Feat of clay

Clay – it has fired her imagination all her adult life and ceramicist Janna Edwards remains endlessly fascinated, challenged and inspired by it. For her it’s the stuff of life, as indeed it may be for us all if, as some claim, life on Earth began in the sticky stuff.
From her studio at Livability Holton Lee, the idyllic 350-acre discovery centre on the shores of Poole Harbour, for almost twenty years Janna has overseen the uniquely inspirational 15 Days In Clay project she conceived in 2003 to give adults with learning/additional needs the opportunity to explore their creativity and become artists in their own right.

‘Each sculpture should be an event’

Sculpture by the Lakes is a work of art in its own right, a haven for people and for sculpture where natural beauty is enhanced by the hand of man – one man, Simon Gudgeon. The soft lines of his monumental work somehow slip effortlessly into the landscape around Pallington Lakes as if the most natural thing in the world to find in this sanctuary for the soul is a pair of giant tilted heads you can look through. They’re quite wonderful.

Life beneath the ocean wave

Even if everything does happen for a reason Maria Munn could be forgiven for wondering why she had to be run over and suffer terrible injuries and multiple organ damage, not just once, but twice. So to find her in the hard-earned comfort of her photographic studio in Swanage professing gratitude for such near catastrophic events takes a moment to process.

Zoot alors!

He was the ‘Flamingo Flasher’, chief mischief maker and mickey taker, the clown prince of the beat clubs, always game for a laugh and a ready foil for whoever he played alongside – when they come to write the definitive history of British Beat they’ll need plenty of space dedicated to Zoot Money.

The staff of life

Few things are quite as primal as our daily bread. The Biblical staff of life, it has occupied a position of social, cultural and nutritional significance whenever and wherever mankind has turned its hand to baking it. ‘Making bread is what I do and the fact it helps support the lives of the people that Read More…

Curious corners of Poole

Ten places in Poole that reveal less well-known features of the town’s history

‘It has to be about the work’

what artist Sarah Hough did, to contemplate and respond in art to the environment she found there. It was no small effort, but in Sarah’s book neither was it evidence for the cod-philosophy that claims it is necessary to suffer for one’s art.

Ale and hearty – Hattie Brown’s

From the corner of a farm that nestles in the lee of Ballard Down, the first brewery in Swanage for more than a century quietly goes about its business of producing quality beer its patrons like and a living for its directors – brewer Jean Young and her partner Kevin Hunt who writes the recipes.

Flock together – a Dorset sheep dynasty

Grazing the hills and fields around North Poorton, as they have for more than a century, these Dorset Horn sheep are more precious than they could ever know – for they have the endangered breed’s longest pure bloodline in the country, and in all likelihood, the world.
Beautifully proportioned, sturdy, docile and unerringly versatile, these sheep are as easy to work with as they are on the eye. That’s according to Francis Fooks, who with brothers Michael, David and Jeffrey, farms the land their grandfather took on in 1920 with its flock of Dorset Horns established by their great grandfather in 1906.

A St Aldhelm’s Head mystery

Laid to rest in a shallow grave lined with stones beneath a wooden board and sealed under a slab of Purbeck marble carved with an ornamental cross, who was the unknown woman buried close to the 12th century chapel at St Aldhelm’s Head?