which at
their deepest can be as warm
as 40C. The Coal Authority
recently partnered with
Gateshead Council to use this
water – two billion cubic metres

“

of it – to successfully heat homes
and buildings across Gateshead,
including The Glasshouse
(above) and the Baltic Centre
for Contemporary Arts.
It’s not just old mines that are
being given a new lease of life
as clean energy sources. A site in
North Yorkshire that was drilled
for fracking but never actually
operated has been utilised for
the same purpose. The Coal
Authority estimates that around
a quarter of the UK’s homes
stand above old mining tunnels,
offering massive potential for
the future, and a restoring of
purpose to places of pride.

Susan Murabana doesn’t remember paying
much attention to the night skies growing up
in Nairobi. However, in her twenties, she went
camping with a group of astronomy and
astrophysics PhD students doing outreach in
Kenya, and what she saw set her gaze firmly
upwards. “They had a telescope and through
it, I saw Saturn for the first time,” she grins.
It ignited a passion for astronomy that led
her to join Cosmos Education, travelling the
continent teaching schoolchildren about space.
She went on to meet her partner, Daniel
Chu Owen, and the pair set up Travelling
Telescope, which over the past ten years has
visited Kenya and Tanzania with a mobile
planetarium to show over 400,000 children
and young people the wonders of space.
One of the joys of her job is hearing from
people who’ve gone
on to work in
space-related jobs
– as rocket engineers
and even space
lawyers. “Looking
up at the skies helps
us to realise that
collaboration is
what makes things
succeed,” she says.

No matter where you are on

our planet, the spirit
of ingenuity, and the ability to
inspire change surrounds us all”
Prince William, on announcing the five winners of this year’s Earthshot Prize

69

FULL STEAM AHEAD
WITH ITS MANY BENEFITS FOR MIND AND BODY, THERE’S
NO WONDER WE’RE WARMING UP TO THE SAUNA

E

very culture, through every age, has enjoyed its
own form of sweat bathing. From the Ottoman
hammam and Mayan temazcal to the Japanese
mushi-buro and kama-buro, from the banyas of
Russia to the saunas of Finland, heat therapy has stood
the test of time, waxing and waning in popularity and
crossing continents in various iterations. Scientists say
regular saunas help lower blood pressure, reduce the

70

risk of cardiovascular disease and dementia, boost
immunity and help with fatigue, depression and more.
There’s a reason why sauna-loving nations, such as
Finland, Sweden and Norway, jostle for the top spots
in the annual United Nations World Happiness Report.
People feel good after a sauna session and have done
for centuries. And now the world is once again waking
up to the incredible power and beauty of the sauna.

GALLERY

HOT STUFF
It’s not just the Scandinavians that
are into sauna. Over the past two
years, almost 100 mobile saunas have
popped up on British beaches. They
come in all shapes and sizes, from
horseboxes and train carriages to army
trucks and old vans. This wood-fired
horsebox sauna forms part of
Brighton’s Beach Box Sauna Spa.
With direct access to the beach,
cooling off in the sea afterwards is
all part of the experience.

THE HEART OF THE MATTER
The effect of the sauna on blood pressure
is one of the most well-documented
areas of medical research, and the general
consensus is that, over time, sauna bathing
decreases our blood pressure. The most
common theory is that the increase in
body temperature causes blood vessels
to dilate, which can increase blood
flow and improve the function of the
endothelium – the tissue that lines
the inside of blood vessels. »

GALLERY

SAUNA HATS
More garden gnome than glamorous,
sauna hats trap air, helping the head to
stay cool, which means you can endure
the heat for longer without overheating
or becoming dizzy. Hats are deliberately
outsized so they can be pulled right down
to the nose, protecting the forehead and
ears from a fierce steam. Often colourful
and kitsch, especially in Scandinavia
where Viking horns and reindeer antlers
are popular. However, in Japan, it’s more
about the plain white.

IT’S ALL ABOUT THE LÖYLY
In most countries a sauna is not an
authentic sauna unless you can pour
water on the rocks. The steam adds a
new dimension, both physically and
spiritually. Known by its Finnish name
löyly (pronounced low-loo), it means
spirit, or soul, and has a life of its own.
Top quality löyly is a good balance
between heat and humidity and should
hug you slowly and intimately. It’s strong,
but never aggressive. Then, after a while,
when it has worked its magic, it releases
its grip and slowly drifts away.

72

FROM BEGINNING TO END
Historically, the sauna was part of
life from the cradle to the grave. New
mothers would rest in its warm embrace
and grandmothers would introduce
newborns to the power of the steam.
When the cycle of life had run its
course, in the sauna the dead were
cleaned, blessed and prepared for
burial. Family members who were
sick would be moved into the separate
sauna hut to be healed in isolation.
The sauna was a place to heal, help
each other, hand down wisdom and
simply hang out. On the banks of
Sipoonjoki River in Finalnd, the founders
of this smoke sauna (left) are keen to
revive ancient sauna practices such
as whisking and washing with leaves.

“WATER, AIR, FIRE
AND EARTH ALL
JOIN FORCES IN
THE HEALING SPACE
THAT IS A SAUNA”

NATURE CONNECTION
A sauna is often located by water in a
place of natural beauty, and connecting
with nature is an important part of sauna
culture. At Björholmens Marina on the
Swedish island of Tjörn, this spectacular
sauna sits on a jetty which drops into the
calm and gentle waters of West Sweden. »

73

GALLERY

PURIFICATION POWERS
We produce about 0.5kg sweat in a
30 minute sauna and while 97% of this
is water, studies have shown that some
toxins and heavy metals are excreted,
too – and sweat does this more
effectively than urine. No matter how
healthy we are, we live in a polluted
world, so any detox helps. Maybe more
importantly, sauna is a tech-free zone.
Where else can we escape the ping of
a smartphone?

“THE STEAM IRONS
OUT THE SEAMS AND
LOOSENS THE KNOTS”

WILD SAUNA
Taking a cross country hike and
stumbling on a random public sauna
when your muscles are aching, is a
joy like no other. If you come across
a sauna in the wilds, such as the Safe
House in Norway (left), treat it like
you would your own bathroom; replace
any wood, wash the benches with some
buckets of warm water and clean up
your rubbish. And don’t forget to leave
an offering for the ‘guardians of the
steam’ – in Norway, the trolls appreciate
an extra log, as do the Finnish elves.

74

TAKING THE PLUNGE
Cooling down is as important as
warming up. Putting our bodies
through the thermo-regulatory
ping-pong that is sauna followed by
a cold rinse is extremely good for us
– and not as challenging as cold-water
swimming on its own. Hot and cold
improve our circulation so that our
core body temperature drops, and
the cooler our core, the less damage
there is to our genetic material and the
longer we live. But which should come
first? There’s no right or wrong, just do
what feels right and try to do at least
three rounds. When you start to feel
numb and elated, get out of the water,
and if the sauna is making you dizzy
or lightheaded, step out and cool off.

IT’S GETTING HOT IN HERE
Temperatures of around 38–40C
stimulate the immune system,
and in the same way that we can
programme ourselves to tolerate
the cold by exposing ourselves to
decreasing water temperatures, so too
can we dial up the heat, by throwing
water on the rocks and embracing the
whoosh of steam. At the Soria Moria
sauna (left) on Norway’s Lake Bandak
sweating, swimming and soaking up
the scenery are all in beautiful balance.

Taken from Sauna: The Power Of Deep Heat by
Emma O’Kelly. Photography by Maija Astikainen
(Welbeck Balance)

75

FEE L R AW P L EA SU RE

OFF - GRI D, HAN D CRA FTED SA UNA LODGES & NATUR AL LY FILTERED PL UNG E PO N DS .
Feel more alive than you ever thought possible: muscles taut, skin fizzing and feeling euphoric.

Designed in Yorkshire. Hand crafted in Sweden.

shokkandawe.com
#shokkandawe

Scan the QR Code to download
your free brochure

To make an appointment to view our sauna in Swaledale, North Yorkshire or talk to us about your ideas contact our
creative director: charles@shokkandawe.com T. 07734 955288

PAUSE
Take a moment with some well-chosen words

Protected in my little house
By Margaret Tait

Protected in my little house,
I watch the weather.
How it beats at my window-panes!
How it shakes my timbers!
How it howls!
Human beings can make themselves these protective
boxes
And lie snugly watching what goes on.

There is a sense of safety and refuge in this short, beautifully evocative poem from
Scottish pioneering film-maker and writer Margaret Tait. Her mother lived on the
“windy Orkney islands… a wonderful place to be brought up” and Margaret was
known for her close observation of the world and its vagaries.
Things to ponder: How does the poet evoke a still, quiet place in the face of
what’s happening outside? How does the wildness of the weather make you feel?
Protected In My Little House by Margaret Tait (Poems, Stories And Writings, 2nd edition,
2023) reprinted by permission of Carcanet Press, UK.

77

PASSIONS

M

O

D

E

R

E

CENTRICS
The Wassailers
Words: JULIAN OWEN Photography: JAYNE JACKSON

78

N

IN A WORLD THAT CAN FEEL
INCREASINGLY UNIFOR M ,
WE’RE CELEBRATING THOSE
HAPPILY DOING THINGS a bit

d if f e re n tl y. Me e t t h e
PEOPLE WHO ARE seriously
P A S S I O N A T E about
their pastimes . PERHAPS
THEY’LL PERSUADE YOU TO
TRY s o m e t h i n g N E W ?
t’s quite the mood jolt, turning the calendar from
31 December to 1 January. In hymnal terms, it’s
goodbye Joy To The World, hello In The Bleak
Midwinter. Once, there was a tradition to soften the
blow: wassailing, a centuries-old carousing custom
cast adrift in Georgian times by the rising tide of
the industrial revolution. It was a key festive element
in that pre-urban world, when Christmas Day was not
the pinnacle of party time but the beginning, the pivot
between Advent fasting and 12 days of merriment.
Wassailing came in for the big blowout at the end, on
Twelfth Night. But yet… glad tidings! In recent times,
it has been undergoing a resurgence.
Wassailing takes two forms, explains dedicated
revivalist Lorna Rees. One involves merrymakers
going door to door to drink toasts and bid householders
good health for the coming year (in Victorian times,
this evolved into carolling). “The other is distinct to
the West Country, the apple- and cider-producing
regions of Britain, and they’re all about celebrating our
orchards – essentially, in the dark days
of winter, waking up apple trees and
An apple head, a barn
asking for a good harvest. Things you’d
owl: there’s no plain
wassailing in Chettle.
traditionally do include pouring a bit
Top right: bring your
of last year’s cider on to the tree roots,
own accordion – or
going around the tree three times
pots and pans – says
clockwise, or loudly banging pots and
revivalist Lorna Rees

pans to get rid of any bad spirits in the orchard.” It’s
this bucolic variation that Lorna and fellow resident
Becky Burchell have helped (re)introduce to Chettle,
a small village in Dorset. “It isn’t only about having
a party,” Lorna says. “There’s a massive disconnect
with people understanding where our food comes
from, so it’s also about saying thanks to the land.”
The community element is fundamental, too. Chettle
is about to hold its third modern-day wassail, and the
100-strong populace has been enthusiastic from the
start. “We worked with the community over a series of
weeks, learning traditional songs and writing new ones.
Everybody made their own costumes.” These included a
giant apple head, a barn owl, and cardboard antlers (the
area was once royal hunting ground). The music was no
less ambitious, aided by guest artists including classical
violinist Simmy Singh, choir leader Sandie Campbell,
and Mercury Prize-nominated folk singer Sam Lee.
Lorna suggested they learn Sumer Is Icumen In, best
known for soundtracking the fiery denouement of a
classic British horror flick. When it comes to folk ritual,
she explains, “everyone always says, ‘Oh, it’s a bit like
The Wicker Man,’ so I thought it would be funny to sing
a song from the film. But it’s also a 13th-century song,
written in medieval Wessex dialect, all about summer
coming, and it was lovely to sing around a fire in an
orchard on a frosty morning. I felt really connected.”
Hoping to spread this sense of connection, Lorna
headed to the nearest school. “It was still a way away –
it’s a very rural community – but I did two days teaching
traditional songs, new songs, and talking about the
landscape’s history.” The visit culminated in a “beautiful, »

