It is a fascinating exercise, to mull over the last 355 days (because yes, I am writing this in advance). My mind goes on a tangent, and then a tangent from the tangent.
How best to sum up a year? And when that year is our 20th! That milestone alone, and every time it made us reflect on the wonders of the last two decades, might be all I need to say. We made it to 20. We are thriving and innovating and still doing pioneering work at 20.
Many of you went to see us in Zoë Law's LEGENDS exhibition at the National Portrait Gallery, which ran until March. We still can’t get over meeting Irvine Welsh, Lemn Sissay and Noel Gallagher in quick succession.
We launched four new pieces, the Boho, our first ever bag that can slouch, and the Crossbody Clutch, which learned so much from the clutch that preceded it and makes the best of the wonderful colours of rescued leather that we have found flowing through the workshop in recent months. We also launched our Voyager Backpack, which has been traveling the world since April. And we updated our Post Bag too - going back to its roots, closer in shape to a traditional American mailbox.
We won a wonderful award from Walpole, from our luxury peers in the UK, which really did mean a lot in our 20th year. We are officially the best sustainable luxury brand in the UK, a true delight to know that we were the unanimous choice of a diverse panel of expert judges.
We made bespoke pieces for several hotels, including epic woven fire-hose wall panels for the Gotham Hotel in Newcastle, which is a fitting home for us as Gotham has painstakingly designed their hotel in an old Fire Station that was originally built in the 1930s. You can spy our pieces in lots of the rooms and restaurants too - like this menu cover!
We also created something really special for fellow B Corp, Berry Brothers & Rudd, even incorporating a stave from a retired whisky barrel. The Distillers One of One Charity auction is a biennial event bringing together the whisky community to raise money for Scottish youth, we were tasked with making a one-of-a-kind case for the Berry Brothers & Rudd donation.
Our first artistic commission, made of hundreds of pieces of woven leather and hose and framed with failed scaffolding, left the workshop for its new home at The World Economic Forum.
And we loved making these branded luggage tag pairs for Christmas guests at The Exclusive Collection hotels.
In May I spent an amazing week in Osaka, with 8 other Impact Awardees and the wider Cartier Women's Initiative community, making great friends and pushing each other to take on new challenges, become better leaders, and work out where we might make the most impact in years to come. We also launched a special edition of our wrist band, in order to help one of the Awardees, Mariam Torosyan, raise money for Safe YOU, an app which has been designed to combat domestic violence.
I am sure that something will have been left out. But to focus on the farm for just a second… We have experienced epic sunsets, hosted hundreds of guests, and worked late into the night on all kinds of material challenges that we keep getting closer to solving. We discovered all kinds of wildflowers that have likely always been here, asleep in the seedbank, which are now awake, and thriving. We started the season with sunny marsh marigolds around the ponds and then came a glorious bounty of oxeye daisies that just kept popping up and flourishing en masse. We pruned, we made compost, we brewed compost tea, we fed the soil and watched the vines grow stronger, some were strong enough to test a first small experimental harvest... which resulted in the wondrous October picking, foot trodding and pressing days, and our first few weeks and months as wine makers.
It was a magnificent year for everything that is flourishing on our small but mighty regenerative farm. We made cider, and apple cider vinegar. We ate kilos of raspberries and picked as many cobnuts as the squirrels deigned to leave us.
We turned 20. Yep, I am going to bring it up again because it really is a long time in business but a very long time in fashion/luxury/accessories... this is not an industry for the faint hearted! This is a great image to sum up 20 - the South China Morning Post sent a photographer to take images for a piece on us - only fitting to be featured in a newspaper from the city where we met - back in 2004!
One group literally got here entirely under their own steam, on bikes that left London early that same morning. The environmental activists/cyclists, that annually 'Ride the Change', rode in for a farm tour with Elvis and dinner in the workshop. Given that this group launched by cycling to COP in Glasgow, we felt honoured to make the schedule!
Social Enterprise Kent came for an away day designed to explore ‘The Art of the Possible’ - something they know is bread and butter here, immersed in our disruptive workshop.
We had our first adult ‘Field Trip’ with the Warrior Network, an incredible group that works to amplify voices that have been historically unheard, because those voices hold the ideas that will shape the future of business, society, and beyond.
We hosted a day for the Regenerative Viticulture Foundation and met representatives from across the UK vineyard/winery spectrum, from Gusbourne to a Cumbrian couple that is just starting to think about planting, all here to learn about our total commitment to soil and regeneration.
We also welcomed the Centre for Sustainable Fashion and the Environmental Funders Network - both groups keen to be restored by everything at the farm and see how our work here might help with their challenges.
Finally, we celebrated the 10 year anniversary of B Corps in the UK, by welcoming all Kent B Corps to the farm for a party, complete with cake.
We met one of our heroes - and it was amazing - we urge you to do the same. Having Kelly Mulville (a regenerative viticulture guru) and Elaine here, all the way from Paicines Ranch in California, was probably the most ‘our cups are running over’ couple of days of the whole year. Thanks to Country and Townhouse, we got to nominate future icons in the sustainability space and reconnect with a whole community that aren't just talking about climate issues, but delivering solutions every day. I also got to record a podcast with an old friend, Ed Gillespie - which was as fun as I thought it would be. Check out Jon Richardson and the Futurenauts if you haven't already!
We rescued more materials. We made more donations to our charity partners, including The Fire Fighters Charity and Barefoot College International. We recertified as a B Corp, for the 4th time. We kept our promises, we expanded our regenerative mission.
This is what I hope the next 20 years will be about - going on a bigger impact journey absolutely, but letting the joy of this work be the real secret weapon. Joy spreads. Joy recruits. Wouldn't it be great if we could solve all our problems collectively, passionately, and with love? Wouldn't that be so much more fun?
. My mind goes on a tangent, and then a tangent from the tangent.
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