I felt hugely privileged to be asked by the Tandridge Jubilee committee to write a poem about the Queen’s Green Canopy – an avenue of 70 young trees bought by people in the village and planted for Her Majesty’s Platinum Jubilee. Its unveiling couldn’t have happened on a more beautiful day, with skylarks skittering overhead Read more about On The Green Canopy[…]
And how do you do it? Storytelling itself is nothing new – humans have created narratives since we first began daubing red earth hand prints on cave walls. We all love listening to a story: it engages our emotional intelligence and helps us understand complex issues. Business storytelling is big right now. Businesses realise that Read more about What is business storytelling?[…]
I have a photo of my mum with my eldest daughter Sophia. It was taken on one of the last (relatively) warm October days in 2003 when they both fell asleep in her garden: Mum on her rickety B&Q bench, Sophia in her pushchair. What I didn’t realise was that it was to be one of the last photos of Read more about Restoration love story[…]
It’s not often I come to write a blog article and can’t find adequate words. Hence the reason this next one in the Berlin series – our visit to Sachsenhausen concentration camp – has taken so long, and it’s mainly pictures. On the second day in Berlin we took the S-Bahn train 45 minutes north of Read more about Hello To Berlin Day Two[…]
A museum nerd, a foodie and two fashion-conscious teens hit the streets of Berlin. How did this historic city manage to maintain D’Alessandro family harmony for a whole three days? We’ve been to a fair few European capitals now – Amsterdam, Paris, Rome, Brussels… Berlin wasn’t particularly on the radar before our youngest started taking German Read more about Hello To Berlin Day One[…]
No matter how much of a country person you are, it’s always a bit of a surprise when you come across a skull. And sometimes more so when you find out what it’s from. In the rural Surrey Hills where I walk the dog there are plenty of opportunities for stumbling across animal bones, particularly within Read more about Badger, fox, or… dog skull?[…]
Omega 3s – polyunsaturated fats found in oily fish, nuts, seeds and green vegetables – are well-known for their benefits to human cardiovascular and general health. Naturally, Omega 3s are found in marine microalgae, eaten by tiny fish and crustaceans. Omega 3s move up the food chain by bioaccumulation: building up in the tissues of Read more about British scientists create sustainable Omega 3[…]