79

PASSIONS

chaotic singsong – the entire school came out and
sang, banged pots and pans, and woke up the spirit
of springtime, which was pretty magical.”
This freewheeling, all-comers-welcome approach
to folklore celebration is at some remove from the
‘everything must be just-so’ school of thought that
evolved during the 1950/60s folk revival. Yet, as folk
singer Jim Moray once observed: “It’s far more
traditional to play using the things around you than
it is to encase things in amber, or stuff them.”
“I couldn’t agree more,” says Lorna, before outlining
her affinity with female folk-dance group Boss Morris
(see The Simple Things, July 2020). “They venerate the
tradition, but without it being so sacred that you can’t
be playful – that’s how I feel. If you pickle things in
aspic, you’ve no space for diversity. It’s exclusionary.”
In which spirit, Lorna emphasises that there’s nothing
to stop you founding your own tree-appreciating wassail,
even if you reside beyond the West Country. “A few
elements are innate, but you can make up some and ditch
others – quite a few wassail traditions fire guns into the
trees and I’m not doing that! We do things like putting
toast into the trees because it might feed the robins,
then they eat bugs that might stop the tree from
flowering – these things are lovely and cyclical.”
If you fear early January may be a little
close
to New Year for maximum party
That’s all folk. What’s
freshness, wassail like it’s pre-1582,
more, modern wassail
offers a great excuse
that time before the introduction of
for getting people
the Gregorian calendar, when Twelfth
together in the grey
Night fell on the equivalent of 17 January.
days of January
(costumes optional)
That’s what happens in Chettle, give

80

or take a day or two. “We go out around the old Twelfth
Night,” says Lorna, remaining understandably vague
about the exact date. “It’s wonderful there’s such
an appetite for reconnecting with this stuff, but we
can’t really have 5,000 people turn up – we just don’t
have the Portaloos!
“I’d encourage anyone to do their own, if for no other
reason than to have a party in the bleakness of January
– to celebrate the land waking up is a profound and
beautiful thing to do. It’s good for the soul.”
Jayne’s photography of the Chettle Wassail received
an honourable mention in the Culture and Daily Life
category at the 2023 Julia Margaret Cameron Awards.
Follow her on Instagram: @jaynejacksonphotography

The core of wassailing
is apples, as shown by
Becky Burchell (left)

81

Nobody has
to know.

up to

40% off *
*Offer ends 31.01.24
Free & easy returns.

Responsibly Sourced Bedding, Curtains, Towels & Nightwear
SCAN ME
TO SHOP

secretlinenstore.com

|

01243 822 599

STYLE

WEARING
WELL
Stories of the clothes we love
PYJAMAS
Words: REBECCA FRANK

PHOTOGRAPHY: GETTY; LOVEYAWN.COM; THEWHITECOMPANY.COM; TOA.ST

J

anuary has always been one of my
favourite months. I know many
will disagree, think it cold, dark,
quiet and dull, but after the madness
that is December, I relish that. And a
large part of my enjoyment is that I can
spend lots of guilt-free time lounging
around in the comforting embrace of
a pair of PJs. If I’m honest the urge to
put on my pyjamas starts on Christmas
Day when I excitedly tear open the
wrapping paper to reveal a new pair.
Whichever well-loved, faithful PJs I am
wearing are immediately stripped off
and the new pair proudly given their
moment in the spotlight. In the lazy
days of Twixtmas, I change briefly
and reluctantly for social occasions
and bracing walks (I might keep the
top on for the latter), but the minute
I’m home and any guests have gone,
I slip them on again and curl up like
a cat that got the cream.
Once New Year’s Eve has passed,
a month of pyjama-wearing heaven
begins in earnest. My midwinter
pyjama preference is a traditional
brushed cotton shirt with long sleeves
and bottoms, comfy and forgiving.
Despite what they say about writers

“My midwinter preference
is a traditional brushed
cotton shirt and bottoms”
who WFH, I don’t spend the whole
day in pyjamas, but when it’s dark
at 4.30pm and I don’t have any plans
for the evening, I don’t see anything

wrong with slipping into something
a little more comfortable.
It’s reassuring to know that I’m not
alone in my penchant for PJs and nor
is it necessarily a sign of middle age.
My student daughter says it’s fine to
wear her fleecy, tartan (unmistakably
pyjama-ry) bottoms to go to the shops.
I haven’t yet stooped to that particular
low, but I did catch myself last summer
wandering around a campsite in some
White Company classics, perhaps a
little too comfortably. And then there’s
the debate about how long one should
wear PJs before washing. I won’t bring
my teenagers’ pyjama habits into this
but let’s just say the car probably gets
washed more often. Personally, I’m not
shy of the washing machine because
I like the just-cleansed, freshly ironed
experience. If I were Elton John, it
wouldn’t be flowers but a fresh pair of
pyjamas I’d feel like demanding every
day of the week. The environmentally
conscious pyjama brand Yawn
(loveyawn.com) say that their supersoft
organic cotton PJs get even softer with
washing – perhaps if I tell my daughter
that she might finally figure out how
to use her washing machine?

83

WELLBEING

IT’S COMMON SENSE THAT IF
WE’RE LIVING LONGER, LOOKING
AFTER OUR BRAINS AND BODIES
EARLIER, WITH A FEW SIMPLE
MEASURES, WILL HELP AS WE AGE
Words REBECCA FRANK

84

!?

ILLUSTRATIONS: ANNELIESE KLOS

BALANCE

hether it’s
having
20:20 vision
or being able
to touch your
toes, it can
come as a shock when the things
you’ve always found easy don’t
feel quite so effortless any more.
Now we’re living longer, it’s more
important than ever that we take
steps to protect and maintain the
health of our brains and bodies,
and it’s more within our control
than you might think. According to
Professor Rose Anne Kenny, author
of Age Proof (Lagom), only 20% of
ageing is controlled by our genes
and the other 80% is in our hands.
Jennie Brown is a barre instructor
and co-founder of Project Me,
an online course to help women
become ‘the old woman of your
dreams’ (meetyouatthebarre.com).
She explains: “Many of us will live
to see 100 and so we need to do
everything we can earlier in our
lives to look after ourselves. By
taking small, actionable steps to
build the best brain and body you
can have, you will feel healthier
and happier now and in the future.”

A good sense
of balance
indicates
a younger
biological age

Balance isn’t something we’re born
with; we learn it early and we lose
it if we don’t keep using it. A good
sense of balance indicates a younger
biological age and can be used to
help predict lifespan. The results
of a ten-year study involving more
than 1,700 participants found that
poor balance was linked with
higher unhealthy blood cholesterol
and incidence of cardiovascular
disease and Type 2 diabetes. Test
your balance by standing on one
leg and holding for as long as you
can for up to 30 seconds. If that
feels okay, try it with your eyes
closed. As a guide, the average
healthy person aged under 60 will
be able to hold the balance with
eyes closed for over 20 seconds.
KEEP IT
Move your body in ways that help to
promote good balance. A ballet, barre
or yoga class will include exercises
that help to improve balance as well
as build core strength. Or you could
just practise standing on one leg
at home while you’re watching TV,
talking on the phone or listening
to a podcast. The more you do it, the
easier it becomes. Walking on uneven
terrain, up and down stairs and hills
will also help strengthen the legs
and feet and improve balance.

MEMORY
Many people fear they’ve got early
signs of dementia if they become
more forgetful but forgetting things
is not the main sign of dementia
and the reasons for forgetfulness
are often reversible. Stress and
anxiety affect concentration
and our ability to take in new
information, so if you’ve already
forgotten something you were
told yesterday it might be that your
mind was on other things, and you
didn’t absorb the information as
a memory. Hormonal changes
during and after pregnancy and
around the menopause can often
lead to memory loss, difficulty
focusing and finding words, or
getting confused, known as ‘brain
fog’. An underactive thyroid can
also affect memory along with
causing other symptoms such as
weight gain, dry skin, hair loss and
increased sensitivity to the cold.
KEEP IT
In menopausal women, HRT can
make a big difference to symptoms
of brain fog, as can good lifestyle
habits, such as a healthy diet,
exercising regularly and doing things
to help reduce stress. Tiredness can
also cause forgetfulness and inability
to concentrate. Brain fog can also
be a symptom of illness – it’s common
in long Covid sufferers and can be
associated with thyroid disorders,
sleep apnoea, vitamin B deficiency
and certain medications. It’s worth
keeping a note of how you feel
each day so you can track symptoms,
spot any triggers, and talk to
your GP if things don’t improve. »

85

WELLBEING

SIGHT

The eye’s ability to
adjust focus and
reaction to light
changes over time

SLEEP
You’ve slept through since you
were a baby but then stop being
able to fall asleep easily and 4am
becomes your new wake-up time.
Denise Iordache, sleep specialist
and therapist at joyspacetherapy.
com says, “A primary contributor
to change in sleep patterns in
middle age is hormone fluctuations.
Oestrogen plays a crucial role in
regulating sleep patterns and its
reduction may lead to disturbances
in the sleep/wake cycle.” Throw
in hot flushes, night sweats and
anxiety and bedtime can start to
feel like a nightmare. Production of
melatonin, the sleep hormone, also
decreases with age and blue light
has been shown to affect melatonin
levels. Lifestyle circumstances
that increase stress levels can also
cause sleep disturbance, including
career demands, financial worries,
care-giving responsibilities and so
on. “Mental health factors such as
anxiety or depression may become
more prevalent during this life
86

