Latest / Live Free Ride Free with Rupert Isaacson / The Lost Gardens of Heligan: Storytelling, Nature, Horses & the Power of Place | Laura Chesterfield | LFRF 49

Transcript

The Lost Gardens of Heligan: Storytelling, Nature, Horses & the Power of Place | Laura Chesterfield | LFRF 49 · Live Free Ride Free with Rupert Isaacson

• 0:00
  Rupert Isaacson: Thanks for joining us.
• 0:01
  Welcome to Live Free, Ride Free.
• 0:03
  I'm your host, Rupert Isaacson, New York Times bestselling author of
• 0:06
  The Horseboy and The Long Ride Home.
• 0:08
  Before I jump in with today's guest, I want to say a huge thank you to you, our
• 0:13
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  books, and other courses, please go to rupertisaacson.com.
• 0:34
  So now let's jump in.
• 0:36
  Welcome back.
• 0:37
  I've got Laura Chesterfield.
• 0:39
  Laura Chesterfield knows about a sense of place she knows about
• 0:46
  story and how to connect with story.
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  And why she is so
• 0:55
  tied up with bound up with this idea of place and home is because
• 1:01
  she has spent the last 10 years working for and subsequently running
• 1:07
  the Lost Gardens of Halligan.
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  And for those of you who know what they are, you'll go, ah, immediately.
• 1:13
  Anyone who's ever been there goes at the, at the name alone because it's
• 1:19
  a little piece of heaven on Earth.
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  And those that don't know it and that discover it, it's one of
• 1:26
  those epiphanies it's it Cornwall.
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  Southwest of England.
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  I'm gonna let Laura tell us about it and how this became really a family home and
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  what is important about carrying a sense of place or curating a sense of place
• 1:46
  also for others nature and the mind comes into this, horses come into this family.
• 1:54
  Let's let Laura kick this off.
• 1:57
  Thanks for coming on, Laura.
• 1:59
  Laura Chesterfield: Pleasure.
• 1:59
  Lovely to see you.
• 2:01
  I hope.
• 2:01
  Rupert Isaacson: Tell us, tell us about your, your interesting,
• 2:04
  amazing family and this halligan malarkey and how it all came to be.
• 2:10
  Laura Chesterfield: Halligan malarkey.
• 2:11
  Gosh, it is such, it's such a long story.
• 2:14
  I'm gonna try and not cut it short, but sort of, condense it, I suppose,
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  because there's such a long a long history of hell ligan and a long
• 2:22
  history for my family and, and then a different history for myself.
• 2:27
  But the Los Gardens are halligan as you've as you've introduced is it's
• 2:31
  just a, a stunning garden in, in Cornwall down on the coast of Mei, which
• 2:36
  is a sea south fishing harbor town.
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  And it, it basically fell asleep.
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  It was lost.
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  After the war, the gardeners went off to war and they didn't return, and it fell
• 2:49
  asleep exactly as it was, you know, and, and when it was first come across and
• 2:53
  rediscovered, if that's the right word the tools were all still exactly where they
• 2:58
  were left, you know, and, and the gardens were just completely overgrown and.
• 3:03
  There was a real feeling of, gosh, yeah.
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  What happened in that moment?
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  What, what, where, where did what was going on before that moment?
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  And real intrigue, a real sense of loss, a real sense of it having been an important
• 3:18
  place for people and very much alive.
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  And then suddenly that being concealed and, and, and ready
• 3:25
  for people to bring back to life.
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  And so my father was part of the, the small group of people who sort of happened
• 3:32
  to come across it with the landowner who had just inherited it from the TMA estate.
• 3:37
  And he didn't really know what he was I inheriting and he, he, to
• 3:40
  meet my dad one day because my dad was actually looking for land to
• 3:44
  turn into a rare breed farm park.
• 3:46
  And he, he, we were obsessed with pigs.
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  We moved from London to Cornwall.
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  Our family were obsessed with pigs and rare breed animals.
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  And my dad suddenly said, hurrah, let's open a rare breed farm and, and,
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  and get everybody wild about animals.
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  And, and met John Willis who'd inherited this land, who then happened
• 4:03
  to say, oh, I've inherited a space.
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  Would you like to come and have a look?
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  I don't think it's suitable as a rare breeze, farm park, but you know,
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  really exciting to go and have a look.
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  And really the rest is history.
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  They went, they came across underneath.
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  You know, my memory as a child is of these brambles being, you
• 4:19
  know, 10 foot high, you know, and it being just a sort of jungle of
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  possible adventure and curiosity and.
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  And they, they went into the gardens and started sort of uncovering the buildings,
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  the working buildings, and came across one particular room that's called the Thunder
• 4:38
  Box room, which you can imagine what went on in there, the toilet and on the
• 4:43
  wall of the thunder box room, they came across the signatures and dates of the
• 4:48
  gardeners and they'd signed on that wall the day before they went off to, to, to
• 4:53
  fight in the world in the First World War.
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  And it was such a moving.
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  Thing for, for that group of, of people to come across to realize that, you
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  know, that story of the gardens had sort of ended or gone to sleep at such a
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  prominent historical moment that carries so much pain and history and, and all
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  sorts of things was just so moving.
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  And so the gardens were then restored in the name of those loft gardeners and
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  always have been, and still now, you know, 35 years later, those gardens very much
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  the, the respect for the gardeners that were there before, their skills, their
• 5:33
  dedication, their expertise in, in their gardening and their food production and,
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  and their knowledge actually of just the natural world and science and our place
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  in the natural world and, and how we fit as humans amongst it inspires to this
• 5:50
  day kind of what goes on at Halligan.
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  So it is got a real sense of.
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  People at the heart of it and working people, you know, not the people that
• 5:59
  were in the big house, but actually working gardeners that really had those
• 6:04
  skills and dirt under their fingernails.
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  And, and, and so the restoration began, you know, it was like a bunch of kids,
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  even though they were adults, everyone felt like they'd stepped into the pages
• 6:14
  of the secret garden, you know, and you know, what's around this next wall and
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  what's the, through this next door and what are we gonna all find together?
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  And it was very much, you know, a group of people doing that together on this curious
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  adventure and learning as they went.
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  And that was 35 years ago.
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  And so for me, I grew up as.
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  It tells you my age now, doesn't it?
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  But a sort of 6, 7, 8, 8, 9-year-old going every single day in the family
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  of Volvo up to this, you know, this piece of land covered in brambles and
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  watching yet another fire get started and another building get uncovered.
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  And not quite understanding really the scale of what I was involved in
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  or what I was seeing, but just knowing that it was just really exciting,
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  you know, and, and felt important and it brought people together.
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  And, and I think that's the thing that has stayed with me the whole
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  time, is that it's about what people can actually do together.
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  When it's about something important and, and, and something fun.
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  You know, going on an adventure, it's, you know, the ultimate.
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  Thing you wanna do as a kid, isn't it?
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  And seeing adults still doing that was really infectious.
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  So, so I've been there since I was a small kid.
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  And you know, my, my mom and my dad then ran the business alongside other
• 7:35
  people and it opened up to the public.
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  I mean, the public came in before it was even open.
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  It really captured the hearts of a nation, you know, just sort of seeing this amazing
• 7:45
  place and hearing the stories and, and seeing normal people fall in love with
• 7:50
  it and want to uncover it, you know?
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  And so I've watched that and, and it's become a place that.
• 7:56
  My family have been, and it's been like a, a sixth member of my family.
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  And so I've had really personal moments there.
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  You know, I, I've spent years just kind of going up at seasonal moments, going
• 8:07
  for walks with family, going with people who are no longer alive, grandparents,
• 8:12
  friends but also getting married there to my husband and, you know, so really.
• 8:17
  Touching moments where it sort of feels like a, a home from home if you like.
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  You know, if I was religious, that would be my church kind of thing.
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  You know, that sort of connection that you get something really
• 8:28
  meaningful and spiritual from it.
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  And for me, for many years it was exactly that.
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  And then a turning point in my career, which historically had been studying
• 8:37
  horses, studying land management had also been counseling and therapeutic practices
• 8:46
  and working within police stations.
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  So, so really nothing to do with horticulture whatsoever.
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  At a real sort of transitional moment in my life when I had children, it
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  was the right moment to come and learn about the family business and
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  to come and take on a, a project which was all about animals at that point.
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  And it was starting the bury farm park.
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  And so I joined the family business nearly 10 years ago.
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  And in my favorite job I've ever had, which was the livestock coordinator
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  looking after the animals, starting a berries farm park and, and really kind
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  of adding another layer of how people engaged with the space at Halligan through
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  animals and animals place in nature.
• 9:28
  I suppose I'm
• 9:29
  Rupert Isaacson: rambling
• 9:29
  Laura Chesterfield: bit Ruth, but you need to mention
• 9:30
  Rupert Isaacson: now a lot, a lot of Brits are quite familiar with Halligan
• 9:34
  because there was a TV show, there was the book, your dad's book about, you
• 9:38
  know, finding that door in the war and opening out into it is exactly as you say.
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  You basically had the secret garden as your childhood.
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  You, you know, a lot of us agreeing with envy.
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  But the, the people who are listening in from say the UUSA
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  and other parts of the world.
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  They don't know, you know, a garden.
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  Okay.
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  The gardens are nice.
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  You know, there's a lot of big country houses that have nice big
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  gardens, and they're all lovely.
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  They're all magical to some degree.
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  I want you to talk us, you, you've touched on the fact that the garden is actually
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  not, the big house is still there, but the garden as it stands, is the garden.
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  Mm-hmm.
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  But it's so much more than a garden.
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  I want you to paint the picture for us.
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  Take us on a ver, take us on a tour through the Lost Gardens of Halligan, just
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  so that those people who are not familiar with it can really taste this magic.
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  'cause this is, and, and, and those people, by the way, who don't
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  know Cornwall, Cornwall is one of the magic places of the world.
• 10:47
  It's the Celtic Fringe.
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  They have pixies.
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  Living forest.
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  There are, it's, it's, it's a place where the veil between the supernatural and the
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  na, you know, the natural is very thin.
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  The Arthurian legends are largely based there.
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  You know, tin Taal Castle, working Arthur is supposed to have been born Sary pool
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  where Excalibur supposed to have come up.
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  This is, this is the type of landscape we're talking about and
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  sort of these deep ravines with old Celtic rainforest in them.
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  And then these, you know, smugglers, coves, you know,
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  down on the, on, on the coast.
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  The reason why everyone in pirate movies speaks with an AR accent, because that
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  is actually the accent of Cornwall, which sticks out into the Atlantic there.
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  Yeah.
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  I'm
• 11:29
  Laura Chesterfield: putting on a voice today.
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  Yeah.
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  So,
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  Rupert Isaacson: so, so take us in because there's a lot more I want
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  to ask you, but, but guide us now.
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  Okay.
• 11:39
  The listener has arrived at Halligan.
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  Take us through.
• 11:44
  Laura Chesterfield: Okay.
• 11:45
  So you've really, this is quite a task, isn't it?
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  It
• 11:50
  Rupert Isaacson: is.
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  Laura Chesterfield: To compete with actually being present in the space.
• 11:53
  Just
• 11:54
  Rupert Isaacson: do it free flow.
• 11:55
  Laura Chesterfield: Free flow.
• 11:55
  So I mean, I think with Halligan it's.
• 11:59
  You are absolutely right.
• 12:00
  There's, there's hundreds of gardens and they're all beautiful and, and
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  I think what is really special at Halligan, there's a number of things,
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  but we're not the best at anything.
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  But we have so many ingredients.
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  The variety is like where this, this very special place on earth where you
• 12:19
  have woodlands, you have meadows, you have water, you have walled productive
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  gardens, you have a jungle, you have all these different ingredients.
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  You have an Italian garden, you have a flower garden, you have a scented
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  garden, you have Rockies, you have farmland, and actually all these
• 12:40
  different habitats in one place.
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  And all these different, also incredible plantings, you know,
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  the great plant hunters bringing back some incredible species is.
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  It's just the diversity of it feels joyful and optimistic.
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  I think that's how it feels for me.
• 12:59
  Mm-hmm.
• 12:59
  Is to be able to see all those things at once rather than some locations
• 13:04
  you might go to and they, they do one thing brilliantly or, or they have
• 13:08
  two different 'cause sort of habitats.
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  Having all of it in one place is really, really special.
• 13:15
  And I think also with GaN, we are not a museum, so I've already talked a little
• 13:20
  bit about the history of the place.
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  So some people might be thinking, oh, you know, it's another sort
• 13:24
  of historical place and it's not.
• 13:27
  It's, it's alive.
• 13:28
  It is absolutely alive.
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  We are a working estate, so we have all of the, the, the livestock there.
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  They are, they are managing the land.
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  They have a job.
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  There's no field ornaments.
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  They are absolutely managing our landscape and they're doing that regeneratively and
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  they're doing that in harmony with nature.
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  We, you know, we have productive wall gardens growing.
• 13:50
  Every month of the year.
• 13:51
  Food that is then given, you know, fed to our visitors in our kitchen and actually
• 13:56
  showing those skills of 3, 6, 5 growing, especially in the seasons that we get in
• 14:01
  Cornwall, which my God is a challenge.
• 14:04
  I mean, these, the gardeners we have are magicians.
• 14:07
  I mean, I call it magic.
• 14:08
  To actually know those skills of how to work with nature, how to work with the
• 14:14
  science of nature as well as kind of, you know, everything nature froze us is magic.
• 14:20
  And it is a dying knowledge set actually that we have today.
• 14:25
  And I think part of the magic for people coming around is seeing that
• 14:28
  that still exists, that it's still cherished, it's still put on a pedestal.
• 14:32
  It's still something that we champion really actively, that we should
• 14:36
  all know where our food comes from.
• 14:38
  We should all care about where our food comes from, and we should all, and.
• 14:42
  Have some knowledge that it's not just delivered on a shelf in Tesco's,
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  you know, and, and actually to come and be on a working estate and seeing
• 14:51
  it happening around you, we don't, you know, they don't change what
• 14:54
  we do every day for the visitor.
• 14:55
  The visitor has to kind of, sometimes, you know, where are the cows?
• 14:58
  Well, a grazing over there, you're gonna have to walk further to see them.
• 15:00
  They're not put on show just for the people coming to visit.
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  And I think it's the magic of seeing.
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  A space that is alive actively with so many different habitats is very magical.
• 15:13
  But it's also, it is not just the beauty of it, it is the, you know,
• 15:17
  we've talked a little bit about the loss and the landscape, but actually
• 15:20
  having these layers on the space people, people feel it and they talk about hell
• 15:26
  being a healing place all the time.
• 15:28
  And it's actually an anagram of the word healing, which we've always
• 15:31
  sort of felt very apt because so many people come to halligan experiencing
• 15:38
  loss, experiencing pain, experiencing bereavement and difficulty.
• 15:43
  And there is just a real feeling of the place having a history behind it of.
• 15:49
  Sharedness, I guess, you know, of humanness and being a space that is open
• 15:55
  for people to feel and be in whatever emotional state they want to be in.
• 16:01
  So the landscape is really healing because we kind of celebrate the
• 16:06
  fact that it's, you know, there's loss, there's abandonment, but
• 16:09
  there's restoration, there's human hands, and this huge sense of time.
• 16:14
  You know, when, when I walk around and look at some of my favorite trees,
• 16:17
  which I've actually walked with you, you'll remember some of those oak trees,
• 16:21
  you know, maybe nearly 200 years old.
• 16:23
  And the stories they've seen, the things they've seen, they give you a real sense
• 16:28
  of place and time and, and that, and that just connects you, you know, it
• 16:34
  just connects you in a different way to walking around a, a more kind of
• 16:37
  perhaps formal garden that's sort of very structured for the visitor, perhaps.
• 16:42
  Yeah.
• 16:43
  And so you'll walk around and you'll, you'll, I think also at
• 16:46
  Elegant, what's special is that you can kind of lose yourself in the
• 16:48
  place in whichever way you want to.
• 16:50
  So we of course get some visitors that they want a map and they
• 16:53
  want a prescription, and they wanna know where to go and how
• 16:55
  to feel and how this is gonna be.
• 16:58
  But for us, we're like, go and lose yourself.
• 17:00
  Go and switch off from the outside world.
• 17:01
  Go and just find your experience.
• 17:05
  You know?
• 17:05
  And there's certain parts of that that are absolutely curated, but in
• 17:09
  a way for people to experience it in, in the way that they need on that,
• 17:12
  on any given day, whether they're in a large group or on their own.
• 17:16
  Rupert Isaacson: I think, I think there is a story that needs to be
• 17:18
  told, which is sort of how this is, well, you, you mentioned the jungle.
• 17:21
  Yeah.
• 17:21
  And you mentioned the, the plant hunters.
• 17:24
  And you mentioned that feeling of being lost and timeless.
• 17:26
  So Cornwall has this microclimate within.
• 17:30
  The UK and the Northern hemisphere where you can grow some sub tropicals
• 17:34
  and tell us about the Tremaine family and the plant hunters and how they got
• 17:39
  going with this and created that jungle.
• 17:41
  And then take us through that jungle.
• 17:43
  'cause I feel that that jungle is, that is sort of, to me,
• 17:46
  the wild heart of Allergan.
• 17:48
  Do you know what I mean?
• 17:48
  There's something, it's like you go in there and you rewild you reset.
• 17:52
  So, so tell us about the Tremaine family.
• 17:54
  How did they get, why did they create this jungle?
• 17:57
  What were the plant hunters?
• 17:58
  And then bring us up to the present day.
• 18:01
  Laura Chesterfield: Okay.
• 18:01
  So, I mean, I'm gonna start by saying I am not a horticulturalist and I'm not gonna
• 18:06
  pretend to be as incredible as, as some of our horticultural team or our historians
• 18:12
  in terms of how I tell the stories.
• 18:13
  But I think what's I think the space, as you say, is really wild because
• 18:18
  to actually have a, a jungle you can go to that's not a, a captive jungle.
• 18:23
  It's not it, it is really wildly cared for.
• 18:26
  It does its own thing.
• 18:28
  And, and being in the climate that we're in, that's so unusual.
• 18:31
  You know, normally you'd need to be flying to a different
• 18:34
  continent to experience that.
• 18:36
  And it's, you do step back in time because you are transported to a place
• 18:41
  where nature is being natural, you know, and it's doing its thing naturally.
• 18:49
  And it's, you're seeing growth, but you're seeing decay.
• 18:54
  You're seeing.
• 18:56
  All of the seasons and how they kind of work together and, and, and
• 19:00
  that in itself, it just transports you from wherever else you are.
• 19:03
  'cause you can't hear any, anything from the modern day.
• 19:06
  So you could be transported back to the 1920s and you wouldn't know
• 19:12
  because it's just so peaceful and.
• 19:17
  And that's really rare actually to have that and to be
• 19:21
  completely immersed by plants.
• 19:23
  Also quite rare, you know, there has been so much deforestation and
• 19:27
  so much kind of controlling nature across, certainly across the uk.
• 19:32
  That to go somewhere that you are absolutely immersed with Gunnar
• 19:35
  leaves that are, you know, 10 foot high and tree ferns that are historic
• 19:40
  and ancient is a really unusual thing for the senses to be around.
• 19:46
  That just really does something for people, which is why it's probably
• 19:49
  the number one thing people come to Halligan to see, actually, because
• 19:53
  they, they feel a sense of adventure.
• 19:55
  'cause people wanna come to places like us for fun, you know?
• 19:58
  Yeah.
• 19:58
  Experience.
• 19:59
  They might not get somewhere else.
• 20:01
  And then, yes, on the other hand, it is also about people that are, you know,
• 20:04
  really interested in the horticulture and the history of the plants and,
• 20:07
  and those, those adventurers if you like, you know, from way back when they
• 20:11
  would go to other continents and bring
• 20:13
  Rupert Isaacson: who, who were these adventurers?
• 20:15
  Who were the tain, you know?
• 20:17
  Yeah,
• 20:18
  Laura Chesterfield: yeah.
• 20:18
  So I mean the, the Tain family, Jack Tain, I mean, there was many
• 20:22
  generations that sort of built and created different parts of the gardens.
• 20:27
  They.
• 20:28
  You know, they were of a generation where it absolutely was about showing
• 20:32
  off some wealth and you know, having a garden with all these different
• 20:35
  plants and it bought from, this is
• 20:37
  Rupert Isaacson: sort of back in the early 19th century, right?
• 20:39
  Yeah.
• 20:39
  Late 18th, early 19th century.
• 20:41
  Laura Chesterfield: Yeah.
• 20:41
  So there's definitely showing off involved.
• 20:45
  You know, look what I've got.
• 20:46
  Look what I've brought back.
• 20:47
  Look at all of these specimens that we brought back, and there's a lot of, you
• 20:50
  know, there's a lot of historical parts,
• 20:52
  Rupert Isaacson: but they were colonialists, right.
• 20:53
  And empire builders, and they went out to these exotic places and brought
• 20:58
  back these, these plants, right?
• 21:00
  But that, that, that was as you, as you say, I mean, it wasn't
• 21:03
  just a trophy thing though.
• 21:05
  I mean the, these were clearly people who had a real feel for
• 21:13
  nature in a certain way.
• 21:15
  Laura Chesterfield: Yeah.
• 21:15
  Right.
• 21:17
  Yeah.
• 21:17
  I think, you know, today isn't about going down the, the political side of
• 21:21
  you know, of, of what was happening at that time and, and, and in those days.
• 21:26
  But they certainly were in tune with nature of, of recreation attached to
• 21:32
  nature, you know, and that actually.
• 21:34
  Their enjoyment in a day.
• 21:35
  What they would do for fun would be to immerse themselves in these spaces, to
• 21:40
  take friends, guests into these spaces.
• 21:44
  You know, they would have ornamental dwelling gardens that they built
• 21:47
  for for spending time in, you know?
• 21:49
  Yeah.
• 21:49
  And how built these gardens.
• 21:51
  There was definitely obviously the operational parts that were about
• 21:55
  providing food, but there was definitely these, the recreation, the beauty, the
• 22:01
  being amongst nature, which they very much understood and did at scale, you
• 22:06
  know, and, and did in a way that was to bring species back that many other
• 22:10
  areas maybe wouldn't have bought back.
• 22:13
  But that also our habitat being so close to the sea, you know,
• 22:16
  that, that some of those water,
• 22:17
  Rupert Isaacson: right.
• 22:17
  And it's, it's quite rare to see, I mean, you go to a place like Q
• 22:21
  Gardens, like a proper jog, botanical garden, and it's always awe inspiring.
• 22:26
  Laura Chesterfield: Yeah.
• 22:26
  Rupert Isaacson: But as you say, when these guys brought back.
• 22:30
  These giant tree ferns, these, they then let them create a jungle similar
• 22:38
  to the jungle that they went to, to go and get these things that I think
• 22:41
  was almost unheard of at that time.
• 22:44
  Normally people formalized it, you know, you'd say, here is the tree
• 22:48
  fern, you know, here is the thing.
• 22:50
  But to, to plant them in the way that down, that the ravine.
• 22:54
  So for, for listeners and viewers, you've got to imagine that you enter
• 22:59
  this ravine and it's suddenly like you're in South America or New Zealand
• 23:05
  or these giant galleries of tree phones.
• 23:10
  Laura Chesterfield: Yeah.
• 23:10
  Rupert Isaacson: That absorb sound, and I think that's one of the things that
• 23:18
  creates that feeling of timelessness.
• 23:20
  Yeah.
• 23:20
  Laura Chesterfield: Yeah.
• 23:21
  Absolutely.
• 23:23
  Rupert Isaacson: What was it about these people, do you think that made them
• 23:27
  so unusual that they would kind of.
• 23:29
  Create a rewild place like that, not a formalized place.
• 23:33
  It's, it, it's unusual.
• 23:36
  Laura Chesterfield: It is.
• 23:36
  It is unusual.
• 23:37
  It is unusual.
• 23:38
  And I mean, there's probably many reasons for it, but I think it was like a hobby.
• 23:42
  It, it was the, the going on the adventures, the bringing the prize
• 23:46
  back, the seeing, you know, and, and obviously enjoying being in
• 23:50
  nature and feeling the good of that, which has been lost since then.
• 23:55
  A little bit, you know, in, in more modern generations, as we know, people are,
• 23:59
  are losing that connection to nature, then people are not as aware of it.
• 24:03
  And actually I think that they were, you know?
• 24:06
  Mm-hmm.
• 24:07
  And there wasn't all the modern day things that we have right now,
• 24:11
  you know, that get in the way of that it nature was very present and
• 24:15
  people were very dependent upon it.
• 24:17
  Yeah.
• 24:18
  And they had the money, they had the wealth, they had the connections
• 24:21
  to enable that and, and a very special climate down in Cornwall.
• 24:24
  I mean, the Cornish Gardens are famous and they are unique, not just Halligan,
• 24:28
  but other Cornish gardens as well.
• 24:30
  You know, the, the climate being so close to the sea, you know, the gardens
• 24:34
  here are very different to what you would see near a London or, or or
• 24:38
  further north in the uk because of the specimens that do do well here for sure.
• 24:45
  Rupert Isaacson: Yeah.
• 24:45
  It's, it, it's also not just a, a garden where you look at plants or
• 24:52
  woodland or these obviously these giant cathedral like roded entrances
• 24:57
  that you can go climb around it.
• 25:00
  It is extraordinary.
• 25:01
  But there's also a lot of art.
• 25:03
  Tell us about.
• 25:05
  The art, the mud made the giant, this stuff, you know, talk, talk us through.
• 25:09
  'cause it, it's a real place of the imagination, I feel.
• 25:13
  Laura Chesterfield: Mm, yeah, definitely.
• 25:14
  Definitely.
• 25:15
  I mean, the sculptures, the sculptures really capture people's imaginations.
• 25:20
  And we've worked on, we've just opened the fourth sculpture by the same local
• 25:27
  Cornish artist, Sue and her brother Pete Hill who created four very different
• 25:34
  sculptures at GaN that are all inspired by different elements of folklore and nature.
• 25:41
  And.
• 25:42
  Playing, you know, very playful.
• 25:45
  And, and it's, it's a really beautiful side of the space, you
• 25:49
  know, that encouragement to be silly and to be creative and to allow
• 25:55
  those parts of yourself to come to life and to be accessed and to
• 26:00
  tell stories and make things up.
• 26:01
  And I think the sculptures do exactly that.
• 26:03
  They encourage families regularly to sit there and talk about, you
• 26:07
  know, the Mud Maid in particular.
• 26:09
  You know, what,
• 26:10
  Rupert Isaacson: can you describe the mud maid for us?
• 26:12
  Laura Chesterfield: Yeah.
• 26:12
  No, you mean she's such an iconic sculpture.
• 26:15
  She's a sleeping maiden made from moss.
• 26:19
  And you find her in our, in our woodland walks of lying on
• 26:24
  her side, peacefully asleep.
• 26:26
  She's dreaming and she's called the mud made, and she's just magical.
• 26:32
  She's so beautifully created that she's part of the landscape.
• 26:37
  So she really.
• 26:39
  Feels very natural.
• 26:40
  There's a real spirit about her, a real energy of, you know, some people think
• 26:45
  of her as being like mother Nature.
• 26:47
  Some people, she's a character of in a different way.
• 26:50
  That's about stories.
• 26:52
  Some people it's about nighttime and what happens after dark.
• 26:55
  And she's.
• 26:57
  She just captures everyone's imagination.
• 26:59
  I mean, people go straight there and you hear people of all generations telling
• 27:04
  each other their stories of what you know, whether it's about what she's
• 27:07
  dreaming about or who she's friends with at night when we all go home.
• 27:12
  You know, and it's, she just captures.
• 27:14
  The spirit of the place.
• 27:16
  I think that playful side and that folklore side, which as you've touched
• 27:20
  on is, is ever present in different ways.
• 27:23
  So you have the mud made, you also have the giant's head which was made
• 27:27
  out of the stump of a tree that fell many years ago, back in the nineties.
• 27:31
  And it's this sort of giant peeping out of the soil and it's just his head and face
• 27:37
  and all his grass is creating this really funky hair doing big eyes and a huge nose.
• 27:43
  And in the years since he was born as such, you know, he's got older and he is
• 27:47
  got more and more facial hair and more and more facial crevices and is very
• 27:51
  much alive, you know, and part of nature.
• 27:54
  And I think that's again, what.
• 27:56
  What these sculptures kind of get you to think about is people being
• 28:00
  part of nature, nature being part of people, and actually that sort
• 28:03
  of yeah, working together and, and not separate from one another is,
• 28:10
  is probably the deeper side of it.
• 28:12
  But you know, again, where does the giant go after dark and who is he friends
• 28:15
  with and where are the other giants and all that stuff that there's books
• 28:18
  and all sorts of things written about these sculptures that, you know, kids.
• 28:22
  Know them as characters, as if they're actually people, you
• 28:25
  know, and the GaN giant is a, is a character and, and that's wonderful.
• 28:30
  You know, it's such a great way to transport people to that, you know, that
• 28:34
  part of their minds to be creative and to.
• 28:38
  To wonder and to make things up and to be silly and to have that
• 28:42
  imaginative play as they go.
• 28:45
  Then we've got a third sculpture, which is the gray lady I
• 28:49
  Rupert Isaacson: was gonna ask you about the gray lady.
• 28:50
  Laura Chesterfield: Yeah, we like the gray lady, don't we?
• 28:51
  We've had,
• 28:54
  so there, I mean, again, it's folklore, it's historical folklore and quite a
• 28:58
  little bit darker because there are lots of stories of historically seeing this
• 29:03
  gray lady after dark at sunset, walking the gardens and stories of her being the
• 29:10
  long lost lover of one of the gardens of being someone who's been murdered.
• 29:15
  There's all sorts of folklore about who she was, what she did, whether she's kind
• 29:20
  and lost in her spirit, or whether she's.
• 29:22
  A bit darker and a bit sort of, spookier, I suppose it's probably
• 29:26
  the spookiest, bit of GaN.
• 29:28
  But again, it's that imaginative that she represents people and history and
• 29:34
  stories and how stories evolve, you know, and, and, and how, and what we tell
• 29:38
  ourselves over the years and how that, you know, Chinese whispers if you like,
• 29:43
  of, of, of this, of, you know, just.
• 29:46
  Stories that have captured people.
• 29:49
  And I think that's, you know, again, so important for what that then brings into
• 29:52
  your future and into the here and now and what that brings into the future.
• 29:56
  You know, for younger people that now hear this story is very powerful actually.
• 30:00
  To think that that woman that was probably someone just wearing a gray
• 30:02
  dress, having a wonder one day, has turned into this, you know, folk clawing
• 30:08
  Cornwall of, of, of scale, but has captured imagination and actually doing
• 30:13
  that through a sculpture that half our visitors can't actually see the sculpture.
• 30:17
  'cause it's sort of, it's made out of metal, but it's sort of see through.
• 30:20
  So unless you catch it at the right light, you're kind of looking straight
• 30:23
  through it at the trees behind.
• 30:24
  And some people stand, they go, I can't see it.
• 30:26
  And it's, it's their sort of hidden quite ghost.
• 30:29
  Rupert Isaacson: Yeah, it's like a ghost.
• 30:29
  Yeah.
• 30:30
  Yeah.
• 30:31
  Laura Chesterfield: So, so clever.
• 30:32
  I mean, the artists are, again, wizards are just, they're just incredible.
• 30:37
  And the most recent sculpture that we commissioned from them
• 30:42
  opened in September last year.
• 30:46
  And we, you know, we realized how successful the storytelling and
• 30:50
  the engagement had been at Halligan through these sculptures and thought
• 30:53
  we really need to invite Sue and Pete back to come and tell another story.
• 30:57
  You know, what is the story that for us in 25 years time,
• 31:01
  my kids are gonna be telling.
• 31:03
  You know, that their friends and the kids then about, you know, the next sculpture
• 31:07
  and you know, and I think that's the thing with these projects is it's about legacy
• 31:10
  and it's about kind of that taking stories forward that are important or meaningful
• 31:15
  or, you know, that connect us all.
• 31:17
  I mean, stories connect everybody, the world over.
• 31:19
  Right?
• 31:20
  So it's, we
• 31:20
  Rupert Isaacson: are the storytelling act.
• 31:21
  Yeah.
• 31:22
  Laura Chesterfield: Yeah.
• 31:22
  That's so, so it's so important to have those, those triggers within the space
• 31:27
  to tell stories and not, you know, heli again, we don't wanna be somewhere
• 31:30
  that's just got hundreds of boards.
• 31:31
  You know, you people don't feel something from a board.
• 31:36
  Rupert Isaacson: Board With the board.
• 31:37
  Laura Chesterfield: Yeah.
• 31:37
  Board with the board.
• 31:38
  It's, it's rare that they do.
• 31:39
  So trying to create other ways for people to feel has been the way that I've curated
• 31:45
  and done the job of is to experience that.
• 31:47
  It is, it's always been about what's the feeling that comes from that and
• 31:50
  from seeing this or hearing this or.
• 31:52
  Or being in a space, what does it feel like?
• 31:55
  Because that's what people remember.
• 31:56
  You know, that's where memories come from.
• 31:57
  That's where a connection to a place and an emotional connection to a
• 32:01
  place comes from is feeling something.
• 32:02
  So, so the, the newest sculpture is a six meter high fox.
• 32:09
  She's a vixen, and her name is LOEs, which is Cornish for vixen.
• 32:15
  And she's utterly spell binding.
• 32:20
  Spell binding.
• 32:21
  Spell.
• 32:21
  Is that, yeah.
• 32:22
  Rupert Isaacson: Spell binding.
• 32:23
  It's
• 32:23
  Laura Chesterfield: spell binding.
• 32:24
  Enchanting.
• 32:25
  I mean, she's,
• 32:25
  Rupert Isaacson: where is she in the, in the is,
• 32:27
  Laura Chesterfield: she's on the wooden walk, so she's further down
• 32:29
  from the other, the other sculpture.
• 32:31
  So it all flows really well.
• 32:33
  Mm-hmm.
• 32:33
  And I mean, there's a, there's a few stories behind this sculpture.
• 32:36
  One was that we did an incredible project last year, the last couple of years with.
• 32:41
  Poet Laureate, Simon Armitage the most incredible poet.
• 32:46
  And, and he came and did a project with us where I asked him if he'd write some poems
• 32:50
  about Halligan and and let us hide them in the landscape for future generations.
• 32:55
  And, you know, there is no one better than words.
• 32:58
  It's official.
• 32:58
  So it was just such an honor and such a joy to, to be around him being
• 33:03
  creative and interpreting the space.
• 33:06
  And we, we left it quite free in terms of a brief for him because.
• 33:10
  We just wanted him to do his thing.
• 33:12
  And actually letting people feel the space and interpret it in
• 33:16
  their own way is really important.
• 33:17
  And so Simon came and spent, you know, two days with our team and met all the team
• 33:23
  and went to all the different habitats and, and went away and wrote poems and,
• 33:27
  you know, we didn't, we were nervous.
• 33:28
  Like, what's he gonna come back and say, what's he gonna, what
• 33:31
  thing is he gonna pick up on?
• 33:32
  And, you know, is it, where, where's this gonna go?
• 33:35
  It was, you know, really sort of exciting.
• 33:36
  And he, he wrote to me and he, he said, Laura, I.
• 33:41
  I feel like it is a safe home for so many creatures, for so many secret inhabitants
• 33:49
  within, you know, the wildlife world that we don't see, but that actually
• 33:53
  halligan makes it a home, not just for humans, but for so many species.
• 33:58
  And you know, that in itself, to have that feedback that that's what someone
• 34:02
  gets from a place is amazing and really moving that, that, that, that was kind
• 34:07
  of what he felt about the place was that it was enabling life to live naturally.
• 34:12
  Rupert Isaacson: Well, it, it, it halligan is kind of poetry.
• 34:15
  Laura Chesterfield: Mm.
• 34:16
  Rupert Isaacson: In form.
• 34:19
  Laura Chesterfield: Yeah.
• 34:19
  Rupert Isaacson: Do you know what I mean?