Over a quarter of us will experience
changes to our vision after the age
of 40 – some of this is inevitable
but research shows that there are
controllable factors that can help
keep your eyes healthy for longer.
One of the first things you might
notice is finding it harder to read
things up close, especially in dim
lighting (getting your phone torch
out in restaurants to look at the
menu is a telltale sign). You might
also find it harder to adjust
between light and dark or
distinguish colours. Other common
vision-related symptoms are
headaches and feeling tired behind
the eyes, especially if you’ve been
reading or looking at a screen a lot.
All of these can be related to the
changes in the lens that occur over
time, including the flexibility that
enables it to adjust focus from near
to far and the strength in the
muscle that controls pupil size and
its reaction to light. Lower tear

stage, further impacting sleep
quality,” says Denise.
KEEP IT
Establishing a consistent sleep
routine by going to bed and waking
up at the same time every day, even
on weekends, will help. A calming
bedtime, free of stimulants, will also
signal to the body that it’s time to
wind down. Swapping blue light
exposure from the TV, iPad and other
devices for a mellow yellow lighting
from lamps, candles or a fire before
bed also helps to increase melatonin
and can make you feel sleepy.
“Another tailored approach
involves mindful stress
management,” says Denise. “Deep
breathing, meditation, mindfulness
practices or gentle yoga before bed
promotes a more tranquil transition
into sleep.”
Spicy foods, caffeine and alcohol
can all disrupt sleep. Instead, opt for
sleep supportive foods like a warm
milky drink, magnesium-rich nuts
or melatonin-producing cherries.”

production can cause a dry, itchy
eye feeling, too.
KEEP IT
Give your eyes a rest. If you’re working
on a screen, follow the 20:20:20 rule
– every 20 minutes spend 20 seconds
looking at something about 20 feet
away. Wearing sunglasses that block
out 99-100% UVA and UVB will help
prevent eye damage. A healthy diet
with oily fish and flaxseed for omega-3
oils, leafy green veg and colourful fruit
and veg will help to prevent macular
degeneration, too. It’s advisable
to have a sight test every two years
to not only assess vision but also to
pick up other conditions, such as high
blood pressure and diabetes, which
can be picked up by spotting changes
to the blood vessels at the back of the
eye. If you do need glasses, don’t put
it off in the fear that it’ll quicken the
decline in your vision – if your eyesight
worsens it would have done so
anyway and in the meantime you’ll
avoid those headaches and tired eyes.

Z

!!

!
FLEXIBILITY

STRENGTH
Once we pass 30 we start to lose
muscle mass and as we get older, the
rate of this loss accelerates. GP Dr
Rangan Chatterjee, author of The 4
Pillar Plan (Penguin Life), describes
muscle as the ‘forgotten organ.’
He says: “We tend to think of
muscle as nothing more than dumb
meat that powers our limbs, but
it plays a number of active roles in
the running of our bodies.” Muscle
controls the way hormones are
released and how they’re regulated.
When we’re strength training, our
body releases chemical messengers
called cytokines which switch off
inflammation. It reduces our risk
of type 2 diabetes, cardiovascular
disease and stroke, stress, anxiety
and osteoporosis. It’s linked to
good brain health, too – studies
have shown that women who
did strength training showed
improvement in their working
memory, concentration and
were better at resolving conflict.
KEEP IT
You don’t need to join a gym or buy
any equipment to do strength training
– the body is a heavy weight and
exercises like squats and press-ups,
along with yoga, Pilates and barrebased exercises all use body weight
to strengthen the muscles and
bones. If you are a gym member,
try a strength training class and don’t
be afraid of heavy weights, as long
as you have supervision of a trainer
and take it gradually. “Moving your
body produces feelgood hormones,
promotes strong bones and increases
energy levels. It’s one of the most
effective weapons in your current
arsenal,” says Jennie Brown.

Can you touch your toes? Would
you like to be able to bend over to
do up your shoelaces when you’re
in your 70s? Increasing numbers
of people are suffering from back
pain and one of the main causes
is spending too much time sitting
down, which causes tight and
inflexible hip flexors and weak
muscles in the abdomen, legs and
buttocks. Studies have suggested
that too much sitting can be as
bad for our health as smoking.
KEEP IT
Break up periods of sitting with a light
activity like walking around the room,
up and down stairs, or just standing
for a while and doing a few stretches.
Dr Chatterjee says that we should
aim to make a rule that we never sit
down for more than an hour at a time
without moving – setting an alarm is a
good way to remind yourself. Regular
stretching helps to keep you flexible
– try to do five to 10 minutes every
day and supplement this with a
yoga, Pilates or Barre class, all of
which help to strengthen the core
which supports the lower back and
improves posture as well as stretching
and strengthening the muscles.
“Barre helps to build muscles in the
core, legs and glutes,” says Jennie
Brown. “It incorporates stretches and
dynamic movements that increase
flexibility and reduce risk of injury
while being gentle on your joints.”

CONFIDENCE
It’s not uncommon to cruise along
until your 40s and then suddenly
start to feel unconfident and
anxious in situations that you’d
previously have breezed through.
“Midlife wreaks havoc with so
many of my clients’ confidence,”
says Jennie. “The brain fog and
tiredness of the perimenopause
can make even the smallest task
seem overwhelmingly challenging.
Careers, kids and ageing parents are
big demands on our time and it can
feel impossible to keep on top of it
all.” A loss of confidence, confusion
and low mood can feel like it’s come
out of nowhere and studies have
shown women are more vulnerable
to depression around the time
of hormonal changes, including
post-pregnancy and menopause.
KEEP IT
The great news is that the things
which will help you feel better in
the future are the same things that’ll
make you feel calmer in the here
and now. Keeping strong and active,
getting enough good quality sleep,
and managing stress will all help you
feel more in control. But if anxiety or
mood disturbances are stopping you
from doing the things that you want
to do and don’t respond to lifestyle
changes, it’s advisable to have a chat
with your GP. If you’re in your 40s or
50s it may well be hormone related
– one of the biggest side effects of
perimenopause and menopause that
women report is increased anxiety.
Keeping a diary of your moods and
emotions will help you to notice
patterns and it’s also helpful to reflect
back on when things haven’t turned
out as badly as you had feared.

87

%VERYȩITEMȩTELLSȩAȩCOLOURFULȩTALE

%URZVHRXUFROOHFWLRQRISUHDGRUHGWUHDVXUHV

#VWXIIDQGWDOHVYLQWDJH
VWXIIDQGWDOHVFRXN
Traditional Workwear
for Men and Women
carriercompany.co.uk

If this is your time for
making changes, looking
ahead, hatching plans, a Sea
Change Residential Hideaway
could be just the ticket.
Next available in the Spring, with 1:1
conversation now to set you on your way.
www.come-as-you-are.today/hideaways

FLOWERS IN THE HOUSE
Bringing blooms indoors: it’s what every home needs

Forced bulbs

WORDS: JO TINSLEY. PHOTOGRAPHY: TIA BORGSMIDT/HOUSE OF PICTURES/IMAGE PROFESSIONALS

Whether narcissi, delicate alliums
or dainty dwarf iris, spring bulbs,
forced in autumn*, tempts them
to bloom early indoors, bringing
welcome colour and scent.
Hyacinths look particularly pretty
grown the ‘Victorian’ way, their
roots entwining within a glass or jar.

*You can buy them at this time of year or have a go yourself in autumn. See how on our blog at: thesimplethings.com/blog/forcedbulbs.

89

HOME TOUR

ARTIST’S
RETREAT
WHY LIMIT YOUR CREATIVITY TO CANVAS?
THIS CREATIVE COUPLE SHOW THAT WALLS,
FLOORS, CURTAINS AND RUGS CAN ALL
BECOME YOUR ARTWORK, TOO
Words: KAREN DUNN Photography: JAMES BALSTON

90

91

HOME TOUR

92

n the middle of the Northumberland
countryside sits a grand-looking hall. From
the outside it gives little indication of the
explosion of colour and pattern that adorns
almost every surface inside – though the
painted gazebo in the garden provides a clue.
Less Downton Abbey, more Alice in Wonderland, it’s
home to Helen Morris and her husband Chip, who
have created a place to live that doubles as a canvas.
The couple, who run The Stencil Library, have
been making stencils and teaching people how to
use them since 1998, but it was finding this home
that set them on this path. They discovered the
house, available for rent, in 1996 and fell in love
with its quirky charms. “It’s a bit of a TARDIS; it
looks quite small from the outside,” explains Helen.
“When we first came to look round, Chip and my
cousin were with the estate agent and I could hear
their voices and didn’t know how I could actually
reach them. I thought, ‘If we take this place, I’ll
be so disappointed when that sense of Alice in
Wonderland disappears and I know where I’m
going!’ But even though I know all the nooks
and crannies now, it’s still magical.”
They took the house on a long lease, and set about
renovating it, roping in friends and family to help

create their dream space. “It was a huge amount of
work. We put in fireplaces and central heating. We
also took down a couple of walls and changed the
layout. The outside of the house is listed but inside
we could be as creative as we wanted,” Helen says.
“One of the things that’s really special to me is
that so much of the home and so many of the things
in it were handmade by friends. One friend was
desperate to use a new tool, so he made all the
wood panelling. Another made all the metal
work, while yet another made many of the soft
furnishings. It’s a house put together by friends.”

Helen happily admits
that some of her choices
may seem ‘out there’,
such as the black living
room (previous page)
and the orange
bathroom (opposite),
but she encourages
experimenting – after
all, anything can always
be painted over again

P L AY I N G W I T H PAT T E R N S
It was while they were renovating that they dreamt
up their business. While Chip made stencils for
his own screen-printing business, he didn’t sell
to the general public. “I asked Chip if he could
make me a floral stencil as I wanted to decorate
one of the rooms – a newspaper was coming to
do a story about me swapping modelling to be
a garden designer. However, he didn’t have time
and suggested that I go and ask around interior
designers and decorators whether they had any for
sale,” explains Helen. “They didn’t, but everybody
was saying, ‘If you know who’s making the stencils »

93

HOME TOUR

“IT WAS A HUGE AMOUNT
OF WORK. THIS IS A
HOUSE PUT TOGETHER
BY FRIENDS”

Barely a surface has gone
un-stencilled in this quirky
home, and the hobby has
inspired an entire business

95

for the restaurants in town, we’d like to know,’ and
I said, ‘Well, that’s my husband!’ Chip got cutting
and within a couple of months it had taken off –
we were featured in many magazines, including
The New York Times and had to run to keep up.”
That meant a steep learning curve for Helen, but
she had plenty of surfaces to practise on. “I learned
through a lot of mistakes. But before I knew it, I
was teaching all sorts of people to stencil,” she says.
While each room and area of the house makes its
own bold statement, whether it’s the ‘Stairway to
Heaven’ stencilled on the back stairs or the willow
pattern in the attic bedroom, there’s a path through
the house, which Helen has made using colour.
“The last colour that you see in a room is the
first colour you see in the next,” she explains.
“It’s a way of bombarding people with pattern
without overwhelming them, because there is that
sense of continuation. It might be a colour that’s
painted on the walls, that’s in a painting, or even
a photograph. I can’t be doing with minimalism!”
TOUR GUIDES
A home like this needs to be shared and Helen loves
filling hers with like-minded people. As well as
hosting courses, they also run tours. “I make jokes
96

about how I’m like an estate agent showing people
around, but people are so respectful and kind. You
never know what the questions will be or where
the conversations will lead,” she smiles. “People
come back time and time again, bringing friends
with them, because there’s always something they
miss the first time around. Often people will say,
‘That’s new!’ but I haven’t redecorated at all!”
The passion for painting is still strong so
the house is always evolving. Helen laughs, “We
only change rooms when I’ve got time and I’m
champing at the bit right now to do at least two.
It’s just finding the time around all the other jobs!”
While their house is their pride and joy, Helen
admits there is a time limit on how long they can
stay. However, for as long as they can, this is the
place they want to call home. “It won’t be a forever
home because there’s going to come an age where
you just can’t manage a house and garden of this
size without extra help, but at the moment we’ve
got no plans to leave. I love it here; there are so
many memories. Late night conversations with
fellow paint geeks, Christmases filled with family
and friends. It really is a special place.”
For more on Helen’s home and work,
visit: stencil-library.com.