• 34:20
  It it, the, the landscape and the interplay between the
• 34:23
  landscapes and then the human relationships with those landscapes.
• 34:27
  Laura Chesterfield: Yeah.
• 34:27
  Rupert Isaacson: It's, the whole thing is, is poetic.
• 34:29
  And of course, while you're talking, I'm just Googling quickly.
• 34:32
  I'm like Simon Monica poem.
• 34:34
  Uh uh.
• 34:36
  Poem Halligan.
• 34:38
  And I've got, I've got one.
• 34:39
  So I was gonna ask if you, if you got one, but I saw you were
• 34:42
  sitting there, so I thought maybe she hasn't actually got it to hand.
• 34:45
  So I'm gonna read it.
• 34:46
  Shall I read it?
• 34:47
  Laura Chesterfield: Which one have you got?
• 34:48
  Rupert Isaacson: Hive.
• 34:49
  Laura Chesterfield: You've got Hive.
• 34:49
  Yeah.
• 34:50
  So there's, so, so, I mean, the poems, he wrote 16 for us and some
• 34:53
  haikus, and then he loved it so much.
• 34:57
  He asked if he could release it as a collection of poems, as a book.
• 35:01
  And the collection is called Dwell.
• 35:03
  Rupert Isaacson: Yep.
• 35:03
  Laura Chesterfield: Which is such a great word.
• 35:05
  You know, it's just like
• 35:06
  Rupert Isaacson: dwell,
• 35:07
  Laura Chesterfield: dwell, you know, and it's, it's magical.
• 35:11
  So the book was released, it's a Sunday Times bestseller.
• 35:13
  It's, it's stunning.
• 35:15
  And everybody has a different favorite and it's all about the creatures
• 35:19
  that dwell at GaN and some magical kind of creative interpretations of,
• 35:26
  Rupert Isaacson: have you got the book to hand?
• 35:28
  Laura Chesterfield: I do, I do.
• 35:29
  Rupert Isaacson: Do you want to read it?
• 35:30
  Why don't you read it?
• 35:31
  Laura Chesterfield: Yeah, I mean, I can, I can,
• 35:33
  Rupert Isaacson: dwell by Simon Armitage, poet laureate.
• 35:35
  Okay.
• 35:36
  Poems of halligan.
• 35:37
  All right.
• 35:38
  Laura Chesterfield: Yeah.
• 35:39
  Rupert Isaacson: Oh, what a treat.
• 35:40
  Okay.
• 35:41
  Laura Chesterfield: Gosh, I'm not, I'm, I'm not as nearly
• 35:44
  as good at poetry as he is so,
• 35:47
  Rupert Isaacson: well, luckily you don't have to write it,
• 35:48
  you just have to read it.
• 35:49
  Laura Chesterfield: I know.
• 35:50
  I'm just looking for, let's see, which one shall I do the one?
• 35:53
  The fox one?
• 35:54
  Rupert Isaacson: Yeah.
• 35:54
  Do the fox one
• 35:56
  Laura Chesterfield: den.
• 35:58
  So the fox one is called den.
• 36:05
  Okay.
• 36:06
  So this is den for the pelt harvest bushels of dead bracken
• 36:11
  quickened with poppy blood.
• 36:14
  Cokes forked lightning onto a barbed wire fence to forge the teeth, the
• 36:19
  incisors of quartz, the claws flint.
• 36:23
  The tail is a copper beach hedge back combed by west winds and tipped with snow.
• 36:29
  The reflection of serious balanced in two puddles of fresh rain will serve as
• 36:34
  the eyes for the tongue, bury raw meat for a month to la maggots dance then
• 36:42
  from daylight's cauldron, pour everything earthwards, flooding the chambers and
• 36:46
  layers, and seal the kiln with the door of night into a wet morning out of
• 36:53
  ash and filth, a fox emerges, dripping with flames, setting the mind on fire.
• 37:00
  Rupert Isaacson: Beautiful.
• 37:02
  All right.
• 37:03
  I'm gonna read, hive
• 37:04
  Laura Chesterfield: Gone.
• 37:05
  Rupert Isaacson: I've got it here and I can't resist.
• 37:07
  Wow.
• 37:08
  Okay, here we go, hive.
• 37:10
  So this is a B hive.
• 37:12
  Laura Chesterfield: Yeah.
• 37:13
  Rupert Isaacson: The weather inside is always a blazing storm.
• 37:19
  Feverish cells colliding particles being drawn in, batched around, thrown out.
• 37:27
  Imagine dipping your hand into the swarm, feeling the furious
• 37:33
  blizzard at the reactor's core.
• 37:36
  Imagine the same frenzy of fusion and fishing conjuring
• 37:41
  up the wrought hexagonal.
• 37:44
  What the heck of a honeycomb and jars of sunlight in edible form.
• 37:53
  Laura Chesterfield: Great.
• 37:54
  Hey,
• 37:54
  Rupert Isaacson: brilliant, and those are your halligan bees.
• 37:58
  Laura Chesterfield: Yeah.
• 37:59
  Yeah.
• 37:59
  So, I mean, read the collection.
• 38:02
  I mean, it's, it's, it's just a stunning collection of, you know, of, of work.
• 38:06
  Yeah.
• 38:06
  And you know, what an honor that he's written them about the place, you know,
• 38:11
  that, that we work and that we also dwell.
• 38:13
  And so that poem then we, we gave the collection of poems to the
• 38:18
  artists and said, you know, we would love to bring these poems.
• 38:23
  'cause they were obviously, you know, curated to be seen in the
• 38:26
  landscape, not just within the book.
• 38:28
  So we thought, well, let's interpret one in a different way through a sculpture.
• 38:33
  And the one that was chosen by the artists was Den and was the Fox.
• 38:38
  And we also had some amazing photographs taken by our head of restoration.
• 38:44
  Actually, Andy Wilson is also a photographer, a brilliant
• 38:48
  wildlife photographer.
• 38:50
  And he had taken some photographs of the foxes that live at Halligan and
• 38:54
  their cubs, and took this one picture.
• 38:58
  That it's just iconic of, of a fox leaping through the air, really kind
• 39:03
  of in its natural hunting state, you know, feeling so free at elgan
• 39:08
  to be its most authentic self.
• 39:11
  You know, they're not cute creatures that are all cuddly
• 39:14
  and, you know, need a cuddle lay.
• 39:15
  They're fierce hunters, you know, in the landscape.
• 39:18
  And, and, and this picture really encaptured that.
• 39:22
  So the artists were inspired both by Simon's words and Andy's photography.
• 39:28
  And created this sculpture, which as I say, six meters high, you know,
• 39:32
  we, we went big, we went all in.
• 39:35
  And and I, and I hope your listeners will, will either visit, but go, but
• 39:39
  Google Luana and, and see an image.
• 39:41
  And it's not you, you can't really describe how she makes
• 39:45
  you feel because she's so big.
• 39:47
  You feel like the prey when you are there, you are underneath her and
• 39:50
  you're tiny and you really feel that power of a powerful wild animal.
• 39:54
  And for us at Halligan that, you know, that was about, again, same as
• 39:59
  all of the sculptures telling a story and people being able to just see the
• 40:03
  piece of art and, you know, making up their own story with their families
• 40:06
  and, you know, pretending to be eaten alive and taking their photographs.
• 40:10
  But it also, you know, for us was absolutely signifying our intention
• 40:14
  as a business to say we are here as a safe space for animals, for wildlife,
• 40:21
  for people you know, and that we are.
• 40:24
  We are celebrating the natural world at scale.
• 40:28
  Rupert Isaacson: I'm looking at, I'm looking at some photos of her now, Lois.
• 40:33
  So, a a lot of listeners may not know Cornish is a form of Gaelic.
• 40:37
  It, it's, it has its own Celtic language.
• 40:40
  Lois is a vixen in in Cornish.
• 40:43
  Laura Chesterfield: Yeah.
• 40:43
  Rupert Isaacson: And I see her.
• 40:44
  She's leaping.
• 40:45
  She's mouthing, but she's huge.
• 40:47
  And she's beautiful.
• 40:49
  Laura Chesterfield: Yeah.
• 40:50
  Rupert Isaacson: I can't wait to come and see her.
• 40:51
  As you know, if you followed any of my work, I'm an autism dad and we have
• 40:56
  a whole career before this podcast in helping people with neurodivergence,
• 41:04
  either who are professionals in the field.
• 41:06
  Are you a therapist?
• 41:07
  Are you a caregiver?
• 41:09
  Are you a parent?
• 41:10
  Or are you somebody with neurodivergence?
• 41:14
  When my son, Rowan, was diagnosed with autism in 2004,
• 41:19
  I really didn't know what to do.
• 41:21
  So I reached out for mentorship, and I found it through an amazing adult
• 41:26
  autistic woman who's very famous, Dr.
• 41:29
  Temple Grandin.
• 41:30
  And she told me what to do.
• 41:32
  And it's been working so amazingly for the last 20 years.
• 41:36
  That not only is my son basically independent, but we've helped
• 41:41
  countless, countless thousands of others reach the same goal.
• 41:45
  Working in schools, working at home, working in therapy settings.
• 41:50
  If you would like to learn this cutting edge, neuroscience backed
• 41:55
  approach, it's called Movement Method.
• 41:57
  You can learn it online, you can learn it very, very simply.
• 42:01
  It's almost laughably simple.
• 42:04
  The important thing is to begin.
• 42:08
  Let yourself be mentored as I was by Dr.
• 42:11
  Grandin and see what results can follow.
• 42:15
  Go to this website, newtrailslearning.
• 42:20
  com Sign up as a gold member.
• 42:23
  Take the online movement method course.
• 42:27
  It's in 40 countries.
• 42:29
  Let us know how it goes for you.
• 42:31
  We really want to know.
• 42:32
  We really want to help people like me, people like you, out there
• 42:36
  live their best life, to live free, ride free, see what happens.
• 42:41
  Laura Chesterfield: Yeah.
• 42:41
  So the other part of Luann is, was that we, we had one of our historic
• 42:46
  rends fell in, in a storm a year ago.
• 42:50
  A year ago now.
• 42:51
  At the top pond of the jungle.
• 42:53
  And it fell and it was like a moment of mourning, you know,
• 42:56
  this tree with all this history.
• 42:58
  And I remember gathering round the tree with Alistair Moore, who was
• 43:01
  our head of gardens at the time, who, you know, and we both sort of felt
• 43:06
  like sobbing, you know, it was like.
• 43:08
  All that history of where that tree had come from and the things
• 43:12
  it had seen over the years.
• 43:13
  And it was, you know, it was fallen by nature really naturally,
• 43:16
  but we felt a real loss of it.
• 43:19
  And that was at the start of this project of LOEs.
• 43:22
  And the artists were just amazing.
• 43:24
  They said, let's, let's restore her.
• 43:27
  Let's restore the tree and turn her into something else.
• 43:30
  And so the entire sculpture is encased and crafted.
• 43:35
  Every last bit has been craft handcrafted by them from the roaded engine tree.
• 43:39
  So it's kind of come back to life.
• 43:41
  Hmm.
• 43:41
  So it, it's actually a 200 year old fox because the, the wood is got
• 43:47
  all that history, but that it also just leads to how special it is,
• 43:51
  you know, that there's that history in the material that's been used.
• 43:55
  And, you know, really
• 43:58
  Rupert Isaacson: again yeah, it's nature in the mind.
• 43:59
  It's the, it's the interaction of the human with the landscape on every level.
• 44:06
  Laura Chesterfield: Yeah.
• 44:06
  Rupert Isaacson: Aesthetic, natural, edible, healing.
• 44:11
  You know, I, I think maybe Halligan is one of those places that reminds
• 44:15
  us what our species actually is.
• 44:18
  Yeah.
• 44:19
  Because, you know, we, I think most of us spend a lot of our lives in a quiet
• 44:24
  state of stress, not knowing we're in a quiet state of stress because
• 44:28
  we are just not in the habitat that our species are supposed to be in.
• 44:32
  Right.
• 44:32
  Yeah.
• 44:33
  And a lot of us now need that, you know, total, total wilderness
• 44:40
  is beautiful, but it also, if you how to be in it, it'll kill you.
• 44:45
  The, a place like Halligan, which which is this absolute sort of
• 44:50
  interface between the civilized world and the wild, natural world, it.
• 44:56
  I think it speaks to something very deep, you know?
• 44:59
  And then you go from that woodland walk and the gray lady as well.
• 45:03
  And you look, you see that meadow where you sometimes have your pigs.
• 45:09
  And beyond that meadow, you see the cliffs and the ocean and the sea.
• 45:13
  And then you go down into that ravine, which is the, which is the jungle.
• 45:17
  And you are in that cathedral of tree phones.
• 45:19
  And you go across this swinging rope bridge, which is so amazing.
• 45:23
  And you could go in all these different directions.
• 45:25
  And there are also these giant oak trees as well, sort of.
• 45:28
  And then you, when you come out on the other side, and then you ascend
• 45:32
  that ravine and you come back out into that meadow, that big medal,
• 45:35
  you've then got bugging and palace.
• 45:38
  Laura Chesterfield: Yeah.
• 45:39
  Rupert Isaacson: Tell us about bugging and palace.
• 45:40
  Laura Chesterfield: Bugging and palace.
• 45:41
  The, there's actually, Simon wrote a poem.
• 45:45
  About bugging and palace as well.
• 45:47
  It, I think, I'm not sure it's my favorite, my favorite changes all
• 45:50
  the time, but it was the one that I laughed out loud every time I read it
• 45:55
  because Bugging and Palace is a project that, that I started with a member
• 46:01
  of the team, a guy called Sam and.
• 46:04
  I think he wanted to kill me by the end of it because I wanted
• 46:07
  to build an insect hotel that people could sort of engage with.
• 46:11
  And that was in a location that was accessible to everybody.
• 46:14
  But again, I wanted to do it at scale.
• 46:16
  I wanted to make it impressive.
• 46:18
  I wanted to make it, you know, were a visitor destination at the end of the
• 46:22
  day, so, you know, you wanna do it where there's, there's lots of stories that
• 46:26
  are gonna be presented for years to come.
• 46:29
  So said, let's make it big.
• 46:30
  And we looked at the world record and we went, okay, we're aimed for that.
• 46:33
  We actually ended up doubling the world record because you know, why not?
• 46:39
  And so it is the largest insect hotel in the world.
• 46:44
  And it's, it's a beautiful thing because it has been designed so beautifully and
• 46:50
  so naturally by the team at Halligan.
• 46:52
  And, and as with most of the things we do at Halligan, our team do it themselves
• 46:56
  and, and, and are absolutely brilliant.
• 46:58
  You know, whether it's a play area or the bug and bug palace, it's our team
• 47:02
  that get their hands dirty and create it.
• 47:04
  And so this bug hotel is absolutely enormous, but the species that have
• 47:10
  come to live in it are astounding.
• 47:13
  I mean, we have had real specialists come and, you know, be so generous with
• 47:18
  their time and, and sort of exploring the hotel for species, some of which, you
• 47:24
  know, you can't see with the naked eye.
• 47:26
  But we, we've had one specialist who is a Beetle fanatic and this guy
• 47:30
  called Jerry Lee has come in and, and, and basically gone the whole way
• 47:34
  round this hotel looking for beetles.
• 47:37
  And he's found species that have never been discovered in the UK before.
• 47:41
  He's found species that.
• 47:42
  He thought were in extinct in this hotel.
• 47:46
  We've had types of fungi grow that are incredibly rare.
• 47:50
  Like the lion's mane.
• 47:51
  We had that suddenly.
• 47:53
  Rupert Isaacson: Yeah, I got really excited about that one.
• 47:54
  Laura Chesterfield: Yeah.
• 47:55
  It suddenly grew and then it grew a friend, and then it grew another friend
• 47:59
  and we actually, I mean it was a very funny story of actually having to get
• 48:04
  Gabe a Gabon that looks a bit like a cage and kind of place it over the
• 48:07
  top of this lion's mane that had grown because you, we were so worried people
• 48:12
  were gonna steal it, but also quite hallucinogenic properties and quite sought
• 48:17
  after and, and also incredibly rare.
• 48:19
  And it was the first time I think that a fungi has been on BB, C.
• 48:24
  World news you know, at seven o'clock in the morning because it was just
• 48:27
  such a story of, of it being put in this cage in captivity to protect it.
• 48:32
  But we've, we've got lots of stories like that from, from the Bug Hotel,
• 48:35
  where I think creating something so large and also filling all of the, a lot of
• 48:41
  it was built using gabon's, filling it with wood from so many different areas.
• 48:45
  Mm-hmm.
• 48:46
  Straw leaves, all sorts of things, has just bought all of these different
• 48:50
  characters and different inhabitants.
• 48:53
  And it's sort of part of what we try and do at Halligan is make
• 48:55
  that hidden world visible, but in a way that protects its stick.
• 49:01
  Mm-hmm.
• 49:01
  So trying to find ways where you can tell those stories through different
• 49:04
  ways, but still protect the habitat because we don't want people to go and
• 49:08
  look for the foxes at liver halligan because, you know, you get 300,000
• 49:11
  people TRAs in through the woodland.
• 49:13
  It's not a safe habitat for them.
• 49:15
  So it's that real balance of like, how do I let people get close and engage, but.
• 49:21
  Still, you know, protect that space so that it prolongs and remains.
• 49:26
  So Ingham Palace does that, 'cause we can keep it shut a lot of the
• 49:29
  time, but we get amazing photographs.
• 49:31
  We,
• 49:31
  Rupert Isaacson: and you say there was a, there was a poem written about it.
• 49:35
  Laura Chesterfield: Yeah.
• 49:35
  So one of Simon's poems.
• 49:37
  Rupert Isaacson: Is it there in Dwell?
• 49:38
  Laura Chesterfield: It is, yeah.
• 49:39
  Rupert Isaacson: Read it to us.
• 49:39
  Laura Chesterfield: Oh my gosh.
• 49:41
  I mean, this one needs someone really good with, with voices
• 49:45
  because it's basically like a triple
• 49:47
  Rupert Isaacson: Imagine I'm your kid and you're reading to me at night.
• 49:49
  Laura Chesterfield: Oh gosh.