Learning on the job,
Helen says that there
are plenty of ‘mistakes’
in the stencils she’s
done, but unless
she points them
out, no one notices.
And perhaps that’s
all part of the charm…

HOME TOUR

HELEN’S STYLE
O There is no surface you can’t stencil. There is
so little in the house that isn’t stencilled, from
the frames around the pictures, to rugs, floors
and soft furnishings, even clothes.
O If you can upcycle a piece of furniture or even
make it yourself, it’ll always mean more than
something that’s bought new from a shop.
O Embrace colour. I admit some of my choices
are ‘out there’. But, if you change your mind,
you can just paint it again.

97

GROWING

The plant rescuer
AN UNHAPPY PLANT CAN BE A GREAT TEACHER. PAY ATTENTION TO WHAT
YOUR PLANTS ARE TRYING TO CONVEY AND EVEN SMALL ADJUSTMENTS
CAN LEAD TO GREAT CHANGES, SAYS SARAH GERRARD-JONES

Banish all thoughts
of Triffids: Living
alongside a family
of plants, and taking
time to care for them,
can be a mindful,
calming experience

PHOTOGRAPHY: EMILY STEIN; EASTERDAY CREATIVE/STOCKSY

don’t believe that people are ‘serial plant
killers’, nor do I believe people are born
with ‘green fingers’. Growing plants that
thrive is simply a case of taking the time
to understand what your houseplant
needs to survive and what it’s conveying
through changes in its appearance.
I’ve been rescuing unheard and
misunderstood plants for years, learning
through the act of caring for them and
nurturing them back to health. Yellow,
brown, droopy or crispy leaves can be part
of the normal life-cycle of a plant – or a cry
for help. But often we misread the signs.
An unhappy plant can be a great teacher,
if you take the time to notice subtle changes
and rectify any problems before they reach
the point of no return. The good news is
that often the smallest adjustment can
make the biggest change.

LEARN FROM PLANTS
There is myriad advice out there on how
to care for plants, but take everything
you read as a starting point for your
own experimentation. It’s important to
understand the science of how plants grow,
but over-analysing every aspect of their
care can suck the joy out of what should
be a relaxing and enjoyable experience.
Remember, too, that expert advice is so
often a documentation of success, whereas
failures are rarely acknowledged. Liberate
yourself from internet advice and learn
from what your plants tell you. Worry less

about doing the ‘wrong’ thing and
remember that failure is the key to future
success – after all, each plant that dies is
another lesson in what not to do next time.

AV O I D P E R F E C T I O N
Our instinct when looking for plants is
to choose the most pristine looking one
on the shelf because we think it must be
healthier and more resilient. It’s similar
to the way we might avoid misshapen
vegetables because they might not taste
as nice as straight ones, though really we
know they will most likely taste the same.
I avoid buying the perfect-looking plant
as I know someone else will, but who will
buy the one with the torn or brown leaf?
A torn leaf can be cut off, a brown leaf
might be a sign that it’s in need of a drink.
Clues to why the plant looks unhappy
can be obvious when you look at where it’s
been placed in the shop. Is it getting enough
light? Is the potting mix very dry or very
wet? These are easy things for you to

rectify: you can put it in a bright spot to let
the soil dry out, or give it a drink. Recovery
can be swift, sometimes within a week.
The sense of achievement from seeing a
neglected plant flourish, knowing it would
otherwise have been thrown away, is
addictive. There is so much to be gained
from nurturing a sad plant back to health.

B E A T R AV E L A G E N T
Within the first week or month of bringing
home a new plant, you might notice that
it doesn’t look as great as it did when you
bought it. Don’t panic. It’s adjusting to the
new conditions in your home, making vital
adaptations to survive. It might lose a few
leaves or even some of the vigour that
attracted you to it in the first place.
Its original home likely felt like a
luxury retreat, and since leaving its happy
place, your plant has endured fluctuating
temperatures, unreliable light levels and
sporadic watering. It is no longer sunning
itself on a beach, sipping coconut water »
99

GROWING

You don’t have to
talk to your plants
(no matter what King
Charles says) but
listening to them
can tell you all sorts…

through a straw; it’s working hard to
adapt to a new way of life. Leaves that have
turned brown, yellow, lighter, darker or
have even fallen off are all normal when
a plant has experienced dramatic changes
in its environmental conditions. Don’t
be tempted to move it or repot it, the
last thing it needs is more change.
What your plant needs is to be reminded
of that wonderful holiday, where it basked
in hours of diffused sun, helping itself
to the all-inclusive buffet with drinks
on tap. Your aim should be to reduce the
amount of stress on your plant by creating
the ultimate package-holiday in your own
home. Think like a travel agent and know
your client: desert cacti would not enjoy
a holiday anywhere dark, and calatheas
would be horrified to be sent somewhere
with 12 hours of direct blazing sun.

BE A PLANT DETECTIVE
Already have a houseplant that’s in need
of special care? Rescuing plants is like
playing a game of Plant Cluedo. The aim
of the game is to become a detective and
build up a strong case for the ‘who, what
and where’ that is causing your plant to
become unhappy.
• Who: Establish the species of plant
and find out about its natural habitat.
This will give you vital information that
can help you determine why its current
environment might be making it unwell.
• What: Find out what weapon has been
100

“Plants can’t be hurried; focusing our attention
on them feels like taking a long, deep breath”
used to cause harm to the plant. The
elements needed for a plant to survive
– light, water, warmth and so on – need
to be considered. Evidence of pests could
also point to potential suspects.
• Where: Look at where your plant is
placed; the environment will have a huge
impact on its survival.
Jumping to conclusions without looking
for the evidence can often be the final
nail in the coffin. Before reaching for
the watering can, look at all the evidence,
build a case file, and then go on to make
an informed decision on what the course
of action should be.

our attention on them feels like taking
a long, deep breath and can often help to
give our tired brains a much-needed rest
from the frantic nature of everyday life.
It can also help reconnect us to a sense of
wonder. As children we viewed nature with
awe. Buying a plant, swapping cuttings or
sowing seeds – just to experience the magic
of watching them grow – is a sign that we
want to once again be enchanted by nature
and make space for it in our lives.
Place yourself within that circle of life,
engage your senses, learn what your plants
love, and in return they will show their
gratitude by enriching your life.

F I N A L LY, S L O W D O W N
Growing plants forces us to slow down,
to be mindful and to be in the moment.
Plants simply can’t be hurried; focusing

Taken from The Plant Rescuer by
Sarah Gerrard-Jones (Bloomsbury
Publishing). Follow Sarah on
Instagram: @theplantrescuer

rhinogreenhouses.co.uk
0800 694 1929

1

Things to
want and
wish for

2

3

Loving your home, inside
and out. Books and treats
for you to enjoy.
Edited by LOUISE GORROD
Book reviews by EITHNE FARRY

4

6

5

1 Waistcoat > £65 Add another layer of cosiness with this hand block-printed, organic cotton number. pinklemons.boutique
2 Decanter > £65 Made from hand-blown glass with a subtle etched pattern, it’s vintage quality. nkuku.com 3 Cushion > £29
Soft, squishy and with a fluffy fringe. idyllhome.co.uk 4 Lamp > £30 Let there be light, wherever you need it, with a 70s-inspired lamp.
habitat.co.uk 5 Yatzy > £14 The classic dice game gets a modern makeover. folkinteriors.co.uk 6 Love seat > from £1,755
This deep, comfy chair may be made for two, but we’d be tempted to keep it all to ourselves. roseandgrey.co.uk

102

WISHLIST

One of life’s simplest pleasures is to sink into a sofa – combine
that with drinks and a board game and it’s possibly the best
way to spend a winter’s evening. A lively game of Jenga, then
reclining back to recover, sounds good to us.
Sofa > £2,295, loaf.com

WISHLIST

Shopkeeper
of the
month

Bookshop
browse
SIGNIFICANT
STITCHES
365 Days Of Stitches
by Steph Arnold
ªLifelong
crafter and
founder of the
Oh Sew Bootiful
sewing kits,
Steph Arnold
shares her
passion for stitching in
an encouraging book that
celebrates self-expression
through embroidery. “It’s
a great way to be mindful,
of looking out for the positives
in each day,” says Steph,
as she explains the stitches,
techniques and equipment
needed to get started on your
thread journaling journey. The
aim of 365 Days Of Stitches is
to create a visual keepsake of
your year*, memorialising the
important daily and monthly
events with resonant motifs
(there are a thousand included
in the book) and wonderful
words. (Search Press)

The cat’s whiskers
Where feline artistry and
culture collides
ªIn the picturesque coastal haven
of Budleigh Salterton in Devon,
designer and illustrator Nia Gould has
masterfully combined her adoration
for cats with an unwavering passion
for popular culture. The result is Niaski,
a delightful feline-focused studio and
shop that marries the worlds of iconic
art and contemporary pop culture with
a deep-seated love for our four-legged
friends. “I really wanted to open up
my studio space and meet people. I find
my work has so much humour behind it,
it would be nice to allow people to stop
by and chat all things art and cats with
me while I’m in my workspace,” she

explains. “I love
watching people
giggle and guess
the famous artists
with a little cat twist.
It can be incredibly
uplifting, especially
when they realise
that I’m the artist
behind all the work.”
Nia’s creative concoctions infuse
humour and charm into a wide array
of products, including witty greetings
cards, stationery, prints, one-of-a-kind
homewares, and stylish pet accessories.
Alongside Nia’s designs are thoughtfully
sourced items such as books, art materials
and pet gifts all picked to complement the
brand. Oh, and dogs are welcome, too!
niaski.com

S AV O U R I N G T H E S E A S O N S
The Almanac: A Seasonal Guide To 2024 by Lia Leendertz
ªThe Garden is the theme of Lia Leendertz’s
inspirational and indispensable 2024 almanac.
From the green buds of spring to the fall of
autumn leaves, Lia’s sage observations are
prompts to see “the magic of each month…
to celebrate the unfolding of the seasons.”
Alongside the usual tide charts, moon rises

104

*For more inspiration on recording your year in stitch, turn to Reflection on p64.

and sun sets, and annual celebrations,
there are garden crafts and tasks, folk songs
and recipes, including snack of the month –
January’s is Haggis Pakora with minty, garlicky
yogurt dip – and suggestions for bringing the
outdoors indoors to encourage an on-going
connection to the natural world. (Gaia)

Our anytime calendar
Enjoy a nature table for every month
For the past year we’ve published a beautiful nature table, collected and curated
for us by Alice Tatham (@thewildwoodmoth) in each issue. Now we’ve gathered
them together to make a beautiful wall calendar.

There’s space to note down happenings and holidays. You can start using it
anytime, in any year. And when your 12 months are done, you can pin up the pics
for inspiration or frame them for your wall.
ORDER AT PICSANDINK.COM £10 (+P&P*)
*£2 flat UK postage for any Pics & Ink order. See website for overseas prices.