• 49:51
  I should have known that this, this conversation was gonna be like this
• 49:57
  insect hotel.
• 49:57
  Right.
• 49:58
  Okay.
• 49:59
  Rupert Isaacson: Slow down so we can hear it.
• 50:01
  Laura Chesterfield: Okay.
• 50:02
  It is quite long actually, this one.
• 50:04
  Rupert Isaacson: This
• 50:04
  Laura Chesterfield: is good.
• 50:04
  So, it's written brilliantly a bit like a TripAdvisor review by all
• 50:10
  of the insects that have stayed at bugging and pallet hotel.
• 50:15
  Okay?
• 50:16
  We were somewhat distressed by the cockroaches in our bedroom until
• 50:20
  we remembered we are cockroaches, then felt very at home, sketchy
• 50:25
  phone signal and rubbish wifi.
• 50:28
  I'm all for being green and environmentally righteous, et cetera,
• 50:31
  et cetera, but not if it means living in the dark Ages, stopped here
• 50:36
  overnight on the way to a decaying oak a couple of miles away and ended
• 50:40
  up hibernating for the whole winter.
• 50:42
  Would Defo recommend dreamland?
• 50:46
  Thin walls.
• 50:47
  Earwigs next door.
• 50:48
  Felt very overheard, dark and dingy.
• 50:52
  Had to ask a glowworm to show me the way to my room.
• 50:56
  Just checking out when.
• 50:58
  Whoa.
• 50:58
  Nater jack toed.
• 50:59
  Incoming nater jack toed swoon.
• 51:02
  Absolute gentleman.
• 51:04
  Got a selfie can die.
• 51:05
  Happy now.
• 51:07
  Room too small, but great.
• 51:08
  Buffet breakfast.
• 51:09
  Fresh baby.
• 51:10
  Wood.
• 51:10
  Lice.
• 51:11
  The best I've tasted.
• 51:14
  Life.
• 51:14
  Doesn't work.
• 51:15
  Got stuck behind an old snail on the stairs.
• 51:19
  I was like, get a R along.
• 51:20
  Granddad.
• 51:21
  Call me Snail list.
• 51:23
  But why?
• 51:23
  Stay at a hotel when you've got your own house on your back, right?
• 51:27
  A little bit off the beaten track, but decent night life.
• 51:31
  Creepy, lousy.
• 51:35
  As a door mouse, I was slightly surprised to be sharing a room with a hedgehog.
• 51:39
  Thought he might be a bit of a prickly character.
• 51:42
  Laugh out loud, winking face emoji, but we rubbed along.
• 51:47
  Ouch.
• 51:47
  Laugh out loud, winking face emoji very well and have kept in touch.
• 51:52
  Ouch again.
• 51:53
  Laugh out loud, winking face emoji ever since.
• 51:56
  Smiley face emoji.
• 51:58
  To whom it may concern, the bar was full of inebriated bees.
• 52:03
  I think there had been a big match.
• 52:05
  They were extremely intoxicated.
• 52:07
  Downing nectar like there was no tomorrow.
• 52:09
  Dressed in team colors.
• 52:11
  Woover Hampton, Wanderers, wasps, Mrs.
• 52:14
  Lace Wing and myself found them very intimidating.
• 52:17
  Haven't they got hives to go to?
• 52:20
  Amazing Beatles tribute band in the function room.
• 52:25
  I am not a stick.
• 52:27
  I am a stick insect, so it's very annoying to have a snooze in the bar, only to wake
• 52:33
  up and find that someone has tidied me away in the umbrella stand, or is using
• 52:38
  me to help them hobble around the gardens.
• 52:40
  Also, for your information, I am not a snooker co.
• 52:44
  Would you be happy if you came round from an afternoon nap to
• 52:47
  discover someone whittling your leg into a Welsh love spoon?
• 52:53
  Left my shoes outside my room, and in the morning they'd been
• 52:56
  properly cleaned and polished.
• 52:58
  Thank you.
• 52:59
  A hundred times over.
• 53:00
  You made this centipede very happy.
• 53:03
  Horrendous.
• 53:04
  Brought the kids with us, but next morning they'd been eaten by a ook.
• 53:08
  No refund or apology.
• 53:09
  Not even a drinks voucher tooth thumbs down.
• 53:13
  Booked a standard fallen log, but got upgraded to junior Birch bark's
• 53:17
  suite with a view of Megi result.
• 53:21
  No parking.
• 53:23
  Great buzz.
• 53:27
  That's it.
• 53:27
  Rupert Isaacson: That's brilliant.
• 53:28
  That's brilliant.
• 53:29
  Laura Chesterfield: I need to practice that one on all the
• 53:31
  voices, but it's so clever.
• 53:32
  Rupert Isaacson: You did it.
• 53:32
  No, you did it beautifully actually.
• 53:34
  Yeah, yeah.
• 53:35
  Well done.
• 53:37
  Laura Chesterfield: So, yeah, so, you know, building things like, like the hotel
• 53:41
  enables us to then still tell stories off the back of it, you know, and, and, and
• 53:45
  you know, that poem will be displayed on site in a really creative, beautiful way.
• 53:49
  And, and just hopefully helps, you know, give nature a bit of a voice and
• 53:54
  for people to empathize with it and connect with it in a different way.
• 53:58
  'cause as soon as you give a, a name to something, you connect with it, right?
• 54:02
  I mean, if we,
• 54:02
  Rupert Isaacson: absolutely,
• 54:03
  Laura Chesterfield: there's a wasp flying around in our house.
• 54:05
  The kids are screaming, but as soon as you call the, was a name.
• 54:08
  Suddenly got a personality and the kids go, oh yeah, no,
• 54:11
  we should let Bernard out.
• 54:12
  You know, like, go, I'm sure he doesn't wanna hurt me.
• 54:14
  And it's just,
• 54:15
  Rupert Isaacson: of course the wasp was called Bernard.
• 54:16
  Yeah,
• 54:17
  Laura Chesterfield: yeah.
• 54:18
  It's an all wasp Is that what Youp
• 54:20
  Rupert Isaacson: Bernard?
• 54:20
  Yeah.
• 54:20
  Laura Chesterfield: All was so Bernard the wasp is suddenly not so scary when
• 54:24
  he's Bernard the wasp and not just the wasp, you know, the wants to hurt you.
• 54:27
  So trying to tell stories where people feel something, where people connect
• 54:31
  in a different way is, is kind of, it's super fun and, and hopefully helps
• 54:35
  Rupert Isaacson: it, it, it's actually an interesting point that you make
• 54:37
  though, because you know, people often say, oh one shouldn't anthropomorphize.
• 54:41
  And I've always questioned that.
• 54:44
  It's like, well, what else can one do about anthropomorphize?
• 54:47
  'cause we are anthropo anthros in a landscape.
• 54:51
  I should imagine that my horses equi.
• 54:57
  Trope, me and my dog probably canino tropes me or whatever, you know, they,
• 55:03
  they, they, they have to, they would have to interpret me right through the
• 55:07
  lens of that they would have to project.
• 55:09
  And, but isn't that also the magic of our interaction with nature?
• 55:12
  And you talk about giving nature a voice.
• 55:14
  Of course.
• 55:14
  One of the big big achievements I'd say in that regard is that you also
• 55:22
  reintroduced the European beaver.
• 55:25
  Laura Chesterfield: Yes.
• 55:25
  Rupert Isaacson: Can you tell us about that?
• 55:27
  How that happened?
• 55:27
  Why that happened?
• 55:29
  Laura Chesterfield: Yeah,
• 55:29
  Rupert Isaacson: that's, that's quite a landmark thing.
• 55:32
  Laura Chesterfield: Very, very cool, very special.
• 55:34
  And I mean the, the wildlife team that, that we've got at heli again, they're, you
• 55:40
  know, they're just brilliant and they're really driven and to doing amazing things.
• 55:45
  And, you know, it was a, it was such a big project to, you know, to kind of be
• 55:50
  brave enough to do, because it's one of those subjects, as soon as you go out
• 55:53
  saying you are reintroducing beavers, everyone's got an opinion, whether
• 55:57
  it's an informed one or not, about what that's gonna do to your land, what that's
• 56:02
  gonna mean for the environment, what
• 56:04
  Rupert Isaacson: also, what's that gonna mean for their land downstream of you.
• 56:07
  Yeah,
• 56:08
  Laura Chesterfield: absolutely.
• 56:08
  Rupert Isaacson: Not to mention all the dirty jokes Yeah.
• 56:10
  Has to be
• 56:11
  Laura Chesterfield: said.
• 56:11
  I mean, they're endless, which is just a gift that keeps
• 56:13
  Rupert Isaacson: wet beavers.
• 56:14
  Yeah.
• 56:14
  Yeah.
• 56:15
  Laura Chesterfield: To be honest, it just keeps on giving every team
• 56:18
  meeting, every team gathering.
• 56:20
  And yeah.
• 56:21
  Rupert Isaacson: But why did you do it?
• 56:22
  Why, why did you guys decide to do that?
• 56:24
  Laura Chesterfield: There are keystone species.
• 56:26
  I mean, they are,
• 56:27
  Rupert Isaacson: tell us what's a keystone species?
• 56:29
  I mean, not everybody knows this term.
• 56:31
  Laura Chesterfield: Yeah, sorry.
• 56:32
  It's they basically are a species that help the world go around.
• 56:36
  You know, if you,
• 56:36
  Rupert Isaacson: why, how?
• 56:38
  Laura Chesterfield: Because they, I mean, the thing with beavers is that they.
• 56:42
  They are one of the biggest architects of nature that there is other than us.
• 56:47
  So that you've never seen an animal change a habitat the way that a
• 56:51
  beaver does, and the impact of that impacts the whole ecosystem.
• 56:57
  So that's really what it means is it's that, you know, it's, it is a species that
• 57:01
  without them, the knock on effect of them.
• 57:05
  Is like a ripple and it really impacts all of the other species, whether it's
• 57:10
  plants, insects, mammals, it, it's, it's, they have such an impact through
• 57:17
  being there, but not being there as well.
• 57:20
  And I think that, you know, they became less and less common.
• 57:24
  Not that not, it wasn't that on recent, you know, it's been quite a recent thing
• 57:28
  that they started disappearing from the landscapes and landscapes kept,
• 57:32
  you know, have changed ever since.
• 57:33
  But when you reintroduce one for us, reintroducing them at GaN onto our
• 57:38
  waterways and, and within a habitat within the woodlands, the transformation
• 57:43
  of that space has been unbelievable.
• 57:46
  You know, and we didn't know,
• 57:47
  Rupert Isaacson: what have you seen?
• 57:48
  Laura Chesterfield: What have we seen?
• 57:49
  So, I mean, they, it was quite funny because Toby, who is our wildlife
• 57:52
  coordinator, he built the start of a couple of dams along the sort of
• 57:57
  stream where we were putting them.
• 58:00
  And within like the first week of, of Mr.
• 58:02
  And Mrs.
• 58:03
  Beaver moving in, they had completely taken Toby's dam apart
• 58:07
  you know, just not good enough
• 58:11
  and completely rebuilt it, and then some and triple it in its size.
• 58:15
  And suddenly then behind this dam, all the water is collecting.
• 58:19
  And then in that water, because it's collecting, you're then
• 58:22
  seeing all these shoots coming up at the edge of what is now.
• 58:27
  You know, it's not a lake, it's definitely not a lake, but it
• 58:29
  is a huge, huge watercourse.
• 58:31
  And then, you know, that the knock on effect of that, of having these
• 58:35
  species growing is that then there's more bugs that are coming in, and then
• 58:39
  they're feeding all of the bats and the owls and the rest of the ecosystem.
• 58:43
  And you're suddenly just seeing this landscape that didn't have
• 58:46
  much biodiversity, becoming a home for so many creatures where they
• 58:51
  all had, you know, something to eat and could live there basically.
• 58:57
  So you're restoring habitat and so beavers as a keystone species that are
• 59:01
  really, you know, can be responsible for incredible habitat restoration.
• 59:06
  And
• 59:07
  Rupert Isaacson: now
• 59:08
  Laura Chesterfield: that's
• 59:08
  Rupert Isaacson: for sure, but given that they became extinct
• 59:11
  in the UK in the 16th C, it's.
• 59:14
  500 years ago, and some people would probably say, well,
• 59:18
  we'd be managing without them.
• 59:20
  Why do we need to bring them back?
• 59:22
  Now?
• 59:23
  I, I, you know, some people might say, okay, it's the whimsical thing.
• 59:25
  It's, or it's restoring, you know, nature as it was, it's rewilding,
• 59:31
  but why do we need beavers in this d everyone needs a beaver.
• 59:36
  But why?
• 59:37
  It's funny we said the architect of nature.
• 59:39
  It's like, well, several jokes came to mind there, but
• 59:43
  Yeah.
• 59:46
  Seriously though, when you had to play devil's advocate, why,
• 59:52
  given that they've been gone for 500 years and life has gone on.
• 59:58
  Laura Chesterfield: Yeah.
• 1:00:00
  Rupert Isaacson: Why, what value, what specific value at
• 1:00:03
  this juncture do they bring?
• 1:00:06
  Laura Chesterfield: Well, I think you have to see it to really understand it.
• 1:00:11
  That's, you know, that's one of the things I think pe people need
• 1:00:14
  to engage with it and see the change in action that they bring.
• 1:00:19
  But I think, you know, looking right now at Cornwall, the flooding
• 1:00:23
  Rupert Isaacson: Yeah.
• 1:00:24
  Laura Chesterfield: Climate change.
• 1:00:25
  Rupert Isaacson: Yeah.
• 1:00:26
  Laura Chesterfield: It's, it's happened.
• 1:00:27
  It's happening.
• 1:00:28
  It's continuing to happen.
• 1:00:30
  We are all seeing the impact of that.
• 1:00:32
  Rupert Isaacson: Absolutely.
• 1:00:33
  I'm sitting here and we are experiencing.
• 1:00:36
  Biblical cataclysmic floods.
• 1:00:38
  Laura Chesterfield: Yeah.
• 1:00:39
  Yeah, yeah.
• 1:00:39
  And that is because, you know, habitats are falling apart.
• 1:00:42
  Structures, roots, you know, spaces in the natural world are
• 1:00:48
  not as they should be to cope
• 1:00:49
  with
• 1:00:50
  the level of water that we're having for an example.
• 1:00:53
  So with beavers, you know, they, they're creating these dams.
• 1:00:56
  They are responsible for stopping flooding in certain places, right?
• 1:01:00
  They, they help to collect water that then when you get the extra dry season,
• 1:01:04
  that water is in place and is making that space where that water is more hydrated.
• 1:01:09
  You know, it just has that knock on effect.
• 1:01:11
  So yeah, it's, you know, plus then you've got all these other creatures, all these
• 1:01:15
  pollinators, you know, they're helping to grow the food that, like the whole
• 1:01:20
  ecological system is all interlinked.
• 1:01:23
  You know, this, this isn't made up bullshit that people just
• 1:01:26
  Rupert Isaacson: absolutely,
• 1:01:27
  Laura Chesterfield: you know, like.
• 1:01:28
  It's just
• 1:01:29
  Rupert Isaacson: no ab absolutely real.
• 1:01:31
  Laura Chesterfield: Like it's just real.
• 1:01:32
  Like everything has to work in harmony together.
• 1:01:35
  Rupert Isaacson: Well it's, it is really interesting that the recently,
• 1:01:38
  and I think you guys are real pioneers with this, 'cause I think a couple of
• 1:01:41
  years after you did it, and there were various other introductions around the uk
• 1:01:46
  Laura Chesterfield: Yeah.
• 1:01:46
  Rupert Isaacson: The London the Greater London Council, GLC, is it
• 1:01:51
  still called the GLCI think it is has introduced them into the Lee Valley,
• 1:01:55
  which is one of the watersheds, main watersheds down into London.
• 1:01:58
  Be to control flooding in London.
• 1:02:02
  And then there was recently a big flood containment project in the Czech
• 1:02:08
  Republic that they were funding had been stalled and bureaucrat and red tape.
• 1:02:16
  And then they suddenly realized they didn't have to do it
• 1:02:18
  because the beavers had.
• 1:02:21
  And the beavers have done it for free.
• 1:02:22
  Laura Chesterfield: Yeah.
• 1:02:23
  Rupert Isaacson: So, yeah.
• 1:02:24
  Laura Chesterfield: Yeah.
• 1:02:25
  Nature's
• 1:02:25
  Rupert Isaacson: not, so when you say keystone species, I, I, I think
• 1:02:28
  that people sort of do need to understand, you know, but it's really
• 1:02:32
  interesting though that you guys as a garden, you know, some people say,
• 1:02:36
  well, are you an ornamental gardener?
• 1:02:37
  Are you a sculpture garden?
• 1:02:38
  Are you the jungle?
• 1:02:39
  Or you these wild species of insects and beavers and things,
• 1:02:44
  as you say, you are all of it.
• 1:02:46
  Yeah.
• 1:02:47
  And then you come out of that woodland area, that beautiful old
• 1:02:51
  ancient woodland that you've got there, and then you're into that
• 1:02:54
  rare breeds form that you are, have.
• 1:02:57
  Tell us about that.
• 1:02:57
  Like, and, and why did your dad get into rare breed?
• 1:03:01
  'cause he was a record producer.
• 1:03:03
  He was a, he was a mu, a music producer.
• 1:03:05
  He was living a very different life in London.
• 1:03:07
  Yeah.
• 1:03:08
  How did he get outta that and into nature and wine?
• 1:03:11
  And how was that for you as a kid too?
• 1:03:13
  You know, because you must have had this sort of early London thing.
• 1:03:17
  And I also grew up partly in Central London.
• 1:03:19
  I hated it, frankly, because kids need nature, like they need oxygen.
• 1:03:26
  Laura Chesterfield: Yeah.
• 1:03:26
  Rupert Isaacson: So what, how is it for you to escape that and the, the
• 1:03:29
  transformation you must have seen your family and your dad make mm-hmm.
• 1:03:33
  You know, from that one life to another life and now these rare breeds.
• 1:03:37
  Just, just talk us through that evolution a little bit.
• 1:03:40
  Laura Chesterfield: Okay.