WISHLIST

It’s peak blanket season and if you’re looking to add extra cosiness
to your home, now’s the time to swathe yourself in all the options.
Tactile textures or a timeless tartan , inside or outside, soft
or sturdy – there’s surely a blanket for every occasion.
Blankets > £150 each, both toa.st

106

Markets,
events
and fairs

1
2

The London Art Fair
>Discover new artists at
this annual fair, host to over
100 galleries showing off
their favourite finds. A great
place to buy affordable art or
to window shop for creativity.
Taking place at the Business
Design Centre in London on
17–21 January, tickets start at
£20.50. londonartfair.co.uk

3

Crafting Live
>With over 60 exhibitors,
stocking crafting supplies
as well as taster classes and
on-stand demonstrations,
this is a fantastic event for
avid crafters. Taking place at
Sandown Racecourse, Esher,
on 19 and 20 January, tickets
are £5. craftinglive.co.uk/
shows/sandown

York Racecourse
Antique & Collectors Fair

4

>This new fair will have up

to 250 stalls all in the ground
floor exhibition hall, meaning
you can browse for antiques
whatever the weather. Taking
place on 7 January, 9–4pm,
adult entry is £3. dualco.co.uk
5

6

1 Backpack > £95 First created to prevent back problems in Swedish school children, some 35 years
later this bag is a favourite for all ages, especially in such a sunshine-spreading shade. fjallraven.com
2 Gloves > £38 Put your hands together for this pair, made in Scotland from 100% lambswool that’s
spun in Yorkshire. quintonchadwick.com 3 Recycled wool blanket > £45 Comes in a range of cheerful
colours. atlanticblankets.com 4 Boot holder > £55 Give it some wellies. johnlewis.com 5 Mug > £18
With plenty of room for your morning coffee. attpynta.com 6 Basket > £32 Cute baskets hand-woven
by women artisans in Northern Ghana. lolaandmawu.com

107

WISHLIST

Maker
of the
month

Transparent beauty
Crafting modern shapes in glass
ªIn a world overrun by massproduced disposable items,
Louisa Raven is an artisan
on a mission to remind us of
the beauty and authenticity of
handcrafted glassware. With
a passion for igniting joy through
her craft, Louisa, a master
glassblower, infuses her work
with a genuine craftsmanship.
Her love for working with glass
goes beyond the final product;
it’s about the process itself. She
finds the medium to be incredibly

immediate and exciting, requiring
quick thinking and a touch
of danger. Crafting glass, she
explains, is like a mesmerising
performance where heat, gravity,
centrifugal force, and hand tools
come together to create unique
pieces. “I love creating pieces
with individual character – no
two pieces of hand-made glass will
ever be the same,” she explains.
Her expertise at handling these
somewhat elemental forces allows
her to form carafes, glasses and
vases in contemporary shapes.
“I’m particularly proud of my
carafes, because nobody else

makes anything like them,”
she says. “I squeeze the body in
by hand while the glass is hot,
so they fit really nicely into your
hand, forming a direct connection
from maker to user.”
What’s more, Louisa works with
acclaimed ceramicist Sue Pryke.
louisaraven.com

V I B R A N T VO C A B U L A RY
The Dictionary People by Sarah Ogilvie

ªSarah Ogilvie’s sprightly look “at the unsung
heroes who created the Oxford English
Dictionary,” who set about researching the
“rare, obsolete, old-fashioned, new” words
that made their way into the 1928 edition.
Chancing upon an old address book of John
Murray, who devoted 36 years to the dictionary,

108

Sarah rediscovered the suffragists, academics,
naturists, novelists and enthusiasts who
assisted in the compilation of 414,825 entries.
It’s an enthralling story of endeavour and the
eccentric people who delighted in the quirks
of language and whose efforts help define and
describe the words and their usage. (Vintage)

Escaping the busy never looked so good.
Dimpsey Days…Shepherd hut stays
RELAX · RECHARGE · REDISCOVER
Indulge in a well deserved you-time or treat your loved ones to
a wonderful stay at Dimpsey in the Blackdown Hills in Somerset

DIMPSEY.CO.UK
contact@dimpsey.co.uk

•

01460 477770

•

@dimpsey_glamping

My place
THE CORNERS OF OUR HOMES THAT MEAN
THE MOST. THIS MONTH: A SPOT ON THE SOFA
Words: LOTTIE STOREY

“The orange sofa
was a second-hand
find, but it nearly
didn’t make it
in one piece.
It wouldn’t fit through the door and
the delivery driver was a moment
away from sawing a leg off to get it
through the window before I caught
him and advised that they unscrew!
I love the period features here, like
the panelling, original parquet floor
and our gorgeous sash window – and
the bright sofa brings a pop
of personality to the room alongside
our disco ball and prints.”
Lou Crane, Cheshire
@notaperioddrama

110

HOW WE LIVE

“I love how cosy this space
is - it’s such a welcoming
sight after a long day. The
sofa’s mossy green colour
gets lots of compliments,
but the best thing about
it is watching movies here
with the kids on rainy days.”
Chloe Greenwold, Colchester, Essex
@thegreenwoldgaff

“Getting a comfy
sofa was always
my No.1 priority.

“When I’m here, I feel energised
as I’m often about to go out
for a walk. I made the cushion
myself and the brown tweed was
a tactical choice to make sure
it didn’t show dirt easily!”

We went to the showroom to view
this sofa because it’s called ‘Crumpet’
and we had a lovely little hamster
called Crumpet, too – so it felt like
it was meant to be. It’s the first ever
piece of furniture we bought, so
I always feel very lucky when I sit here.”
Sophie Longmire, Chorlton, Manchester
@sophiswearing

Anna Hope, Bristol
@hope_and_the_house

111

“The fabric tells tales of shared
laughter, cosy movie nights, and
the comforting presence of loved
ones. Red wine was accidentally spilled on it recently but
the stain disappeared without a trace. I love that it’s not just
resilient, but embodies both durability and cherished moments.”
Coral McTigue, Hertfordshire
@coral.create

“I was six months’ pregnant
when we got the sofa and
it quickly became my place
to relax, sleep and work.
Then it became my favourite spot for a snooze and
a cuddle, and now it makes a great fort with some
blankets! It’s a great size for guests, but also works
well for my much-needed 1-1 catch-ups with friends.”
Jade Paris, Glasgow
@thegoffgaff

DO YOU HAVE A FAVOURITE SPOT IN YOUR HOME?
If you have a display cabinet that always makes you smile or a corner that’s made
all the better with your favourite textiles, get in touch and share your best picture at:
thesimplethings@icebergpress.co.uk

112

“I always said I’d have
a pink sofa in my first
house, so as soon as I
got the chance, I had to
buy one. I love sitting
here with a cup of tea
planning gatherings.”
Amy Skinner, Bristol
@chapter.102

BELONGINGS

W H AT I T R E A S U R E
Granny’s pie dish
By Kathryn Price

W

hile I have prettier things
by which to remember
her, nothing expresses
Granny’s personality
as well as her pie dish.
She loved fine china for her cup of tea, and
a good glass for her dram of whisky, but
the pie dish says much more about her.
Granny was born in 1897 and, as a girl,
she’d been in service in a big house. There’s a
photo of her from before the First World War,
taken as a gift for her mother – it’s a startling
likeness to my niece, some 100 years later.
While Granny was proud of being a cook,
including in Morpeth’s ‘Buttery’ (“That’s
The Buttery in The Queen’s Hotel, on the
main road, ye knaw”), she wasn’t the best
at teaching her four granddaughters to bake.
Well, not me, anyway.
“Ye don’t need a recipe to make a sponge,
pet, ye just…” then her hands blurred as she
threw ingredients together, beating with
a battered old spoon or fork.
“But Granny, how much do you put in?”
“Ee, I diven’t knaw. Just… enough. Just so.
Till it’s done.” Her pastry was always superb.
She died a month before my wedding
in 1991 and, years later, I’m still trying to
approach her heights. Yes, sometimes it’s
a pack of frozen short, puff or filo, but I do

make my own pastry too. Well, I try. And
I try again. I’ve read the recipe books,
watched the TV chefs, followed the advice
in magazines. Sometimes I give up for
a bit, then I think maybe this time…
And her pie dish has survived umpteen
bedsit/flat/house moves and declutterings.
Many things have been looked at, considered,
thanked and discarded, or just plain left, like
the time we forgot to pack the contents of an
entire kitchen cupboard. However the pie
dish has always survived.

“Her hands blurred as she
threw ingredients together.
Her pastry was always superb”
Each time the dish comes out, I’m hopeful.
My husband is encouraging; he eats my
piecrusts, whether soggy or leaden, barely
beige or charcoaled brown. But I just can’t
crack pastry – unless it’s the overcooked sort
that shatters into dark, brittle flakes. But we
like pie day, and one day, maybe I’ll get what
Granny was saying, with the ingredients
being just enough, and the method being
just so. The pie dish will stay till it’s done.
What means a lot to you? Tell us in 500 words;
thesimplethings@icebergpress.co.uk.

113

Where we stayed

SEEKING OUT LEEDS’ ARTS AND CULTURE SCENE,
BEFORE DRIFTING OFF IMMERSED IN IT AT THE
FUNKY AND AFFORDABLE ART HOSTEL
Words and photos: LISA SYKES

ou may think your hostelling days are done, however, you might think
again when you stay at the Art Hostel in Leeds. Affordable, friendly,
spacious and central big city accommodation is notoriously hard to pin
down but this 12-room building, each adorned by a different artist, and
less than 10 minutes’ walk from Leeds’ Victoria Quarter, is a real find.
For an art-themed weekend, albeit often with a distinct northern
twang, Leeds is ideal, being full of murals, street art, community projects and
sculpture trails, as well as galleries and spaces, both traditional and contemporary.
No car necessary, as none of it is more than half-an-hour’s walk from the station.
114

PHOTOGRAPHY: HANNAH PLATT; MOHAMMAD BARRANGI

Weekend away

The Art Hostel, a social enterprise
for East Street Arts in Mabgate,
a relatively quiet backwater with
a park and old industrial buildings
that’s being slowly taken on by
charities, art hubs and co-ops.
There’s a sunspot with seats out
front, cleverly hidden from a nearby
flyover; a surprisingly peaceful
spot to sit with a beer from local
craft brewery Northern Monk.
Communal areas are cheerful and
sociable: a lounge with art books to
browse and a shared kitchen with
colourful ceramic tiles and giant
flower sculptures made from car
tail-lights. Guests receive ear plugs
and toothbrushes, towels and bed
linen so you can literally turn up,
as we did, with a small backpack for
the weekend. It’s 20 minutes’ walk
to Leeds station and even closer to
Leeds’ famous Victorian arcades.