• 1:03:40
  So my dad.
• 1:03:42
  My dad's had many hats in his life.
• 1:03:44
  I think, you know, he's one of those guys that he's curious about everything.
• 1:03:48
  He wants to meet everyone, he wants to learn about everything.
• 1:03:51
  He's got that childish kind of curiosity, I think.
• 1:03:54
  And so he's had a number of hats, a number of different jobs, but I think as a kid,
• 1:03:59
  he was really connected to nature, you know, and he, his fondest memories are of,
• 1:04:04
  you know, same as a lot of people looking under rocks and looking for toads and, you
• 1:04:08
  know, looking for, looking for wildlife and, and sort of hunting that down.
• 1:04:12
  He rode horses, he had dogs, he had animals.
• 1:04:16
  He was out in nature and.
• 1:04:18
  Enabled to be connected to it, I suppose, and, and very aware of how that made
• 1:04:24
  him feel and, and how he wanted that in his life in one way or another.
• 1:04:28
  So he studied archeology.
• 1:04:31
  He also studied you know, he was a deep sea diver at some point in his
• 1:04:35
  life and also a record producer.
• 1:04:37
  So he's sort of done all sorts of different things in his world.
• 1:04:40
  And the rare Breeds thing was.
• 1:04:43
  Moving from London.
• 1:04:44
  I think I was about six when we moved from Brixton, which was a
• 1:04:47
  very different place back then in
• 1:04:49
  Rupert Isaacson: which is about as London as you can get.
• 1:04:50
  Yeah,
• 1:04:51
  Laura Chesterfield: it's proper London.
• 1:04:52
  Yeah.
• 1:04:52
  Rupert Isaacson: Yeah.
• 1:04:52
  Proper.
• 1:04:53
  It is.
• 1:04:54
  Laura Chesterfield: And was very different in the eighties to what it is now.
• 1:04:58
  Yeah.
• 1:04:58
  Brixton.
• 1:04:58
  Yeah.
• 1:04:58
  It
• 1:04:58
  Rupert Isaacson: was rough.
• 1:04:59
  Laura Chesterfield: It was rough.
• 1:05:00
  It was not place.
• 1:05:01
  I don't have I don't have un fond memories of it, you know, and, and regularly we
• 1:05:06
  were in parks and we were in gardens and we had pets and you know, I think
• 1:05:11
  both my parents were very much sort of.
• 1:05:14
  In tune with the natural world.
• 1:05:17
  And, but we came down and visited a place called Foy when
• 1:05:20
  I must have been about six.
• 1:05:21
  And I think, you know, my parents just fell in love with Cornwall and decided
• 1:05:26
  actually this is where we want our kids to grow up, you know, on the beach crabbing
• 1:05:30
  off of, you know, the key and, you know, fishing and, you know, walking footpaths,
• 1:05:37
  naming wild flowers, all of those sorts of things I have such memories of as a kid.
• 1:05:41
  So yeah, really fortunate that that was the decision that they made.
• 1:05:44
  And they bought this big old farmhouse, moved from Brixton down to
• 1:05:49
  a tiny little village called Goran, which is right on the coast near.
• 1:05:53
  And, you know, we lived at, we lived at a farm but didn't own the farm.
• 1:05:57
  We lived in a farmhouse, we had a little bit of land, and so our childhoods
• 1:06:00
  were just built around, you know, having animals going to the beach.
• 1:06:06
  Growing food, building tree houses, you know, making apple
• 1:06:10
  pies out of blackberries.
• 1:06:12
  We just foraged, you know, it was really picturesque and really very beautiful
• 1:06:16
  and we didn't have a lot of money.
• 1:06:17
  It wasn't based on money whatsoever.
• 1:06:19
  You know, it's, there's a lot of assumptions when you sort of, people
• 1:06:22
  see the success my father has had.
• 1:06:25
  They make assumptions about fin finance and about people's experiences.
• 1:06:30
  And actually we, we never had a lot of money.
• 1:06:33
  And money doesn't motivate us to this day.
• 1:06:36
  You know, it's, it's not about that at all.
• 1:06:38
  And I think growing up we used our imaginations, we played outside, we had
• 1:06:43
  animals, we had bikes, we had the beach.
• 1:06:45
  We, you know, and our, and our parents were very present in that.
• 1:06:47
  And we read a lot.
• 1:06:48
  And so when GaN came along, the rare breeds thing was actually about going
• 1:06:53
  to the Royal Cornwall Show and going to the rare breeds Farm Park Tent,
• 1:06:57
  which was hosted by the rare breeds Survival Trust, who are still a
• 1:07:02
  really successful charity, championing those heritage breeds here in the uk.
• 1:07:07
  And we went to that tent and you know, the diversity of seeing all of these
• 1:07:11
  animals that were not what you read about in, you know, in Charlotte's Web, for
• 1:07:15
  example, which was my favorite book, you know, pigs are not all pink, sheep are
• 1:07:20
  not all white and looking like clouds.
• 1:07:22
  And actually to go to this bury tent and see, you know, polka dot pigs and
• 1:07:27
  you know, sheep with horns up to here and you know, all these different breeds
• 1:07:32
  and they were so colorful and so diverse and all had stories attached to them
• 1:07:37
  that it just captured our imaginations.
• 1:07:38
  And pigs have been a bit of a running theme in our family, have just.
• 1:07:43
  Just, we just like them.
• 1:07:44
  I can't say more than that.
• 1:07:45
  We just like pigs.
• 1:07:47
  Pigs are so intelligent.
• 1:07:48
  They're so far.
• 1:07:48
  Yeah.
• 1:07:49
  They're just, oh, adore them.
• 1:07:51
  So, we went about adopting some pigs from Newy Zoo.
• 1:07:55
  And they came to live on our farm with us, Horace and Doris, and they were our pets.
• 1:07:59
  And I used to walk one of the pigs to school with me and then mum would
• 1:08:03
  walk at home 'cause I'd have to go to class and sort of, you know, you
• 1:08:07
  Rupert Isaacson: weren't allowed to Your emotional support
• 1:08:08
  Laura Chesterfield: pig in class.
• 1:08:09
  Yeah, my emotional support pig was not allowed in class.
• 1:08:11
  So, so animals had always kind of been within our family.
• 1:08:15
  And then when, when dad was, you know, part of the restoration at Halligan,
• 1:08:19
  he'd obviously been on a search for a location for the rare, rare breed
• 1:08:23
  farm park that he wanted to start.
• 1:08:25
  He got a bit distracted by heli and, you know, all the stories that I've just told
• 1:08:31
  you that were more kind of people based.
• 1:08:33
  But when I then came to work at Halligan.
• 1:08:37
  They decided that they wanted to start the restoration of the landscape and
• 1:08:40
  the estate more so, you know, they've been very focused on the walled garden,
• 1:08:44
  the ornamental gardens, the jungle up until that point, but actually the
• 1:08:47
  wider estate and, and the, the, the fields and the pasture land and stuff,
• 1:08:52
  those stories hadn't really been told.
• 1:08:55
  And so they wanted to do a focus on the animals and bringing in the native
• 1:09:00
  breeds and, and telling that kind of farm to fork plate in a different way.
• 1:09:05
  So that was the first job I had coming to Halligan, was to finally
• 1:09:08
  start my dad's rare breed farm, which, you know, took 30 years.
• 1:09:13
  But it was, it was an amazing thing because I think,
• 1:09:16
  'cause I already understood.
• 1:09:18
  Animals in the sense of storytelling.
• 1:09:21
  You know, the emotional impact that I personally had from being around animals.
• 1:09:26
  You know, I studied horses at Dutchie College.
• 1:09:28
  I studied yard management.
• 1:09:29
  I loved animals.
• 1:09:31
  I rode horses.
• 1:09:31
  I competed horses.
• 1:09:33
  We had every kind of animal at home growing up, you know, like I
• 1:09:36
  say, pigs in the kitchen, hatching chickens and incubators In my
• 1:09:39
  bedroom, we took on a, you know, orphaned lambs and every poultry.
• 1:09:44
  And so I was very blessed that that was kind of the childhood I had.
• 1:09:48
  And felt very connected to animals.
• 1:09:51
  So I realized when I was then in a professional sense, that actually.
• 1:09:55
  So many, so many people, it's not just kids do not have
• 1:09:58
  that connection with animals.
• 1:10:00
  Maybe because they don't have the opportunity to, you know, they don't,
• 1:10:02
  not everyone grows up on a farm, and if you, especially on holiday in Cornwall,
• 1:10:06
  maybe have come from London or wherever else, you, you don't see sheep and
• 1:10:10
  pigs every day and you don't have that understanding or that empathy or, you
• 1:10:15
  know, so it's another world, isn't it?
• 1:10:16
  So having the berries, farm park had a number of layers attached
• 1:10:21
  to it, I suppose is how I see it.
• 1:10:22
  So you've got the basic layer of engagement with cute animals,
• 1:10:26
  which absolutely works for people on a real basic level of seeing
• 1:10:29
  baby animals running around.
• 1:10:31
  But it enabled us to tell stories of conservation through consumption,
• 1:10:35
  where your food comes from, how you look after animals and livestock, how,
• 1:10:40
  you know, how often people eat meat and where they get their meat from.
• 1:10:44
  Where does their meat grow?
• 1:10:46
  How is that grown in harmony with the environment?
• 1:10:49
  And so.
• 1:10:49
  It is enabled us to just have this wonderful way of telling stories to
• 1:10:55
  different audiences in different ways at different depths and, and mainly to tell
• 1:10:59
  the story of, you know, of the estate, you know, and it is managed by our livestock
• 1:11:05
  and, you know, regenerative grazing, you know, it's quite a recent term.
• 1:11:09
  It's really well known now, but probably 10 years ago, not so much.
• 1:11:13
  And, and we, you know, we were really passionate about trying it
• 1:11:17
  and I think what we've done quite well at Halligan is that we never
• 1:11:19
  said we were the experts in it.
• 1:11:21
  We didn't know what would happen when we did it, whether it be
• 1:11:23
  successful, whether it be too hard, whether it, you know, what, what,
• 1:11:26
  what the outcomes that would be.
• 1:11:27
  But we quite enjoy sharing our trying.
• 1:11:30
  Same as with the reintroduction of beavers.
• 1:11:32
  Let's give it a go.
• 1:11:33
  Let's collectively give this a go, see how it works, share our
• 1:11:38
  successes, share our challenges, and be kind of a platform for sharing.
• 1:11:44
  You know, how, how we might approach problems as a society.
• 1:11:47
  Rupert Isaacson: Tell us, talk me through regenerative grazing.
• 1:11:50
  How does it work?
• 1:11:51
  How do you do it?
• 1:11:52
  Laura Chesterfield: So, regenerative grazing, mob grazing, there's different
• 1:11:55
  sort of terms depending on exactly how you're doing it, what animals
• 1:11:57
  you're, you are using for that.
• 1:11:59
  So we, we've got what's called a flud which is.
• 1:12:04
  A flock and a herd combined.
• 1:12:06
  So your, your sheep and your cattle.
• 1:12:09
  Okay.
• 1:12:09
  And, and they graze together.
• 1:12:11
  And, and what we do is we basically, we, we graze 'em in one area and
• 1:12:15
  then we move them the next day.
• 1:12:17
  Right.
• 1:12:17
  So you're trying to, you're trying to copycat if they were
• 1:12:20
  wild, how wild animals graze.
• 1:12:24
  Yeah.
• 1:12:24
  So wild animals do not just stay in the same bit of grassland until
• 1:12:28
  it's bare and raw and empty of nutrients and mud up to their knees.
• 1:12:33
  They tend to go, you know, they graze a wider area.
• 1:12:36
  They seek the nutrition, they seek the goodness for their bodies.
• 1:12:40
  So we try to.
• 1:12:42
  Imitate that, you know, we are managing that of course, because they're not wild
• 1:12:48
  as in, you know, they are contained.
• 1:12:50
  But by moving them every single day to a new area, you are enabling
• 1:12:54
  the habitat they're in to be grazed in a much more natural way.
• 1:12:58
  So they will in and they will graze the, the level of the grasses
• 1:13:02
  that they want to leaving other grasses, their feet will trample
• 1:13:06
  the soil in a much more natural way.
• 1:13:09
  So rather than overgrazing it and compacting it, they're actually opening
• 1:13:12
  up the soil so that then when it rains, the rain actually goes into the soil,
• 1:13:17
  helps the plants to grow, keeps it, you know, so it's, again, it's about
• 1:13:20
  that harmonious cycle within the natural world, enabling that to happen.
• 1:13:25
  So we can then see the impact of that, you know, and, and how easy that is to manage.
• 1:13:29
  And does that take more resource?
• 1:13:31
  Is there a reason we're not doing this anymore because it takes more staff and
• 1:13:35
  more fencing and more, or is it actually.
• 1:13:38
  Having amazing impacts.
• 1:13:39
  And, and what we've seen is it has great impacts, you know, and that actually,
• 1:13:43
  if you do it correctly, you can, you can rest certain fields and make your
• 1:13:47
  haze, you've got a bit more forest for your animals at different times of year.
• 1:13:51
  And in winter, they, they have been bought in far less into the barns
• 1:13:55
  because we've actually had better pasture land that's remaining healthy.
• 1:14:00
  That's regenerating itself where, you know, we're seeing far more
• 1:14:03
  species of birds and other insects.
• 1:14:06
  And then we're getting, you know, when we are then doing our observations of levels
• 1:14:10
  of how many owls we've got, or we're doing our back counts and, and things like that.
• 1:14:13
  The, the levels are going up.
• 1:14:15
  You know, we have like the Moth Society come in for a night and they'll capture
• 1:14:18
  all the different varieties of moths and, and they're a really good gauge of,
• 1:14:22
  you know, how biodiverse is this space.
• 1:14:23
  There's loads of moths as a really good.
• 1:14:25
  Mm.
• 1:14:26
  Good idea that it's a really healthy space.
• 1:14:28
  So you can see that it's having a great impact on nature.
• 1:14:32
  And I think for us, if you can demonstrate that the meat that maybe
• 1:14:36
  ends up on the menu, that actually the job of those animals has not been
• 1:14:42
  primarily to end up on your plate, their job has been to manage the land,
• 1:14:46
  to do that in a really healthy way for the future, that's sustainable.
• 1:14:52
  Mm-hmm.
• 1:14:52
  A lot more people these days, they wanna get behind that.
• 1:14:54
  They wanna feel like they're investing their money into eating meat that has
• 1:14:58
  been ethically grown, that is having a really great impact on the planet.
• 1:15:01
  So trying to tell those stories but seeing it in motion rather than, again,
• 1:15:06
  a sign or a menu, actually seeing that you know, is really mixed opinions, but
• 1:15:12
  we are really kind of proud of that and, and it opens up those conversations.
• 1:15:17
  Rupert Isaacson: Yeah.
• 1:15:17
  Tell us about, okay, so you, you also mentioned your horsey side
• 1:15:20
  of life and it's interesting.
• 1:15:21
  That's one, that's the one.
• 1:15:23
  Part of heli that, you know, I'm a horseman, obviously.
• 1:15:25
  Laura Chesterfield: Are
• 1:15:25
  Rupert Isaacson: you, I look around it.
• 1:15:26
  You
• 1:15:26
  Laura Chesterfield: got a horse?
• 1:15:27
  Have you got a horse?
• 1:15:29
  Rupert Isaacson: And you know, I look at heli.
• 1:15:31
  Oh, it'd be nice to have some horses here.
• 1:15:33
  And of course, for a while you did have, you know, a couple of shires draft horses.
• 1:15:36
  But tell us about your horsey life and how do you feel, you
• 1:15:39
  know, you went and studied it too.
• 1:15:41
  You didn't just do it recreationally.
• 1:15:42
  Talk us through that and, and how do you feel that's impacted your,
• 1:15:46
  your particularly I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm quite intrigued by what horses
• 1:15:51
  teach people in terms of leadership.
• 1:15:53
  And I, because, you know, I've grown up around very, very, very horsey
• 1:15:57
  women, so I've never understood why anyone ever had a problem with like.
• 1:16:04
  Women bosses or women leadership or whatever, because I just always grew
• 1:16:07
  up with these incredibly strong women who were natural leaders who were
• 1:16:11
  always in these leadership positions and you just deferred to them because
• 1:16:15
  they had the expertise and they cut your head off if you didn't.
• 1:16:19
  So, I'd like to hear a little bit about this from your point of view, because this
• 1:16:23
  was also part of forming your worldview that's ended up with the halligan thing.
• 1:16:27
  Laura Chesterfield: Mm.
• 1:16:28
  Rupert Isaacson: Tell us your whole story.
• 1:16:29
  Laura Chesterfield: No, it's really that, that's my management
• 1:16:31
  style is chopping the's heads off.
• 1:16:32
  Yeah,
• 1:16:33
  Rupert Isaacson: that's you all the way.
• 1:16:34
  That's right.
• 1:16:34
  Laura Chesterfield: Me every day.
• 1:16:35
  Rupert Isaacson: Well, you give them a chance at first before you
• 1:16:37
  Laura Chesterfield: Yeah, no, I think it's really interesting, isn't it?
• 1:16:39
  Like I talk, I talk a lot to people about relationships with nature,
• 1:16:44
  you know, and, and how to, you know, there's, there's a, there's ongoing
• 1:16:47
  conversation everywhere I go, you know, how do we get people into nature?
• 1:16:50
  How do we get people to spend more time in nature for their wellbeing,
• 1:16:54
  for, you know, for, to feel better and.
• 1:16:58
  People try and turn it into something that's all about retreats and
• 1:17:01
  that you've gotta basically have a bank balance to be well or to
• 1:17:04
  be healthy or, or whatever else.
• 1:17:05
  Yeah, actually I just think that's bollocks.
• 1:17:08
  I just think wellbeing is for everybody.
• 1:17:10
  Mm-hmm.
• 1:17:10
  And having a relationship with nature is something people
• 1:17:12
  have gotta find themselves.
• 1:17:14
  So, you know, trying to wellbeing as an outcome rather
• 1:17:19
  than a, an advertised thing.
• 1:17:20
  So GaN is very much about, you know, that's the outcome and that's my viewpoint
• 1:17:24
  as well, is that you just feel better.
• 1:17:26
  You come to Halligan, you go and have a walk around, you have a play,
• 1:17:29
  you eat something nice, you see something amazing, you switch off.
• 1:17:32
  The outcome is that you feel better.
• 1:17:33
  We don't advertise it that way because that kind of removes it.
• 1:17:36
  But I think
• 1:17:37
  I I hear you.
• 1:17:37
  Yeah.
• 1:17:38
  You know what I mean?
• 1:17:38
  So, but for me, with horses that was.
• 1:17:41
  I've always had a relationship with animals, felt very attuned and
• 1:17:44
  comfortable and confident around animals.
• 1:17:46
  And I think that's, you know, something I certainly inherit from my dad.
• 1:17:49
  And my relationship with nature was mainly about going out, hacking on my pony before
• 1:17:54
  the days of having a mobile phone where you were going out safely on your pony and
• 1:17:58
  someone knew where you were, was actually getting on my pony and off we went.
• 1:18:03
  And, you know, whether we were going off across a beach or up across a woodland
• 1:18:07
  or in a farmer's field or up a track.
• 1:18:09
  And that feeling of adventure on my pony of where are we, what's our story today?
• 1:18:14
  You know, where are we going?
• 1:18:16
  And, and he was my trustee guide, you know, and I'd probably like a
• 1:18:19
  lot of horsey people share all of my world worldly secrets with my pony.
• 1:18:24
  And he never told a soul.
• 1:18:26
  And, and, and, and it's true.
• 1:18:29
  It's like, it, it's therapy, isn't it?
• 1:18:31
  But it's, it's, it's one of those things where.
• 1:18:34
  When you're younger, you don't necessarily understand the science of it in the
• 1:18:37
  way that you so eloquently talk about, but I think I just knew every time
• 1:18:41
  I went horse riding, I felt good.
• 1:18:44
  I, I'd come away and I would feel great and I'd feel great mentally.
• 1:18:49
  I'd feel good physically, and, and I'd have had fun, you know, there
• 1:18:51
  was recreation involved a bit.
• 1:18:53
  And that was my relationship with nature because then when I was out on
• 1:18:56
  my hacks on the, on the horse, I would notice the seasons changing, you know?
• 1:19:01
  Because if you got horses, as you know, as opposed, probably most
• 1:19:03
  of your audience are very aware.
• 1:19:05
  Every season you're out there.
• 1:19:07
  Twice a day, you're out there
• 1:19:08
  Rupert Isaacson: and
• 1:19:09
  Laura Chesterfield: you love it, whatever's going on.
• 1:19:13
  So you notice when you're an outside person like that, you notice the seasons
• 1:19:16
  change and you really notice those intricate details of, I said to my husband
• 1:19:20
  this morning, we were walking the dog.
• 1:19:21
  I was like, look, all of the snow drops are out.
• 1:19:24
  You know?
• 1:19:24
  And you notice those moments in the year that kind of give joy or
• 1:19:28
  give those anchoring moments of, okay, spring is coming, it's okay.
• 1:19:32
  You know, we are, we're not stuck in this winter of storms forever.
• 1:19:36
  And I think horse riding gave me that of noticing.
• 1:19:40
  Birds, berries, wildlife, newborn lambs in the fields, far more cars 'cause the
• 1:19:46
  tourists were here, so it must be summer.
• 1:19:48
  You know, so you notice everything from that, from that bird's eye view.
• 1:19:53
  And so for me, I mean, that's where my relationship with nature started probably,
• 1:19:57
  but with horses was from that point.
• 1:19:59
  And, you know, I was very lucky that I, I was bought a pony by my dad when I was 15,
• 1:20:06
  you know, and I'd spent six years having to prove to him that I would go out in
• 1:20:12
  all weathers before he would buy me one.
• 1:20:13
  And so going at the local stables and the local farmer and mucking out their horses
• 1:20:18
  and, you know, proving that I was an all weather girl and that this was for me.
• 1:20:22
  And got bought my pony Tyson when I was 15 and, and he was four.
• 1:20:28
  And it was love at first sight.
• 1:20:30
  And he was a pain in the ass.
• 1:20:31
  You know, he was a Welsh section D.
• 1:20:33
  He was beautiful.
• 1:20:34
  He knew it, he was wild, but he was kind of heart, but he was strong.
• 1:20:39
  And I think, you know, you, as soon as you start that new relationship, you,
• 1:20:44
  you get some respect for one another.
• 1:20:46
  And you have to find that, that place don't you?
• 1:20:49
  Of I know how to keep you safe and I know you are gonna keep me safe, but I also
• 1:20:53
  know how to read if you are not okay.
• 1:20:55
  And you might read if I'm not okay and you know, you are waiting for me to come and
• 1:20:59
  give you your hay on a day where the snow.
• 1:21:01
  And equally, I'm waiting for you to keep me safe when you, you know, we
• 1:21:05
  go somewhere and something spooks you and you're gonna look after me.
• 1:21:08
  And that growing, that relationship was.
• 1:21:11
  The most important thing, and you know, other than my, you know, children, the
• 1:21:15
  most important relationship I've ever had, and, you know, the day that I
• 1:21:19
  had to actually have him put to sleep 23 years later was still goes down
• 1:21:24
  in history as absolutely, without a doubt, the worst day of my entire life.
• 1:21:28
  And that's because he represented to me, you know, that relationship.
• 1:21:33
  But.
• 1:21:34
  He represented hobbies, he represented fitness, he represented like my mental
• 1:21:40
  health and how I kept my mental health good was riding, hacking, grooming, being
• 1:21:44
  in a stable with him, all of those things.
• 1:21:46
  So it wasn't just losing your pet or your rec, you know,
• 1:21:51
  just go and get another one.
• 1:21:52
  And I was like, no, can't do it.
• 1:21:53
  Never do it.
• 1:21:54
  But that, you know, that definitely that respectful relationship.
• 1:22:00
  Trying to come back to one part of your question about leadership was, was that
• 1:22:04
  you gotta work with people, you know, you've gotta use your strengths alongside
• 1:22:07
  other people's strengths, and you've also gotta be really confident when it's hard.
• 1:22:12
  You know, sometimes your horse needs to be told and needs to learn, and
• 1:22:16
  needs, needs to be led, and needs to, to be taught things equally.
• 1:22:21
  You've gotta be open to listening and hearing what's.
• 1:22:24
  Being told from the other perspective?
• 1:22:25
  I suppose so
• 1:22:26
  Rupert Isaacson: right.
• 1:22:27
  I I, I'm a great believer too that, you know, we talk about nature a lot
• 1:22:30
  and one of the, but one of the things which has removed people from nature
• 1:22:35
  and now I think affect how people relate to nature is that nature is dangerous.
• 1:22:41
  Mm.
• 1:22:42
  It's supposed to be.
• 1:22:43
  Right.
• 1:22:43
  And we are, because there is an ecosystem.
• 1:22:46
  Those things eat other things.
• 1:22:48
  And we of course are not top of the tree.
• 1:22:51
  We are mid-level predators.
• 1:22:53
  There are things out there that eat us only when we get together
• 1:22:56
  with this larynx and strategized together, do we become top predator.
• 1:23:00
  And obviously we've been a bit too successful at that.
• 1:23:03
  But it means to, I, I often feel that when people now want to reconnect with
• 1:23:08
  nature, there's one really important element that they miss, which is danger.
• 1:23:12
  You have to have risk because we're hunter-gatherers.
• 1:23:15
  We are designed to deal with this all the time.
• 1:23:18
  And of course, with horses.
• 1:23:21
  The risk is inherent.
• 1:23:23
  Laura Chesterfield: Mm-hmm.
• 1:23:23
  Rupert Isaacson: As you may know, if you've been following my work,
• 1:23:25
  we are also horsey folk here.
• 1:23:28
  And we have been training horses for many, many years in the manner of
• 1:23:32
  the old classical dressage masters.
• 1:23:36
  This is something which is often very confusing for people.
• 1:23:39
  We shine a light on that murky, difficult stuff and make it crystal clear.
• 1:23:44
  If you'd like to learn to train your horse in the manner of the old masters and
• 1:23:49
  really have fun and joy for you and your equine, go to our website, heliosharmony.
• 1:23:55
  com Sign up as a premium member.
• 1:23:58
  and begin to take the Helios Harmony course, which will take you from zero
• 1:24:02
  to the Piaf, where the horse is dancing on the spot in hand on the ground.
• 1:24:08
  And then from there, you can develop out to anywhere you want to.
• 1:24:13
  Heliosharmony.
• 1:24:14
  com to unlock the secrets of the old masters.
• 1:24:18
  The danger is there all the time.
• 1:24:20
  Talk to me about that, a little bit, about your, your relationship
• 1:24:24
  with the natural world.
• 1:24:25
  Danger, courage.
• 1:24:29
  Yeah.
• 1:24:30
  This and how this forms the human mind, but the, the horse, the
• 1:24:33
  very specific, the way horses interact with nature themselves.
• 1:24:36
  'cause they're pre species, you know, so they spook, but they're
• 1:24:39
  also way what a car weighs.
• 1:24:41
  So if they spook on us, that's not great for, you know, J Ex.
• 1:24:46
  Just explore this a little bit.
• 1:24:47
  I'd be interested to know your thoughts.
• 1:24:50
  Laura Chesterfield: It's an interesting one, isn't it?
• 1:24:51
  I think I, most people I know that, you know, do.
• 1:24:57
  Connect with nature through a sport, shall we say.
• 1:25:00
  Mm-hmm.
• 1:25:00
  It's usually because there is that danger, isn't it?
• 1:25:02
  So if I was, I was listening yesterday to this amazing female surfer that has just
• 1:25:07
  surfed the, the, is it the biggest wave of all time, or the biggest wave this year?
• 1:25:11
  Or, or, you know, so it was on in the background.
• 1:25:13
  I was watching her and, you know, she was talking about that emotional
• 1:25:16
  relationship and that respect of fear and danger and that actually that's
• 1:25:20
  what makes her feel part of nature and makes her feel alive the most.
• 1:25:24
  Mm-hmm.
• 1:25:25
  I think, you know, there's, people talk about that a lot, don't they?
• 1:25:28
  That, that, that element of risk is, it makes you feel alive because that, I
• 1:25:34
  guess, you know, being hunter-gatherers, we would've way back when lived in a
• 1:25:39
  cave, had to deal with the elements, had to deal with risk far less risk
• 1:25:43
  managed than in today's day and age.
• 1:25:45
  So I guess, you know, it makes us feel more human, doesn't it?
• 1:25:47
  But,
• 1:25:48
  mm-hmm.
• 1:25:48
  I think horses.
• 1:25:52
  Is that there is that element of danger, and it is exci, it is exciting, but you've
• 1:25:56
  gotta know how to manage it, haven't you?
• 1:25:57
  It's not for everybody.
• 1:25:58
  It's not for everybody at all.
• 1:26:00
  But horses have got it.
• 1:26:02
  They've got it nailed, haven't they?
• 1:26:03
  They're kind of, they're, they're in harmony with what they've got
• 1:26:06
  very clear boundaries, I think, of what's okay for them and what's not.
• 1:26:10
  Rupert Isaacson: Yeah.
• 1:26:11
  Laura Chesterfield: And, and you can learn a lot from that.
• 1:26:13
  Definitely.
• 1:26:14
  Definitely.
• 1:26:15
  Rupert Isaacson: Yeah.
• 1:26:15
  I feel that there's a, there's an element, you know, people talk a
• 1:26:18
  lot about awe these days, a WE.
• 1:26:21
  Laura Chesterfield: Mm-hmm.
• 1:26:21
  Rupert Isaacson: And this being a really necessary component to happiness.
• 1:26:27
  Laura Chesterfield: Yeah.
• 1:26:27
  Rupert Isaacson: To feel in the presence of, you know, you have that down in
• 1:26:30
  Cornwall in spades because the ocean is there, the landscape is there.
• 1:26:35
  You are often feeling dwarfed by the awesome immensity of, you know, of nature.
• 1:26:43
  But I feel that horses, in a weird way, embody that.
• 1:26:46
  Laura Chesterfield: Mm.
• 1:26:46
  Rupert Isaacson: You know what I mean?
• 1:26:48
  Laura Chesterfield: Yeah.
• 1:26:48
  It's, it's a, wow.
• 1:26:49
  It's all those wow moments, isn't it?
• 1:26:50
  And I think it's, it's sense.
• 1:26:53
  But you were talking there and I was just thinking it is that sensory thing,
• 1:26:56
  isn't it, of for some people they won't want to do things that you might class
• 1:26:59
  as dangerous, but sensory extremes.
• 1:27:03
  Mm.
• 1:27:04
  Are.
• 1:27:04
  So if I think about like my mom, she would love to go for a walk on a stormy day.
• 1:27:10
  Not maybe the dangerous, dangerous storms that we've had recently, but that
• 1:27:14
  feeling of sensory wind in your face.
• 1:27:18
  Yeah.
• 1:27:18
  Pushing you backwards, going to the beach, seeing the huge
• 1:27:21
  waves, feeling nature's force.
• 1:27:25
  Mm-hmm.
• 1:27:25
  That, that in itself is really, you know, is, is that Wow.
• 1:27:28
  And that feeling connected to it.
• 1:27:30
  And part of what you then love is maybe going home and having a
• 1:27:32
  different sensory experience of snuggling up in the snuggle by a fire.
• 1:27:36
  And I think as humans we see all of those sensory things, don't we mm-hmm.
• 1:27:41
  Get alive at different points and, but yeah.
• 1:27:43
  Horses as powerful creatures, definitely they represent that kind of courage
• 1:27:48
  to be open to all of that, I suppose, and to, to seek it a little bit, you
• 1:27:55
  know, to go into the, to ride into risk rather than to shelter away maybe.
• 1:28:03
  Rupert Isaacson: They'll carry you through.
• 1:28:04
  They carry you.
• 1:28:05
  You know, I was, I was looking at, we, we, we have this little YouTube channel
• 1:28:09
  that we do around horses in mythology.
• 1:28:11
  And I was doing one on slight near the other day, you know, slight near being
• 1:28:15
  Odin's horse, the eight legged horse.
• 1:28:18
  And there's a point at which, you know, people will often say, oh,
• 1:28:22
  that horse, you, you could ride to hell and back on that horse.
• 1:28:25
  And of course, in the, in the legend of slight near, that's exactly what they do.
• 1:28:29
  They, they ride to hell to try and recover the soul of a, of a God called Boulder.
• 1:28:35
  He actually jumps the fence into hell.
• 1:28:37
  So there's a good jumper too, and they ride out.
• 1:28:39
  But I was just thinking as a metaphor, we, we horses transform us, don't they?
• 1:28:43
  Because they carry us through the landscape.
• 1:28:45
  They carry us into danger, but through the other side of danger if we don't
• 1:28:49
  get killed in the way, you know?
• 1:28:50
  Yeah.
• 1:28:51
  But with that ever present risk, and then this need for balance, right.
• 1:28:57
  Laura Chesterfield: Yep.
• 1:28:58
  Rupert Isaacson: You know, you, 'cause strength doesn't
• 1:29:00
  really come into it with horses.
• 1:29:01
  They're obviously so ridiculously strong.
• 1:29:04
  The whole thing comes to down to balance, emotional as well as physical.
• 1:29:10
  Again, what are your thoughts on this?
• 1:29:12
  Because you, you, you went and studied, you were going to go into this, you
• 1:29:17
  were gonna go into the equine industry.
• 1:29:19
  Mm.
• 1:29:20
  You know, so this obviously really grabbed you at a certain point and
• 1:29:22
  then you didn't, why, why didn't you?
• 1:29:25
  But what do you feel you took from it anyway into your career?
• 1:29:29
  Yeah,
• 1:29:30
  Laura Chesterfield: I was just, when you were first talking, I was
• 1:29:31
  actually thinking about it like, it's the year of the horse, isn't it?
• 1:29:34
  This year is,
• 1:29:34
  Rupert Isaacson: yeah, it is.
• 1:29:35
  Yeah.
• 1:29:36
  Laura Chesterfield: From year of the fire horse year of the
• 1:29:38
  snake to the year of the horse.
• 1:29:39
  And some of the words you were using actually, I think were, the things I've
• 1:29:42
  read about for this year of kind of that courage and balance actually being
• 1:29:46
  kind of those, those words attached to this year, which feels feels good.
• 1:29:50
  But yeah, I studied horses because I.
• 1:29:54
  I wanted to learn more.
• 1:29:56
  I think that was what it started off as.
• 1:29:58
  I was interested.
• 1:29:59
  I was curious.
• 1:30:00
  Like I knew I loved it recreationally as a child.
• 1:30:03
  And then when I was at a point of being 17 and you're able to choose what you
• 1:30:07
  do at college and, you know, my, my dad was happy for me to study horses.
• 1:30:11
  My mom was like, you have to do something proper as well.
• 1:30:14
  You know, and, and so, so we kind of found a balance of I'll do horses, but
• 1:30:19
  I'll do business management as well.
• 1:30:21
  And, you know, that that worked actually really well together.
• 1:30:24
  But for me it was that curiosity.
• 1:30:26
  I just wanted to be an expert in it because I loved it, you know?
• 1:30:30
  And I do think doing things now, I'm 20 years older than
• 1:30:33
  that, doing things you love.
• 1:30:37
  If you can do something you love, do it because you're bound to be better at it.
• 1:30:43
  You'll want to learn, you'll want to do it, you'll want to fill your time with it.
• 1:30:47
  And I, I do have an element of, regret's the wrong word, because I've had a
• 1:30:52
  great career so far, and, and, but there's something to be said for when
• 1:30:57
  you had sort of different points in your career and you think, what do I love?
• 1:31:01
  What am I good at?
• 1:31:02
  What am I interested in that, you know, horses for me has always come back
• 1:31:05
  as a, you know, something that just makes me feel good in every single way.
• 1:31:10
  But I think at the point after I'd studied horses, I probably at that moment couldn't
• 1:31:17
  see down in Cornwall a career path that felt obvious to me at that point.