A PLACE TO STAY

Our room

What we ate

Each of the 12 rooms is adorned
by a different artist. Ours – Living
in a Wonderland by Mohammad
Barrangi – was a 4-bed family
en-suite with restored parquet
floors, homely rugs, packing crate
bedside tables and bunks made from
recycled metalwork. There are also
twins and dorms of different sizes;
you can stay solo, with friends
or family but there are, thankfully,
no stags and hens. Beds are plain and
simple, all the better to showcase the

A helpful handout pin-pointed great
indie places to eat. But it was the
promise of the signature ‘Yorkshire
Pudding Burger’ at Wapentake,
a pub on Kirkgate, that caught our
eye. It did not disappoint. Ensconced
in a bar claiming to exist ‘for the love
of all things Yorkshire’, we tucked
in to the heartiest of dinners. This
community pub is also a café and
bakery, there’s a graffiti covered
piano and local artists’ work creates
an impromptu exhibition on the
walls. The pub’s name refers to
a Danelaw administrative division
of the three Yorkshire Ridings. We
discussed the possibility of other
drinking establishments being
named after branches of historical
local government. But not for long.
There was local ale to drink and
pudding to consume. For those
whose love of Yorkshire may not be
quite so fervent, I also recommend
the House of Fu for tasty ramen;
there are karaoke pods upstairs
if you fancy making a night of it.

art. Included in the reasonable price
was a ‘light breakfast’, which turned
out to be a student-style all-youcan-eat feast of fruit, cereals, toast
and pastries with tea and coffee on
serve-yourself tap. A big guest fridge
and the full complement of pots and
pans means you can also cook your
own supper – ideal if you’re bringing
the kids or are on a tight budget.

favourites. We sought out Winifred,
an armoured elephant, wearing the
white rose of Yorkshire, in a ginnel
(alleyway) in the business district.
Then there are the galleries: Leeds
Art Gallery with its collection of
20th century art; the Henry Moore
Institute and The Tetley, HQ of the
former brewery, now a contemporary
art gallery. An exhibition at the
fascinating Stanley & Audrey Burton
Gallery on the university campus
on rethinking landscape art,
reminded us how closely connected
Leeds is to the open landscapes
of Yorkshire that surrounds it.

The best bit

What we did
Art, art and more art. Once you
have your eye in, you spot street
art all over the place. But Leeds
makes it easy with a Street Art Trail
(visitleeds.co.uk/street-art-gallery).
The Grey Heron by Centenary
Bridge, designed to be submerged
and reappear with the water level
of the River Aire, was one of our

Arriving on foot with a backpack –
you feel like you’re exploring a newto-you European city as a twentysomething again. While a hostel
makes for chance encounters and
you realise how impersonal so many
hotels are. It’s also firmly rooted in
it’s community, inviting you to
explore a neighbourhood as well as
the city’s must-sees. Wandering and
seeking out the street art was way
more fun than spending time in a
shopping mall. And Leeds is a
compact enough city to walk it all.

A night at Art Hostel, Leeds: From
£25 per bunk for a shared room;
£60 for a twin/double; and £85
for a family room. arthostel.org.uk
115

A BEAUTIFUL SPACE CREATED FOR LOVERS OF SHOPPING
SHOP ONLINE STUFFANDCO.CO.UK
FOLLOW ON INSTAGRAM @STUFFANDCOUK
WEST STREET | MIDHURST | WEST SUSSEX | GU29 9NF

FIGHT
COLDS &
FLU WITH
THREE
TIMES
THE POWER
HRI Coldcare is a triple formula used to support a strong immune system.
Winter doesn’t have to mean battling with colds and fl u. Take HRI Coldcare at the fi rst signs of
a cold – a unique tablet formula combining Echinacea herb plus 100% RDA of vitamin C and
zinc in the daily dose. HRI Coldcare is a traditional herbal medicinal product used to relieve the
symptoms of colds and fl u. Based on traditional use only. Always read the label.

HRIherbalmedicine.co.uk

iscellany

Keep the
light on

Tales of fire and ice, ran
an
ngiing from Vienna to a land down under. Storm watch
from a lighthousse, walk like a penguin and write your own song
Compiled by
b FRA
R NCES AMBLER Illustrations KAVEL RAFFERTY

down to a tea towel

PHOTOGRAPHY: SHUTTERSTOCK; ADOBE STOCK; GETTY; ROBERT DAVIES/SHUTTERSTOCK

Monica Gabbs, the
designer behind
Twenty Birds, loves
birds and all their
variations. Go on,
test yourself on how
many you can identify
from their feathers
as you dry up. £14,
twentybirds.co.uk

O L D J E A NS

BRICK IN THE WALL
How many five-letter words can you find reading
down the face of our wall? The letters of each word
can only read downwards on touching bricks,
taking just one from each line.

(answers on page 124)

“Think before you speak.
Read before you think”

What to do with...

Nipper was a real
dog (apparently
a terrier mix)
– first seen in a
1898 painting by
Francis Barraud.
It was sold to
the ‘Gramophone
Company’, later
renamed ‘His
Master’s Voice’
(and still later
HMV), due to the
logo’s popularity.

PRACTICAL: The
denim works for baby’s
bibs; alternatively,
instructables.com has
a tutorial for making
them into an apron.
Or how about a DIY
denim heat pad? Find
a how-to on the blog
at knittyvet.com.
PLAYFUL: Pop kids in
oversized pairs, gently
tied at the ankles. The
game is to run (as best

they can) to collect a
list of items, carrying
them in the jeans.
SILLY: Long-time
readers may recall
Ian Berry from our
September 2017 issue,
who creates intricate
scenes from old denim
(ianberry.org). He’s even
making a replica of his
living room. Proving
no subject matter – or
material – is off limits.

a jolly good follow
@cabinhounds
What’s better than a cosy cabin? A cosy cabin with dogs.
This is the stuff of dreams (Instagram).

Fran Lebowitz

117

Track record
VI E N N A B Y
U LT R AV O X
It seems that the charts in
February 1981 were a very
negative place. At number
one, Joe Dolce, with Shaddap
You Face. And then, at
number two, Ultravox
proclaiming “This means
nothing to me.” It’s one of
pop’s indignities that Vienna
– a sweeping, impressionistic
tale of the end of a love affair
– never made it to the top
(although it later won a poll
of the best singles that only
reached number two, beating
the likes of Elvis and The
Beatles). There are various
stories about how the famous
line came into being: one says
it’s a proclamation lyricist
Midge Ure made in the
studio, another that he came
in with it already in his head.
At the time, they also said the

song was inspired by the 1949
film The Third Man – again,
not true they later admitted
(though its influence was
felt in the video), the
inspiration came because the
city has a “decaying elegance
about it. In such a crumbling
environment, you could
easily fall in love.” Should
you be inspired to visit
Vienna, there’s a guide to the
places featured in the video
at visitingvienna.com. But
– for a budget version – do
a day trip to London: Covent
Garden and the former
Gaumont State Theatre in
Kilburn were both filming
locations, too. And let’s not
forget some of the song’s
other fine filmic moments:
appearing in the holy trio
of Father Ted, Ashes
To Ashes and
Doctor Who.

³PET CORNER

DOGS IN BLANKETS
Florence, 1, Gordon Setter
“Pass me the neaps and
tatties, I am ready to address
a haggis.”
As nominated by David Parker

trick is not to
“Happiness is a gift and the
when it comes”
expect it, but to delight in it
Charles Dickens

118

How to...
M OV E A C R O S S S N O W A N D IC E
On feet: walk like a
penguin! Have your feet
turned out slightly, with
your body weight over the
feet. Take smaller, lighter
steps. Your arms can help
balance: keep them free.
And do use something
that penguins don’t have
– shoes with good grip!
On ice skates: begin with
the penguin walk, gradually
extending your step length.
Bend your knees and
adjust your body so the
head, knees and feet
are in line. The key is
keeping your balance
as you adjust your body
weight, switching between
each leg to push off. Keep
movements on the small
side and you’re less likely to
fall. But, if you do, try to fall

to your side, keeping your
head and hands tucked in.
On wheels: if you have
to use a bike or car, take
it slow. Try to use suitable
tyres if you can (on a
bike, fatter/wider tyres
are better, or taking a little
bit of air out can help with
grip). Keep all movements
as calm as possible (so
no sudden slamming on
of brakes, or sharp turns).
In a sledge: use one that’s
actually made for the job
(forget baking trays and
the like!), then sit back,
legs straight out in front.
Experiment with shifting
your body weight to move
the sledge – such as lifting
a leg, or leaning into the
direction, to move one way.
On skis: see Almanac, p26.

Take THREE

QUICK-FIRE QUIZ

Simple pick-me-ups for keeping houseplants happy*

FORTIFYING FEED
Like us, our houseplants can
do with a bit of fortification.
Best for: bringing extra
nutrients to help with
glossy leaves and the like.
£5.99, leafenvy.co.uk

INDOOR WATERING CAN
Steel and beechwood add
up to a very stylish design.
Best for: doing a much more
efficient job than your kitchen
jug or outdoor watering can.
£20, cornercopiastore.co.uk

*For more houseplant help, see p98

MINI PLANT TOOLS
Repot, sow and tidy… in
more dainty dimensions.
Best for: tidying away easily
as they are sized at a scale
suitable for houseplants.
£12.95, oliverbonas.com

1 What links Bailey, Fair Isle
and Fastnet and celebrates
100 years on 1 January?
2 Whose diary starts the
year with ‘January: An
Exceptionally Bad Start’?
3 On what seasonal event
can you expect to hear
The Selkirk Grace?
4 St Dwynwen – her day
marked in Wales on
25 January – is the
patron saint of what?
5 What teen-favourite
magazine would have
turned 60 this month?
(answers on page 124)

SUDOKU
Fill the grid so that every column, every row
and every 3x3 box contains 1 to 9

WAYS TO MAKE ART
Take your cue from famous artists
with a creative challenge
Choose a favourite image and try to create it using coloured
modelling clay. For her project ‘Photographs Rendered in
Play-Doh’, Eleanor Macnair uses the modelling material to
remake images by famous photographers. Reconstructing an
image this way makes you slow down and look at it carefully.
Taken from Open This Box And Make Some Art by Robert Shore
(Frances Lincoln). Illustrated by Gorkie

(answers on page 124)

119

R
READE DS
MEN
RECOM

A GOOD READ

COLLECTIVE NOUNS

The Silent Treatment by
Abbie Greaves is a sad story,
but one that vividly shows the
deep love of a couple for a
much-wanted daughter and the
joy of family
life shines
through the
sadness. Every
parent – and
child! – should
read this book.
As nominated by Nicky Horrocks
Read a good book you want
to share? Tell us all about it
by emailing thesimplethings@
icebergpress.co.uk

³IT'S IN THE BAG

A b a r re l o f m o n k ey s

barbie:
barbecue; budgie smugglers:
ming
short, tight-fitting men’s swim
trunks; dunny: the loo; esky:
ikin:
portable food/drink cooler; larr
rted,
someone naughty but kind-hea
ich;
like a scallywag; sanger: sandw
thongs: flip-flops; tucker: food

TALK LIKE … AN AUSSIE
CALLIGRAPHY
Any keen calligraphers will need a pen. To begin, try
experimenting with a brush pen. Then, you might want
to move on to more traditional ones with different nibs,
depending on the calligraphy style (unlike handwriting,
calligraphy has set styles and rules) and calligraphy ink
(thicker than regular pen ink). Whatever you’re using to
write with, you are going to want paper that’s as smooth
and thick as possible. A ruler, pencil and eraser can be
handy for drawing guidelines and sketching out ideas,
and there are lots of practice sheets online to help you
get to grips with your style of choice with a flourish.