• 1:31:23
  I, I didn't, I wasn't the best jockey.
• 1:31:25
  I was a good rider, but compared to some of the other jockeys that
• 1:31:29
  maybe already had sponsorships and, and, and rode for yards and,
• 1:31:33
  and trainers, I didn't feel like.
• 1:31:36
  I necessarily was that route, and I didn't, I liked teaching and did
• 1:31:42
  some teaching qualifications and liked it, but I wasn't sure that
• 1:31:46
  I was ready to settle to do that.
• 1:31:48
  Mm.
• 1:31:48
  Because I still loved my riding.
• 1:31:50
  So I loved the yard management side of it.
• 1:31:52
  I loved all of that, but I think I just couldn't see a pathway from
• 1:31:56
  there as to where I would get a job without moving away or, or without,
• 1:32:02
  you know, not being financially in a situation that would sustain me.
• 1:32:06
  You know, it was at that point.
• 1:32:08
  Rupert Isaacson: Yeah, it's an ill paid industry, that's
• 1:32:09
  Laura Chesterfield: for sure.
• 1:32:09
  It's ill paid industry.
• 1:32:10
  It's not supported.
• 1:32:11
  And so I just, but I also, when I finished my qualifications,
• 1:32:15
  I was a much better rider.
• 1:32:17
  I'd taken my horse to college with me, so he was a much better horse.
• 1:32:20
  And I also, I, I loved, I loved the business study side of stuff.
• 1:32:24
  I, I, I really liked sort of learning that side of things, but
• 1:32:27
  I, it, I then went into the world.
• 1:32:29
  I went traveling for a while, but I then went and studied to be a counselor and
• 1:32:32
  I went into sort of the world of therapy and trauma therapy and, and just kind
• 1:32:36
  of explored other interests that I had.
• 1:32:38
  I've always been someone with, as most people are, lots of
• 1:32:41
  things I'm interested in.
• 1:32:43
  So horses, I think, I just felt like.
• 1:32:46
  That can just go back to being a hobby that I love, you know, that's
• 1:32:49
  for me to do outside of work.
• 1:32:51
  I've seen work as a kind of something you do to get paid, and I'll go and do that.
• 1:32:55
  You know, I'll find a profession and I'll find a job and I'll
• 1:32:58
  keep horses as my thing for my.
• 1:33:01
  Fun, my wellbeing, my outside of work thing, which there was a lot
• 1:33:05
  to be said for that at the time.
• 1:33:06
  'cause I had my horse for many years after that.
• 1:33:08
  You know, I had him throughout, you know, before I met my husband, when
• 1:33:11
  I met my husband, when I got married, when I had kids, you know, he traveled
• 1:33:14
  with me through all those stages of my life and enabled that hobby to remain.
• 1:33:20
  And I've actually seen so many, you know, so many other people as
• 1:33:23
  they grow up suddenly lose their hobbies because they're too busy
• 1:33:26
  with family life or with their jobs.
• 1:33:28
  And so it was a real blessing to actually have that as a hobby that kept
• 1:33:32
  me fit, kept me having time to myself, kept me having something really fun.
• 1:33:36
  So there was a lot to be said for it, but I, yeah, I do wonder what if
• 1:33:40
  perhaps at times, but it's definitely something you can come back to as well.
• 1:33:44
  So,
• 1:33:45
  Rupert Isaacson: well, a hundred percent.
• 1:33:46
  I mean, you know, it's interesting for me, I didn't, I didn't expect
• 1:33:49
  to have a professional life as a horseman really at all.
• 1:33:53
  And you know, as a journalist I was a, you know, I was always
• 1:33:55
  passionate with horses, but.
• 1:33:58
  It was obviously, as you know, only when my son became verbal on
• 1:34:02
  the back of a horse with me, and then my life just went p that way.
• 1:34:05
  Yeah.
• 1:34:06
  And then with realizing that the key was to collect the horse, so therefore
• 1:34:12
  dressage, so now I'm a dressage trainer and, you know, but also in parallel
• 1:34:17
  with all the other, with the writing, with the journalism, with all the other
• 1:34:19
  stuff, and of course the healing thing.
• 1:34:21
  So I have a, I have a strong suspicion that it's going to come back into
• 1:34:24
  your life and it's gonna come back into your life professionally.
• 1:34:28
  I might even have a few little ideas up my sleeve about this that I might
• 1:34:34
  want to discuss with you later because but interestingly, I think you, you
• 1:34:39
  going off and learning, particularly equine management, probably really
• 1:34:43
  prepared you to run Halligan because, you know, Halligan is so multifaceted.
• 1:34:49
  As you say, you've got the gardens, you've got the horticulture, you've
• 1:34:51
  got the, the estate management, you've got the livestock, you've got the
• 1:34:54
  art, you've got the tourism interface, you've got all of this, you've got the,
• 1:34:59
  the food production and the kitchens.
• 1:35:02
  You know, horses are so multifaceted in that way too.
• 1:35:06
  Laura Chesterfield: Yeah.
• 1:35:06
  Rupert Isaacson: I suspect that that really did prepare you well, but now
• 1:35:10
  you are on the cusp of another change.
• 1:35:12
  So you, you are now flying free from literally in the last two weeks
• 1:35:19
  Yeah.
• 1:35:19
  Rupert Isaacson: From the secret garden of your childhood and Yeah.
• 1:35:24
  Running that place and it's, so this must be quite an interesting feeling.
• 1:35:31
  Yeah.
• 1:35:31
  What's, what's ahead now?
• 1:35:32
  What are you, what are you going into?
• 1:35:33
  What, what's the plan?
• 1:35:35
  Laura Chesterfield: So.
• 1:35:36
  Gosh.
• 1:35:36
  Yeah, no, it's a real time of transition and, but I really welcome that, you
• 1:35:41
  know, I did 10 year career before Heli, 10 years at Heli with it being my work.
• 1:35:47
  And I think, you know, I'm really ready for it to go back
• 1:35:49
  to being the place that I love.
• 1:35:52
  You know, that my church, if you, I talked about earlier, you know, for
• 1:35:55
  me and my family to just go there for that, that, that feeling great
• 1:36:01
  and it being a safe space again.
• 1:36:03
  Mm-hmm.
• 1:36:03
  It's just the right time and it's important to know
• 1:36:07
  when it's the right time.
• 1:36:08
  So it's,
• 1:36:09
  Rupert Isaacson: but what are you gonna go and do now?
• 1:36:10
  What
• 1:36:10
  Laura Chesterfield: am I gonna do now?
• 1:36:12
  So, so I mean, there's a lot of, there's a lot of plans and there's a lot of
• 1:36:17
  what ifs, which is the excitement.
• 1:36:19
  And I think, you know, for me leaving what I've done so far is set up my consultancy
• 1:36:25
  business, which is called Le Lova Studios.
• 1:36:28
  Which
• 1:36:28
  Rupert Isaacson: Lova Studios?
• 1:36:31
  Laura Chesterfield: Lova Studios.
• 1:36:31
  Rupert Isaacson: That sounds like a Cornish word.
• 1:36:33
  Laura Chesterfield: It is so it means in your happy place.
• 1:36:37
  And I really believe that, you know, connecting people to place and to
• 1:36:45
  nature that they age your happiness.
• 1:36:47
  You know, they make you happy.
• 1:36:49
  They make, they really, your wellbeing if you want, is
• 1:36:52
  enhanced through those things.
• 1:36:54
  And all the things I've learned that we've talked about in this
• 1:36:56
  conversation about how you.
• 1:36:59
  Connect people to a place through stories, through experiences, through events.
• 1:37:05
  I, I'm gonna help other people to do that.
• 1:37:09
  I think it's, it's what I've seen is a real gap in, in a number of venues,
• 1:37:14
  whether it be gardens, whether it be hotels, whether, you know, what businesses
• 1:37:18
  in general that if they stole, told their stories differently, they would connect
• 1:37:24
  to their audience better and in a more sustainable way that actually adds value,
• 1:37:29
  emotional connection, and real meaning.
• 1:37:33
  And I think that what my hope is that my consultancy is gonna, you know,
• 1:37:37
  take that to lots of places to really explore, explore that storytelling
• 1:37:41
  and to give real depth to businesses and how they talk about themselves.
• 1:37:45
  Because if you, if you run a business where your marketing doesn't match up
• 1:37:50
  to the experience on the ground, and people come and they don't feel anything.
• 1:37:54
  You're not gonna keep attracting people, you're not gonna have that word
• 1:37:57
  of mouth, you're not gonna have that
• 1:38:00
  sure
• 1:38:00
  emotional connection that we've talked about that then goes on for generations.
• 1:38:03
  And I think, you know, being able to help people explore
• 1:38:07
  that is gonna be a real joy.
• 1:38:08
  So I've got some projects that I'm working on at the moment through that, which is.
• 1:38:14
  It's just really exciting.
• 1:38:15
  You know, it's, it's really nice to help people feel brave enough to do that.
• 1:38:20
  Sometimes telling these stories of place, you know, stories of heart and
• 1:38:25
  meaning and people can be quite scary.
• 1:38:27
  You know, some people don't wanna go there or they don't dunno how to go
• 1:38:30
  or which medium to use to go there.
• 1:38:32
  They might just do it through boards like we talked about, or,
• 1:38:35
  or they might do it through events that don't make you feel anything.
• 1:38:39
  And actually I think, you know, if you open people up to that, that
• 1:38:42
  depth, then you know, we can create businesses that have much more feeling.
• 1:38:47
  Within them.
• 1:38:48
  And happier people.
• 1:38:49
  Rupert Isaacson: Yeah.
• 1:38:49
  I mean, Halligan, you've done nothing but create story sort of over the
• 1:38:52
  years, whether it's these pieces of sculpture that then people end up
• 1:38:55
  writing poems and whole books around.
• 1:38:57
  There's whole books about the mud made, you know?
• 1:39:00
  Yeah.
• 1:39:00
  Or, but I guess the whole thing comes out of story, doesn't it?
• 1:39:02
  Which is the story of finding the garden and then the story of those gardeners
• 1:39:07
  going to war and not coming back, writing their names in the, in the thunder box.
• 1:39:11
  And
• 1:39:12
  Laura Chesterfield: it's how you tell those stories, you know?
• 1:39:14
  It's,
• 1:39:14
  Rupert Isaacson: yes.
• 1:39:15
  Laura Chesterfield: You know, it's, I've grown up in those, in those places, but
• 1:39:19
  it's how you choose to tell those stories.
• 1:39:21
  It could have been, in terms of publicly a very different story that was told.
• 1:39:24
  If you pick different words and a different dialogue and a different
• 1:39:28
  narrative, people wouldn't have connected to it, you know?
• 1:39:31
  I truly believe that.
• 1:39:32
  So it's, it's about how you tell your stories and what narrative is
• 1:39:37
  running through that, that people can see themselves in or connect to, or.
• 1:39:42
  Or feel like, God, that's really interesting.
• 1:39:44
  That's making me curious.
• 1:39:45
  That's making me really kind of want, want a bit of that in my life.
• 1:39:50
  So it, it is how you tell stories and, you know, I've been very fortunate
• 1:39:53
  to grow up at Heli again, but also at Eden and, you know, these are two
• 1:39:59
  of the places that doing storytelling brilliantly in a way that people feel a
• 1:40:04
  part of and people can feel inspired by.
• 1:40:07
  So, my hope is to,
• 1:40:09
  Rupert Isaacson: yeah, people.
• 1:40:10
  By the way, just quickly aside, a lot of the viewers, listeners, the Los
• 1:40:15
  Hard Gardens of Allergan is, is, is one project, the Eden Project is another
• 1:40:19
  one, which the Laura's family has been.
• 1:40:23
  You just need to go Google the Eden project and you'll
• 1:40:25
  get knocked on your ass.
• 1:40:27
  It's, it, the scale of it is, is extraordinary.
• 1:40:29
  Also ecological.
• 1:40:30
  But where do you think, do you think this, you're, you're a very good storyteller
• 1:40:36
  and you understand how to present story.
• 1:40:39
  When we were putting together our project which became walks
• 1:40:43
  of a curious nature, you know?
• 1:40:45
  Yeah.
• 1:40:45
  Which is interacting with nature in the mind.
• 1:40:47
  At Halligan, it was you who came up with that name.
• 1:40:50
  And I remember thinking
• 1:40:54
  that's a certain instinct that people have.
• 1:40:56
  And obviously your father has this as well.
• 1:40:59
  Yeah.
• 1:40:59
  But do you feel that you learned storytelling at a certain point?
• 1:41:02
  Do you feel it's just instinctive because you, you, you guys are masterful at.
• 1:41:08
  Bringing the story of your projects across, I think in
• 1:41:11
  a way that is quite unusual.
• 1:41:14
  We know, you know, one always knows a lot of people who do amazing
• 1:41:16
  work, and you think, oh, they could only just get it out there more.
• 1:41:20
  Yeah.
• 1:41:20
  They get the recognition.
• 1:41:21
  But as you say that the story somehow isn't getting out there.
• 1:41:24
  Hmm.
• 1:41:25
  Do do you feel you are, did you study it in any way?
• 1:41:29
  Do you feel you just acquired it at your mother's, with your mother's milk?
• 1:41:32
  I mean, how,
• 1:41:35
  Laura Chesterfield: I don't, I, I don't know.
• 1:41:37
  I mean, you just, you're born and you're just, you, aren't you?
• 1:41:39
  I mean, it's just, yeah.
• 1:41:41
  I think it's in, it's in, you know, it's, it's in my blood I guess a little bit.
• 1:41:46
  It, it must be, but, but I also think growing up in a house where.
• 1:41:52
  We were always reading books, we were always telling jokes.
• 1:41:56
  We were always telling stories and trying to make each other laugh.
• 1:42:00
  We were always
• 1:42:01
  mm-hmm.
• 1:42:01
  Doing things, you know, and, and, and whether that was, you know, like I
• 1:42:06
  said earlier, going off and catching crabs or going off and stomping the,
• 1:42:11
  the footpath, you know, it wasn't about having money to go and do things.
• 1:42:14
  It was just, I think spending time communicating a lot.
• 1:42:19
  Yeah.
• 1:42:19
  And, you know, my dad and my mom filled the house with friends, you
• 1:42:23
  know, they were really social people and so we heard a lot of tales
• 1:42:27
  and a lot, you know, nights where.
• 1:42:30
  As kids, we were welcome round the table with the adults, you know, to listen
• 1:42:34
  to stories, to communicate with adults, to, to see lots of various people, you
• 1:42:40
  know, that were in different worlds.
• 1:42:41
  So my dad was surrounded by musicians people in theater you know, some really
• 1:42:46
  sort of creative, creative people.
• 1:42:49
  So there was always laughter and music and theatrics.
• 1:42:52
  And we were always going to the cinema.
• 1:42:54
  We were always going to, you know, to watch the theater.
• 1:42:56
  We grew up near Kneehigh Theater, who are a local theater here that
• 1:43:00
  have just done amazing things.
• 1:43:01
  They're renowned for just telling incredible stories and, and,
• 1:43:05
  and in amazing ways, you know, just imagination gone wild.
• 1:43:10
  And, and so I think that inspiration has always been around me of.
• 1:43:14
  Telling tales and, you know, and like I talked about earlier with
• 1:43:18
  The Secret Garden, I mean, I grew up reading Matilda over and over again,
• 1:43:22
  secret Garden over and over again, Charlotte's Web over and over again.
• 1:43:26
  And, and I think all kids, a lot of kids love telling stories
• 1:43:30
  over and over again, don't they?
• 1:43:32
  Yes.
• 1:43:32
  They know that it's what, you know, it's a, a memory of having a 2-year-old
• 1:43:37
  that wants the same book every night.
• 1:43:40
  There's a reason, there's a reason why they wanna watch the same
• 1:43:42
  episode of Pepper Pig over again.
• 1:43:44
  People like recalling, they like joining in and all knowing the
• 1:43:47
  words and all, and that, that sort of like togetherness of story and
• 1:43:51
  Rupert Isaacson: it's basically learning the craft of storytelling,
• 1:43:54
  isn't it, when you're a kid that revisiting the same story
• 1:43:57
  Laura Chesterfield: Yeah.
• 1:43:58
  Rupert Isaacson: In more depth, in more detail.
• 1:43:59
  Yep.
• 1:44:00
  Laura Chesterfield: Yeah.
• 1:44:00
  And I hope that, so I think, you know, for, for me, I just
• 1:44:05
  go with what feels good and I.
• 1:44:09
  I love seeing people having a great time.
• 1:44:12
  Like there's nothing better than creating something that holds meaning
• 1:44:16
  for other people because it just, holding meaning for yourself means nothing.
• 1:44:20
  Rupert Isaacson: Absolutely.
• 1:44:21
  And my God, have you guys done that in spades with, with heli and, and with Eden?
• 1:44:25
  I mean, I think one of the things that strikes everybody there is that it's the
• 1:44:30
  de, it's the democratic nature of it.
• 1:44:32
  It's the big house with the big garden, but the big garden out in its own
• 1:44:36
  universe, which is now feels like it.
• 1:44:40
  It's so weird when you're in Halligan, you do feel like it's your own, it
• 1:44:44
  feels personal and I know that's every person's experience who goes there.
• 1:44:48
  There's not a single person I've ever spoken to, whether they work there,
• 1:44:51
  whether even your dad who, you know, sort of conceived it, it, it's, I think
• 1:44:56
  that there's generations of people now who've kind of grown up there and
• 1:44:59
  their kids have grown up there and there's this feeling that it is theirs.
• 1:45:03
  Yeah.
• 1:45:03
  And you guys are really good at.
• 1:45:08
  Letting people feel that.
• 1:45:09
  Whereas, you know, if you go to a big formal garden, like I was just in Alhambra
• 1:45:16
  the Alazar, sorry in Seve the other day, and you know, they're beautiful
• 1:45:19
  gardens, but they're not your gardens.
• 1:45:21
  You know what I mean?
• 1:45:21
  They's say you can visit them, you can pay some money to visit,
• 1:45:23
  but they're not your gardens.
• 1:45:25
  Yeah.
• 1:45:25
  Halligan is so much more intimate than that.
• 1:45:27
  People just wonder and get lost and as you say,
• 1:45:30
  Laura Chesterfield: yeah.
• 1:45:30
  Rupert Isaacson: Become wrapped in story.
• 1:45:34
  But the way in which you guys do it, you know, I've, I've gone around your gift
• 1:45:37
  shop and it's said, oh my gosh, there's another book on some aspect of Elgan,
• 1:45:40
  and now here you are reading the poems.
• 1:45:42
  Laura Chesterfield: Yeah.
• 1:45:43
  You
• 1:45:43
  Rupert Isaacson: know, that's an instinct that I think a lot of people don't have
• 1:45:48
  is this constantly asking how can we, how can we tell and retell the story?
• 1:45:55
  How can we look for different aspects of what we do and tell those stories?
• 1:45:59
  Laura Chesterfield: Yeah.
• 1:46:01
  Rupert Isaacson: So I imagine you're going to be very successful with this.
• 1:46:05
  Laura Chesterfield: Hey, I hope, I hope so.
• 1:46:07
  People are very generous and, and I think it's for me, someone, someone said to me
• 1:46:12
  a while ago that was, you know, really, really kind, they came and looked around
• 1:46:16
  the gardens with me and they were like, wow, where did, where did you train
• 1:46:19
  to know how to curate these things?
• 1:46:22
  Like, what course did you do?
• 1:46:24
  And this, and I just looked at them like, you know, that doesn't exist.
• 1:46:27
  Right.
• 1:46:28
  And like, maybe it should.
• 1:46:30
  I mean, that would be great.
• 1:46:31
  But I just said to him,
• 1:46:32
  Rupert Isaacson: maybe you should teach it.
• 1:46:35
  Laura Chesterfield: No, it, it, it's an, it is an do you what?
• 1:46:38
  It's, for me, it's, it's being, it's not being an expert in most things,
• 1:46:46
  but being interested in everything.
• 1:46:48
  Rupert Isaacson: Sure.
• 1:46:49
  Curious
• 1:46:50
  Laura Chesterfield: is actually
• 1:46:51
  Rupert Isaacson: in curious nature.
• 1:46:52
  Laura Chesterfield: Yeah.
• 1:46:52
  Hence the always of a curious nature.
• 1:46:54
  And I think my strength is that I.
• 1:46:57
  I'm not afraid to tell people I know nothing about that.
• 1:47:01
  I know nothing about that.
• 1:47:02
  But you've just told me how amazing tardy grades are, or you've just told
• 1:47:07
  me what's actually happening under the soil and now it's like an itch
• 1:47:11
  that I've got a scratch because why doesn't everybody know about this?
• 1:47:14
  Like, you know, in terms of why doesn't Joe blogs know about this?
• 1:47:18
  I know that there's people studying things that will know about these
• 1:47:21
  things, but actually, why don't people know about all of these things?
• 1:47:24
  And I think that's where I get a lot of my, my oomph from is
• 1:47:29
  that I don't know those things.
• 1:47:31
  And then when I get a glimpse of them, I go, how am I gonna tell everyone?
• 1:47:35
  And I think my weird, happy ideas come out about, you know, how are we
• 1:47:40
  gonna tell this story in a way that my neighbors, my kids, my friends,
• 1:47:44
  yes.
• 1:47:44
  Would get, you know, you don't have to be an academic, you
• 1:47:48
  don't have to be at university.
• 1:47:49
  This should just be wow.
• 1:47:52
  You know, how do you spread the wow.
• 1:47:55
  Rupert Isaacson: What, what your family have done is, is, is you,
• 1:47:58
  you create a world of enchantment.
• 1:48:01
  You know, I'm, I'm also thinking for example, about the night garden that
• 1:48:03
  you do at Halligan, which, although I know it half kills you to do it.
• 1:48:07
  It's, it's this, for those who dunno, it, it's it's through the, the Christmas
• 1:48:12
  period and and the lead up to it at night, they open up the gardens
• 1:48:15
  in these grand illuminations in, in a very similar way to their way.
• 1:48:21
  There were these illuminated gardens in London two, 300 years ago, and
• 1:48:25
  it's incredibly beautiful and it's, it's exquisitely done and people
• 1:48:28
  come from Mars mar around and it's amazing and it's full and people
• 1:48:33
  are just marveling and enchanted.
• 1:48:35
  It's an enchantment secret garden isn't about enchantment.
• 1:48:39
  It seems that the key is you guys know how to be enchanted.
• 1:48:44
  Laura Chesterfield: Yeah.
• 1:48:45
  Rupert Isaacson: Which then allows you to communicate that enchantment, but
• 1:48:50
  you guys are actively looking for it.
• 1:48:52
  And maybe that is the key that you can go out and teach people and show
• 1:48:57
  people a little bit like when you were exploring on your, on your wealth
• 1:49:01
  section D you are going into Cornwall, which is a land of enchantment, you
• 1:49:05
  know, allowing this enchanting horse to take you through the land of
• 1:49:08
  enchantment, including the dangers.
• 1:49:11
  Mm-hmm.
• 1:49:11
  But you,
• 1:49:14
  you then can bring the story back and I think a lot of us actually could,
• 1:49:19
  I've actually quite often looked at what you guys do at how think, oh God,
• 1:49:22
  I could use a bit of mentorship here in, even though I'm a storyteller,
• 1:49:26
  even though I'm a writer, it's like, I see the way you guys do it.
• 1:49:28
  Yeah.
• 1:49:28
  Best
• 1:49:28
  Laura Chesterfield: storyteller.
• 1:49:29
  Oh my gosh.
• 1:49:29
  Rupert Isaacson: They're like, damn, these guys are good.
• 1:49:32
  I could, yeah.
• 1:49:32
  But there's things that you come up with that don't occur to me to do.
• 1:49:36
  You know, particularly telling the specific as like.
• 1:49:42
  For example, if I were to take a leaf out of your book in Horse Boy, it
• 1:49:48
  would be looking at specific stories of particular kids and families
• 1:49:54
  that have had particular outcomes or something magical within horses in
• 1:49:59
  the shamanic aspect of it, that's, and creating books and stories around that.
• 1:50:03
  And of course part of it's just bandwidth.
• 1:50:04
  One only has a certain amount of time, but I've looked at how you guys
• 1:50:08
  take all these different aspects of Heli and Eden and tell those stories.
• 1:50:16
  I could see, I think that is something that people need help with.
• 1:50:21
  So I will certainly be recommending to people that they hire a
• 1:50:25
  bit of Laura Chesterfield.
• 1:50:27
  And I think you and I should actually have some of these conversations
• 1:50:30
  because I, I really do admire.
• 1:50:34
  How you guys communicate the stories, because it also
• 1:50:38
  enhances people's experience.
• 1:50:40
  It means that when they, they go from Halligan and they go home, they
• 1:50:42
  take a bit of halligan with them.
• 1:50:44
  Laura Chesterfield: Yeah,
• 1:50:44
  Rupert Isaacson: yeah,
• 1:50:45
  Laura Chesterfield: yeah, absolutely.
• 1:50:46
  I think it's it's allowing yourself to be quite childish still.
• 1:50:50
  You know,
• 1:50:50
  Rupert Isaacson: and
• 1:50:50
  Laura Chesterfield: I'm a real Ella from corporate, you know, I, I
• 1:50:55
  rubella away from it at speed and.
• 1:50:59
  Some people, you know, you get the commentary of, oh, you know, it's not very
• 1:51:02
  professional or, or there's not enough process and spreadsheets and rah rah rah.
• 1:51:06
  And actually, you know, it's just about people being people and telling stories
• 1:51:10
  and actually being creative and letting that fire, and letting that kind of
• 1:51:15
  bouncing off the right people to tell stories like kids would, you know?
• 1:51:20
  And, and actually you can let too much process and corporate and adulting
• 1:51:26
  of what you are meant to do if you're a professional or what you're meant
• 1:51:29
  to do if you're running a business.
• 1:51:31
  Really cloud and dissolve that ability to be silly, that ability
• 1:51:36
  to, to dream, that ability to
• 1:51:40
  Rupert Isaacson: playfulness.
• 1:51:40
  Yeah.
• 1:51:40
  Laura Chesterfield: Think, think big.
• 1:51:42
  Be playful.
• 1:51:43
  And you know, those things get lost along the way.
• 1:51:47
  And, and I think trying to keep that fresh in people's minds and giving
• 1:51:52
  that permission of be bloody silly.
• 1:51:54
  Tell, I mean, you yourself Yes.
• 1:51:56
  Love a part joke.
• 1:51:57
  Rupert, don't you?
• 1:51:57
  Like, you, you, I,
• 1:51:59
  Rupert Isaacson: my entire life is a far joke.
• 1:52:00
  You know,
• 1:52:03
  Laura Chesterfield: it's just like,
• 1:52:04
  Rupert Isaacson: I'm a far joke.
• 1:52:05
  Laura Chesterfield: You're a far joke.
• 1:52:06
  But it's that stuffiness and I think that, you know, yeah.
• 1:52:08
  And businesses that allow stuffiness to fill the spaces could lose their way.
• 1:52:14
  And, and I think, you know, we've been very fortunate to employ great
• 1:52:18
  people and to have great visitors.
• 1:52:22
  Rupert Isaacson: Well, yeah.
• 1:52:22
  One of the things which you, you, you guys prove is that playfulness
• 1:52:28
  does not destroy structure.
• 1:52:30
  You, you, it's not one or the other.
• 1:52:32
  Laura Chesterfield: Mm-hmm.
• 1:52:33
  Rupert Isaacson: The structures and mechanisms.
• 1:52:36
  Even though they're so flexible and so multifaceted and parallel at a place
• 1:52:41
  like Halligan, it's very structured.
• 1:52:43
  That place has to run.
• 1:52:44
  It's got a huge staff, you know, it's got fragile ecosystems and plants.
• 1:52:49
  It's got the whole business side of it.
• 1:52:52
  You guys do it without it being in your face onerous.
• 1:52:58
  Laura Chesterfield: Yeah.
• 1:52:58
  Rupert Isaacson: The best structures I always feel are invisible, right?
• 1:53:01
  Laura Chesterfield: Yeah.
• 1:53:01
  Rupert Isaacson: Yeah, that's the, that's the true sign of a masterful
• 1:53:04
  structure is when you're not aware of it.
• 1:53:06
  Laura Chesterfield: It's, it's teamwork, you know, and I
• 1:53:07
  think that's what we're lucky.
• 1:53:08
  We've got lots of team members.
• 1:53:10
  We all get stuck in and we all do a bit of, you know, you might one minute be in
• 1:53:15
  the car park, car parking, and the next minute rounding up pigs that have escaped
• 1:53:18
  and the next minute all going to a, you know, a, an a glow worm release and the
• 1:53:23
  next minute all on the jumpy pillow in the play area, and then the next minute
• 1:53:26
  dealing with storms and climate change.
• 1:53:28
  And I think it's, again, it's about having that ecosystem.
• 1:53:31
  All in one place that it's quite special people to be there and to love that,
• 1:53:38
  you know, and to find the joy in it.
• 1:53:40
  And then you, you get the best outta people and get great things.
• 1:53:43
  But yeah, of course there's structure underneath it that, that, you know,
• 1:53:45
  there has to be some of that of course, but not that to lead the way.
• 1:53:51
  Lead.
• 1:53:51
  Rupert Isaacson: Absolutely.
• 1:53:52
  No, absolutely.
• 1:53:53
  It's what we all, I think, I think what you've put your finger on
• 1:53:56
  is actually what fulfillment is.
• 1:53:58
  Fulfillment is being able to fulfill, to see through, to bring to
• 1:54:03
  fruition one's projects, but not in a way that exhaust kills the soul.
• 1:54:11
  Laura Chesterfield: Yeah.
• 1:54:12
  The outcomes for us are never about, you know, the bottom line and the profit.
• 1:54:16
  Of course, you've gotta make a business and there, there are people that
• 1:54:19
  are looking at that of course, but.
• 1:54:23
  Rupert Isaacson: And yet you have made it very successful.
• 1:54:25
  Laura Chesterfield: Yeah.
• 1:54:26
  But the, the, you, you sustain your success by people being aligned
• 1:54:30
  with you, you know, so positive outcomes are about people going, wow.
• 1:54:35
  Oh my god, mommy, did you see this?
• 1:54:37
  Yeah.
• 1:54:37
  Like, that's a positive outcome for us.
• 1:54:38
  It's not just about the pennies in the pot.
• 1:54:42
  Right.
• 1:54:42
  That doesn't inspire anybody.
• 1:54:43
  Well, it shouldn't.
• 1:54:44
  And, and I think again, it, it, it is having a team that get off on seeing
• 1:54:49
  those reactions, you know, that really like the, the, the scale of how we
• 1:54:55
  review a project is not just built on, you know, those, those set things.
• 1:55:00
  It is about how does it feel?
• 1:55:02
  How does it,
• 1:55:02
  Rupert Isaacson: yeah.
• 1:55:03
  Laura Chesterfield: What, what, what, what does it do for somebody?
• 1:55:06
  Rupert Isaacson: And yet you are, your family is the, and listeners, you should
• 1:55:11
  go and listen to the early podcast we did in 2023 with Laura's father,
• 1:55:16
  Tim, Tim Smit, you, your brothers.
• 1:55:20
  Your dad, your mom, you are one of the great British entrepreneurial families.
• 1:55:26
  You actually, I know you guys don't think of yourselves that way.
• 1:55:28
  And I think that's the one of the beauties of it, you know, is, is but
• 1:55:33
  you are, I mean, you guys have made incredibly successful businesses
• 1:55:37
  out of enchantment and good causes.
• 1:55:42
  No, but you were never in it for the money.
• 1:55:45
  Never.
• 1:55:45
  Laura Chesterfield: No,
• 1:55:46
  Rupert Isaacson: no.
• 1:55:46
  Laura Chesterfield: We just wanted a pig farm
• 1:55:50
  Rupert Isaacson: and you got one
• 1:55:51
  Laura Chesterfield: with all 11 rare breeds a pig.
• 1:55:53
  Like that was the dream.
• 1:55:55
  Yeah.
• 1:55:55
  It's still a dream, you know, it's it, yeah.
• 1:55:58
  If you, you, if you lead with heart and heart and joy
• 1:56:02
  Rupert Isaacson: Yeah.
• 1:56:02
  Laura Chesterfield: You end up with heart and joy.
• 1:56:04
  That's, you know,
• 1:56:05
  Rupert Isaacson: so listen, we're, we're absolutely, I couldn't agree more.
• 1:56:08
  If you lead with heart and joy, you get heart and joy wise words.
• 1:56:14
  As we approach now, the.
• 1:56:17
  Our mark, I think there will be people who are listening who might actually
• 1:56:20
  appreciate some mentorship from you.
• 1:56:23
  You are now available for hire.
• 1:56:26
  So lo, it's LoRa, LoRa Studios, right?
• 1:56:29
  Lova
• 1:56:30
  Laura Chesterfield: yeah,
• 1:56:30
  Rupert Isaacson: sorry.
• 1:56:31
  Laura Chesterfield: Lova.
• 1:56:32
  LOWE.
• 1:56:33
  Rupert Isaacson: Lova with a V.
• 1:56:35
  Laura Chesterfield: Yeah.
• 1:56:37
  Rupert Isaacson: Those people listening, I cannot recommend enough
• 1:56:41
  getting, if you are in a business or needing to put ideas together, Laura
• 1:56:50
  and the family that she comes out of that is, is pretty breathtaking.
• 1:56:54
  Go and have a look at Halligan Online, had Lost Gardens of Halligan.
• 1:56:58
  Go and have a look at the Eden Project and now how, if they do
• 1:57:01
  want to reach out for you mm-hmm.
• 1:57:03
  For mentorship, and I think I might be actually how do we contact you?
• 1:57:07
  Give us the, the plugs.
• 1:57:09
  Laura Chesterfield: Okay.
• 1:57:09
  So, I mean, really, really only just sort of launching.
• 1:57:13
  So, so it's very exciting.
• 1:57:14
  So Lober Studios dot com is the website.
• 1:57:19
  That's the best place to get a hold of me currently.
• 1:57:21
  And maybe we can put some details on the bottom of the podcast of, of, of how
• 1:57:25
  Rupert Isaacson: we will We'll, we'll, we'll make sure that's in there.
• 1:57:27
  Low enva studios.com.
• 1:57:30
  Laura Chesterfield: Yeah.
• 1:57:30
  Rupert Isaacson: Yeah, if you've got products you want to have a story told
• 1:57:37
  Laura Chesterfield: Yeah.
• 1:57:37
  These
• 1:57:37
  Rupert Isaacson: guys know how to do it in spades.
• 1:57:40
  Laura Chesterfield: Yeah.
• 1:57:40
  Rupert Isaacson: I'm gonna look forward with Beta breath
• 1:57:43
  to see how you do with this.
• 1:57:46
  Thank and there's some projects I think I'd like to bring you in on.
• 1:57:50
  Perfect.
• 1:57:51
  So we should talk about that.
• 1:57:52
  Laura Chesterfield: Very happy.
• 1:57:52
  Okay.
• 1:57:53
  Yeah.
• 1:57:54
  Thank you.
• 1:57:54
  Rupert Isaacson: All right, my friend.
• 1:57:55
  Well, thank you so much.
• 1:57:57
  And perhaps we'll have you back on in a.
• 1:58:01
  Year or so when you've, yeah.
• 1:58:02
  Got some interesting projects under your belt.
• 1:58:04
  Tell us what you did.
• 1:58:05
  Laura Chesterfield: Yeah, for sure.
• 1:58:06
  That would be wonderful.
• 1:58:07
  Thank you.
• 1:58:08
  Rupert Isaacson: I hope you enjoyed today's conversation as much as I did.
• 1:58:12
  If you did, please help us to make more.
• 1:58:16
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• 1:58:20
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• 1:58:26
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• 1:58:26
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• 1:58:30
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• 1:58:34
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• 1:58:37
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• 1:58:41
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• 1:58:56
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• 1:59:00
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• 1:59:02
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• 1:59:07
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• 1:59:11
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• 1:59:12
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• 1:59:13
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• 1:59:17
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• 1:59:22
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