120

MAKE FIRE WITH ICE
At first there seems to be some kind of elemental
magic at play here. In fact, this is a simple variation
on the classic solar fire-starting method, where the
sun’s rays are concentrated and redirected to create
a fire. It takes some practice, but you’ll get there in
the end. Have a go!
1. Finding clear ice (without bubbles) is an important
first step. The ice around a river or lake could work
well, or you could even make your own by boiling
water, leaving it to cool twice before freezing.
2. Shape the ice into a convex lens form with a knife
and smooth with the heat of your hands – it should become a circle around 15cm
in diameter and at least 7cm thick at the widest point, curved on both sides.
3. Lean the ice against something sturdy (two logs, rocks or knives) and move your tinder
into the burn point. This means you don’t need to worry about holding the ice still. When
your tinder catches after glowing and smoking, feed the tiny fire with birch bark and thin
sticks before moving on to bigger fuel.
Taken from Fifty Things To Do In The Snow by Richard Skrein (HarperCollins). Illustration by Maria Nilsson

Heritage hunter

³GOOD GAME

A meander through UNESCO’s list of Intangible Cultural Heritage
HUACONADA, RITUAL DANCE OF MITO, PERU

Rather than being tucked
up in bed, the village of Mito
in the Peruvian Andes marks
the first three days of January
a bit differently, with a series
of dances performed by
huacones. The huacones are
men of the village, disguised
by costumes and elaborately
carved masks. The masks
echo the face of the condor,
representing the spirit of the
mountains. Costumes are
passed down through the
generations, fathers to sons.

The men are divided into
two: the elders and the
modern. The latter wear
much more colourful clothes,
but also have to dance strictly
choreographed steps, while
the elders get a bit more
freedom to improvise.
There are some other crucial
elements to the dance: the
accompanying musicians,
particularly the traditional
tinya drum and the distinctive
crack of the whip (tronador)
carried by the men.

INDOOR CURLING
Don’t let bad weather stop
play. Have a go at curling
from the warmth of your own
home – happily no ice required,
only a flat
surface.
It’s a
hit! £15,
prezzybox.
com
121

Take your
pick-le

GOOGLE VOX…

+

+

=
Apparently 5.5 out of
10 of us still have a
calendar on our walls.

Store cupboard sums
Deli pickles Toast 1 tbsp mustard seeds, 2 tsp coriander seeds
and 2 tsp black peppercorns in a dry frying pan for 5 mins. In a pan
over a medium heat, heat 500ml vinegar, 700ml water, 2 tbsp salt,
7 tbsp caster sugar and the toasted spices, swirling the pan until
the salt and sugar dissolve. Meanwhile, wash 1kg baby cucumbers
and pack into a sterilised 2-ltr Kilner jar. Pour over the hot pickling
liquid, cool for 15 mins with the lid open, then seal and leave at room
temp for 24 hrs. Keep in fridge and eat the gherkins within a week.
Taken from The Modern Spice Rack by Esther Clark and
Rachel Walker (Hardie Grant). Photography: Matt Russell
³SIMPLE PILATES

A BIT OF A

That’s compared to
only 27% of women
who keep a diary.

SEEING
SEEING DOUBLE
DOUBLE
Each pair of words shares two middle
letters. The first has been filled in as
an example. Complete the remaining
words to find the mystery keyword
reading down the middle.

stretch

Spine Twist Supine Strengthens core muscles, as well as the inner thigh
muscles, the quads and the calf muscles. 1 Start on your back and raise
your legs one at a time into the tabletop position: knees gently pressed
together and held directly above the hips with lower legs parallel to the
floor, feet gently pointed and arms out to the side with palms facing up.
2 Exhale. Gently pull your abdominals in and tilt your pelvis just a little
toward your face so you feel your core muscles engage. 3 Inhale. Rotate
your pelvis and legs as one unit to the right, keeping knees together and
shoulders on the mat. 4 Exhale. Draw your abdominals in and rotate
back to the start position. 5 Inhale. Rotate your lower body to the left.
6 Exhale. Return once again to your start position. 7 Repeat 4-5 times
in each direction, making a total of 8–10 times.
Taken from The Little Book Of Pilates by Rachel Lawrence (Vie).
Find Rachel online @thegirlwiththepilatesmat

122

(answers on page 124)

IDENTIFIER
Lighthouses

Stalwarts for seafarers, you’d be extra
grateful for these in a storm. If your knowledge of the
Atlantic or the Pacific isn’t too terrific, use our handy guide to light your way.

Bell Rock

Adziogal

Longstone

This treasure on a North Sea island (well, a rock)
was engineered by R.L. Stevenson’s grandad. Lit
in 1811, it’s the oldest still standing in open sea.

Takes design inspiration from a wicker basket.
Its red metal frame has helped those weaving
their way up Ukraine’s Dnipro River since 1911.

A Northumberland landmark made legendary
thanks to the daring of the keeper’s daughter, Grace
Darling, rescuing survivors from a wreck in 1838.

Maatsuyker

Smalls Lighthouse

Klein Curaçao

A Tasmanian devil between the Pacific and
Indian oceans. So isolated, its keepers were only
contactable via pigeon post in the early 1800s.

A Welsh wonder, site of not-so-small disputes of
keepers Griffith and Howell, trapped together for
months, inspiring 2019’s The Lighthouse film.

From 1913 until 2008, you’d be in-klein-ed to steer
clear of this Caribbean island as the lighthouse was
abandoned – the wreck's still visible on its shore.

Stannard Rock

Wenwei Zhou

Evangelistas

Stands alone by being in a lake (albeit one of the
world’s biggest), not at sea. Marks the mountain
under North America's Lake Superior.

A lighthouse of two halves: on split levels, it also
required negotiation between China and Britain
(for nearby colonised Hong Kong) to build it.

Keeps you on the Strait of Magellan, between
the Atlantic and Pacific. Its Scottish engineer
also kept busy, with 70-plus lighthouse builds.

These illustrations are by José Luis González Macías, taken from his book, A Brief Atlas Of The Lighthouses At The End Of The World.
Translated by Daniel Hahn (Picador).

123

Clever thinking

How hard can it be...

Smart ideas for boosting your brain

T O W RIT E YO U R O W N S O NG
Lots of people do it (just look at
Spotify!), though, of course, some
do it better than others. It requires
practice and patience – but you
can improve with a few pointers.
Study the greats. What are your
favourite songs? “You learn by
listening to tunes,” says Tom
Waits, no less. “Take them apart
and see what they’re made of.”
Take it to the bridge. Most genres
follow similar patterns that you
can follow using the verse, chorus
and bridge (the connecting bit).
Start with echoing the patterns
of a genre you know well.
Thank you for the music. Y
You don’t
need to be a virtuoso musician,
but it’ll help if you can give yourself
a bit of basic knowledge of the
likes of chords, keys and scales.
More than words. The lyrics are
the trickiest bit, according to
one poll. Keep a note of possible
ideas and observations to build

on. Paul Simon advises starting
with “something simple and true,
that has a lot of possibilities.”
Play to your strengths. A key part
of writing a song is to actually start
writing a song. Pick the part that
comes most naturally to you.
John Legend, for example, starts
by trying “to come up with musical
ideas, then the melody, then the
hook, and the lyrics come last.”
Get back-up. Think of the brilliant
songwriting partnerships like
Lennon and McCartney or Carole
King and Gerry Goffin. Perhaps
a pal can help bolster your skills.
And don’t forget digital help, with
software such as GarageBand.
Keep on truckin’. Devote time
to it each day, and it’ll come
more easily. And try to enjoy
the process. Last word goes
to Macca, who says it’s still one
of his biggest thrills to sit down
“trying to make a song happen.”

Daydream
For more lightbulb moments, allow your
brain some idle time. Try adding 10-minute
breaks to your diary between tasks, or set
alarms to remind yourself to tune out.
The science: When you’re not actively
engaged in a task, a group of brain regions
called the default-mode network becomes
more active. Ideas and solutions emerge
through daydreaming because this
network probes your long-term memory
to find associations in the Aladdin’s cave
of your life experiences.

ell’s
Half of the sales of Campb
take place in the
Cream of Mushroom soup
ber to January
three months from Novem

DID YOU KNOW

NICE FIND

A china cup, made for
first-class passengers on
the Titanic, was spotted
on a kitchen shelf
in Burton-on-Trent by
eagle-eyed
antiques
pro, Charles
Hanson. It
later sold
for more
than £3,000.
124

Taken from Brain Gym by Dr Sabina Brennan,
illustrated by Andy Goodman. Available at laurenceking.com

PUZZLE SOLUTIONS
Brick in the wall
Agent, apace, place, plant,
price, prick, pride, slack,
slant, slice, slick, slide, space,
spank, spelt, spent

Sudoku solution

Quick-fire quiz
1. The first broadcast of The
Shipping Forecast (originally
called Weather Shipping)
2. Bridget Jones 3. Burns Night
4. Lovers 5. Jackie
Seeing Double
1. Umpire 2. Rapier 3. Bonsai
4. Census 5. Entrée
6. Betray 7. Triple 8. Sniper
9. Fiesta 10. Muesli
Mystery keyword: Pinstripes

Puzzles provided by Lovatts Crosswords
& Puzzles (lovattspuzzles.com)

FE B RUARY ISSU E

TENDER
Gathering

Wellbeing

Looking back

Sharing a fondue

Being gentle with yourself

What’s for breakfast?

Gardens

Know a thing or two

Growing

A home for birds

Here be dragons

Tales from the veg patch

IF YOU ENJOYED THIS ISSUE…
PHOTOGRAPHY: CATHERINE FRAWLEY; JESKA HERNE

… you can buy the next one at picsandink.com from 31 January 2024
If you really liked it, might we suggest a subscription delivered to your door? – see page 60

ON SALE 31 JANUARY 2024
TERMS AND CONDITIONS By taking part in our competitions and giveaways, you agree to be bound by the Competition Rules, which are summarised below but can be viewed in full at icebergpress.co.uk/comprules.
1. Late or incomplete entries will be disqualified. 2. Proof of posting (if relevant) shall not be deemed proof of delivery. 3. Entries must be submitted by an individual (not via any agency or similar) and, unless otherwise stated, are
limited to one per household. 4. Iceberg Press reserves the right in its sole discretion to substitute any prize with cash or a prize of comparable value. 5. Unless otherwise stated, the Competition is open to all GB residents of 18 years
and over, except employees of Iceberg Press and any party involved in the Competition or their households. 6. Winners will be selected at random from all correct entries received by the closing date. If for any reason there are more
winners than prizes, a simple draw will take place. 7. By entering a Competition you give permission to use your name, likeness and personal information in connection with the Competition and for promotional purposes. All entries
will become the property of the company upon receipt and will not be returned. You warrant that the Competition entry is entirely your own work and not copied or adapted from any other source. If you are a winner, you may have
to provide additional information. 8. Details of winners will be available on request within three months of the closing date. If you are a winner, your receipt of any prize is conditional upon you complying with (among other things)
the Competition Rules. You acknowledge and agree that neither Iceberg Press nor any associated third parties shall have any liability to you in connection with your use and/or possession of your prize.
DATA PROTECTION TERMS AND CONDITIONS When entering our Competitions by post, text or email, you agree to our Competition Rules and that you’re happy to receive details of future offers and promotions from
Iceberg Press Limited and carefully selected third parties, via post, email or text message. If you do not want to receive this information, please mark your email entries ‘NO OFFERS’ or include
the word ‘STOP’ at the end of your text message.

PLAYLIST

JA N U A

RY

8
Soundtrack to January

E I G H T DAY S A W E E K

Saturday
Wednesday Morning, 3AM
A Sunday Kind Of Love
Monday, Monday

The Beatles
The Bangles
Blondie
The Pogues
The Cure
The Specials
Sam Cooke
Holly Humberstone
Oliver Cheatham
Margo Guryan
Khruangbin
The Clientele
Simon & Garfunkel
Etta James
The Mamas & The Papas

Take a listen at thesimplethings.com/blog/daysoftheweek

stop
look
listen
126

“Friday’s at an end,
I can’t wait for Saturday to begin!
Get down it’s Saturday night”

DJ: FRANCES AMBLER; ILLUSTRATION: ANNELIESE KLOS

Eight Days A Week
Manic Monday
Sunday Girl
Tuesday Morning
Friday I’m In Love
Friday Night, Saturday Morning
Another Saturday Night
Thursday
Get Down Saturday Night
Sunday Morning
Friday Morning

FOOD TO SHARE

CU
A N DT O U T
KEE
P

Too good to keep to ourselves. Try it and pass it on

Ham and green
eggs noodles
A great way to use up
leftover Christmas ham
and veg, in a simple,
filling and tasty dish. »

127

Ham and green eggs noodles

Serves 2
100g cavolo nero or kale, tough
stems removed, finely shredded
1 spring onion, sliced
4 eggs, beaten
2 tbsp neutral oil
2 tbsp butter
1 garlic clove, crushed or grated
100g Christmas ham or pork belly
slices, chopped into 1cm pieces
2 nests fresh or dried thick
wheat noodles
1 handful of frozen peas
1 tbsp light soy sauce
1 tbsp kecap manis (sweet
soy sauce)
¼ tsp freshly ground black pepper
1 Add the shredded cavolo nero
and the spring onion to the
beaten eggs.
2 Heat 1 tbsp of the neutral oil in
a non-stick, heavy-based frying
pan over a medium-high heat and
spread it around the pan using
paper towel. Add the egg mixture
and swirl the pan to create a thin
omelette. Cook on both sides for
1–2 mins, or until the eggs are just
set. Transfer from the pan to a
chopping board and, when cool
enough, roll it up into a sausage

128

shape. Cut the omelette into
1cm slices and set aside.
3 Give the pan a wipe, then
return it to a medium heat and
add the remaining 1 tbsp of
neutral oil, the butter and garlic.
Fry for 30 seconds, or until
fragrant. Add the pork belly and
cook on all sides for 3–4 mins, or
until evenly browned and crispy.
4 Meanwhile, cook the fresh or
dried noodles according to the
packet instructions.
5 Add the peas to the pork and
cook for another minute. Add the
light soy sauce, kecap manis and
black pepper and mix well. Scoop
the noodles from their pan and
pop them straight into the frying
pan with the pork and peas. Fold
through the buttery soy sauce.
Add the omelette pieces and
toss through. Serve immediately.
Cook’s note: The pork belly
can be swapped out for smoked
bacon or air-dried ham. It also
works really well with crumbled
sausage meat.

Taken from Simple Noodles by Pippa
Middlehurst (Quadrille). Photography
by India Hobson & Magnus Edmondson

GETTING IN TOUCH

WHERE WAS THAT?

thesimplethings@icebergpress.co.uk
020 3950 1835
thesimplethings.com
Visit our blog for original features
and sign up for our newsletter

Good things to eat and drink
A feast of spices
6
Earl grey loaf cake
23
Marmalade goodness 36
Smoked sbiten
62
Ham and green eggs 127

The Simple Things
Iceberg Press
The Old Bakery
3b Hoskins Road
Oxted
Surrey RH8 9HT
/THESIMPLETHINGSMAG
/SIMPLETHINGSMAG
/SIMPLETHINGSMAG

Good people & places
Magical parakeets
16
My day in cups of tea 24
My Island:
Vancouver Island
30
Wisdom: Jay Blades
42
Women mountaineers 46
Good news
68
Modern wassailing
78
Shop: Niaski
104

Maker: Glassblower
Leeds art hostel

108
114

Feeling better
Cosy reads
Stitch journalling
A feeling for sauna
Poem
Use it or lose it
Playlist
Bedtime story

51
64
70
77
84
126
130

The comfort of things
The winter honesty box 14
Tidal treasures
18
Pyjamas
83
Spring bulbs
89

Home tour
Houseplants
Wishlist
A spot on the sofa
What I treasure

90
98
102
110
113

Proudly homemade
Pink grapefruit curd
Lip balm
Furniture rehab
Deli pickles

15
27
56
122

… and more
Could-do list
January almanac
Miscellany
Nature table

3
26
117
132

/SIMPLETHINGS

MEET THE TEAM
Subscriptions
subscriptions@icebergpress.co.uk
020 3950 1835
Advertising
rob@icebergpress.co.uk
07896 239433
Publishing & Licensing
david@icebergpress.co.uk
07768 873139

Taking time to live well

January

Deputy Editor
Frances Ambler

Art Editors
Anneliese Klos
Joe McIntyre

Sub Editors
Abbie Miller
Maria Lester

Commissioning Editor
(Homes, food & projects)
Karen Dunn

Editor-at-Large
Iona Bower

Commissioning Editors
(Travel, nature & growing)
Jo Mattock
Jo Tinsley

Editor Lisa Sykes

Picture Editor
Liz Boyd
Wellbeing Editor
Rebecca Frank

Books Editor
Eithne Farry

Wishlist Editor
Louise Gorrod
Reprographics Editor
James Wootton
Commercial Director
Rob Biddiss
Subscription Manager
Heléna Broadbridge
Assistant Publisher
Fiona Hamilton
Managing Director
David Parker

Co-founders
David Parker, Guy Foreman, Lisa Sykes
icebergpress.co.uk

NOOK

Cosy books to curl up with • Wearing PJs • Marmalade sandwich pudding
A feeling for sauna • Spice-baked cauliflower • Modern wassailing
Furniture rehab & houseplant rescue • Tarns, hares & tideline treasures

FRONT COVER HOLLY JOLLIFFE
BACK COVER ALICE TATHAM
PRINT HOUSEPLANT WALLPAPER
BY OHPOPSI (JANECLAYTON.CO.UK)

The Simple Things is published by Iceberg Press, printed by William Gibbons and distributed by
Seymour. We print on chlorine-free paper and our subscription copies are wrapped in paper, which can
be recycled. © Iceberg Press Limited 2024. All rights reserved. No part of this magazine may be used
or reproduced without the written permission of the publisher. ISSN 2050-4136
Iceberg Press Limited is registered in England, company no 09051321 with its registered office at
Thorne House, Turners Hill Road, Crawley Down, West Sussex RH10 4HQ. All information contained in
this magazine is for information only and is, as far as we are aware, correct at the time of going to press.
Iceberg Press Limited does not accept any responsibility for errors or inaccuracies in such information.
Readers are advised to contact retailers directly with regard to the price of products/services referred
to in this magazine.

BEDTIME STORY

THE RETURN

he sight of her own shins surprised her.
Pearlescent almost in their whiteness,
goosebumping in the biting air with the rest
of her, they looked vulnerable, like pale grubs
dug up from the earth. She wondered when she
had last truly noticed her legs, really studied
them. In her forties, perhaps, when she had met the love
of her life and felt reborn; or, no, it must have been 23 years
later when grief, for a spell, had rendered her a stranger
in her own body.
She deposited clothes and bag in the plastic bin that the
girl, who was wrapped head-to-foot in down jacket and
woollens, pointed out, and felt the shoulder straps of her
borrowed bikini slinking south. Clamping towel to chest,
she clambered into the horsebox before nakedness claimed
her completely.
Heat and silence. Scent of cedar. She lowered herself
stiffly onto the bench near the stove and faced the wall of
glass. Outside, tufted dune, damp sand, grey, flat sea. A
single cormorant floated on the water, idle, as if at a loss.
She wondered why she had come. The others had cancelled,
Covid-stricken, but it was all their idea. Sweat out the
Christmas booze! Experience real Scotland! The benefits
of winter swimming! Not a chance she was going in.
She had allowed herself to be manoeuvred through
this first Christmas without family, hauled up north by
well-meaning friends and shoehorned into their traditions.
But there were limits. East Neuk had sounded nice, Neuk
(nyook) meaning nook or corner, but it struck her now
that she had indeed turned a corner and the vista was
this: grey, flat, cold. A future borrowed and ill-fitting.
She closed her eyes and tried to imagine Australia. It
might be as hot as this right now, her daughter and the boys
in shorts and flip-flops in January. Before they had flown
away in early autumn like the swallows, she had smiled
gamely, as if grateful for the promises of long Zoom calls
and annual visits. Wicked, secret rage. Her hands gripped
the bench, nails digging into cedar. She caught herself,
breathed out, opened her eyes.
The cormorant, without warning, dived. The sauna was
doing its job; moisture seeped from her skin, filling folds
and crannies. She considered her legs again, the stand-out
veins, scarred knee, crepey flesh; and higher up, her belly,
flushed pink and wrinkling over the ridiculous bikini.
Gratitude filled her, the real kind. This stubbornly enduring
form had seen her round other corners. Big ones. From

130

singledom to motherhood; old-fashioned marriage to the
love of another woman; wife to widow, twice. It was at the
turning points, she realised, that she returned to herself
like this, as if her body were a tool for calibrating change.
To return. Re-turn. She scanned the water for the
cormorant, but she must have missed it. The grey expanse
was like slate. A clean slate. Funny how a word can change
the view. The increasing heat was making her heart beat
faster and the chill beginnings of the year outside seem
less hostile. Inviting even. The girl had disappeared to
the warmth of her car. It was midweek and the coffee van
had broken down, so no one else was around. She could
try it, test the water, at least up to her pearly shins. There
was always this warm and woody womb to return to,
and afterwards, the texture of her own skin, the thud
of her pulse, the body that still served as a homing
beacon for her family, wherever they might be.
The cormorant bobbed to the surface, shook its feathers,
settled again.
“Where have you been?” she said out loud, meaning it.
Forgetting her towel, she went to find out.
Hester Musson’s debut, The Beholders (published by
4th Estate on 18 January) is a dark slice of 19th-century
Gothic. Her Simple Thing is to get up early in the morning
to sip coffee and write nonsense in her journal.

ILLUSTRATION: LARA PAULUSSEN

A short story by HESTER MUSSON

5

YEARS

Exceptional British made wood stoves for the home.
01983 537780 • @charnwoodstoves • www.charnwood.com

charnwood

£6.99

ISSUE 139 • JANUARY 2024 • PRINTED IN THE UK