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Tag: Anna Shepard

Eco Hero: Joanna Yarrow

Anna Guyer | 18.06.10

If green is the new black, surely Joanna Yarrow is one of the reasons why. She makes "green" glamourous, from her fashionable wardrobe made by ethical designers and sourced on eBay, to her home which showcases how smart interior design can co-exist with a low eco footprint. Joanna is the quintessential example of the elegant environmentalist.

Her ethic came to her organically, handed down to her by her parents who worked in environmental arenas and were committed to living a self-sufficient and eco-friendly lifestyle. She went through school feeling somewhat different: her healthy and organic meals were in sharp contrast to her friends' crisps and snacks, and she made do mending her clothes when all her friends were into throw-away fashion. But she survived and, in fact, thrived from those experiences which became the foundation of everything she's about today.

Joanna went on to study sustainability with Forum for the Future, and now runs an inspiring and trailblazing consultancy, Beyond Green. She has an impressive list of broadcast credits which include her role as GMTV's environmental expert, and she is a published author whose work includes 1001 Ways You Can Save the Earth, How to Reduce Your Carbon Footprint, and Eco-Logical!

Not one to rest on her eco laurels, Joanna has recently left London to take over Wilderness Wood, an award-winning working woodland which hosts more than 30,000 visitors a year, inspiring and educating the local community and school children about sustainable living.

Green, glamorous, astute, committed and challenging: Joanna Yarrow is this edition's Greenhouse Eco Hero. Writer Anna Shepard gets her take on the issues. -- ed.

How would you describe yourself?
My official title is writer, broadcaster and consultant. I set up a sustainability consultancy called Beyond Green and also property company Blue Living. I’d also like to add injured runner, recent ruralist and constant juggler.

What is your mission?
To make sustainable living attractive and accessible to a broad range of people.

What do you care most passionately about?
I want sustainable living to speak for itself. In other words, I want people to feel as passionately about it as I do - not just because its green or eco or good for your carbon footprint, but because it tastes good, makes you feel good, saves money and makes you fit and healthy.

Is organic important?
Whether in farming or any other kind of horticulture, organic production methods make a lot of sense. It’s about respecting the systems we rely on. I’m not a farmer, but rather alarmingly, since I took on my parents’ wood in Sussex and moved there with my family, I am a recent forester (www.wildernesswood.co.uk). I’d love to manage the wood completely organically, but the soil is poor quality, which is why the land is still woodland, otherwise it would have cultivated long ago.

To grow Christmas trees - our main crop – we’ve had to use petrochemical based fertilizers and chemical weed killers. One of the things I want to do is cut back on that by introducing sheep to graze around the Christmas trees. The idea is that the sheep will do the weeding. There’s a certain breed that don't eat Christmas tree shoots, or that’s what I’m hoping.

What do you think is the next big challenge?
One of them is to create some inspiring success stories. In the UK, people are starting to get very clued up about problems, but there are still so few examples of good solutions. Most people don’t even have a picture in their mind of what ‘doing things differently’ might look like, whether it is a house or a low-carbon community. It’s really difficult to find sources of inspiration that will appeal to a broad range of people, not just natural-born treehuggers. That’s one of the things we’re aiming to achieve at Wilderness Wood. We want to get lots of people coming here from different walks of life to get a taste of sustainable living.

What would you like to achieve in your lifetime?
What’s important to me is to be involved with projects that inspire people to live in a different way - it could be a book or TV program or a place like the wood that reaches out to people and makes that emotional connection. I grew up lucky enough to have a personal relationship with the natural world. Obviously not everyone can grow up in a 60 acre wood, but there are lots of different ways that you can touch people and inspire them to make changes.

What top green principles do you live by?
One of the big ones is travel. In my twenties, to my shame, I clocked up a pretty nasty carbon footprint. These days, I don’t fly - except if it’s unavoidable for work. All our holidays are by train. Last year we went to Morocco: we took the train to the south coast of Spain, then the boat over to Tangier, then we explored Fez, Marrakesh and up into the Atlas Mountains.

I don’t own a car or a driving license. Everyone keeps telling me that I won’t survive in the countryside without one, but so far, three months in, I’m doing fine. In terms of food, I'm vegetarian and I have ambitious plans for growing my own. In London, we grew herbs and salads in the garden, but here in Sussex, I’m hoping to do a lot more.

On the energy front, we use a green energy supplier. All our heating and hot water comes from wood, and I’m hoping in the future to install solar hot water heating and PV (photo-voltaic) cells for electricity.

I’m also a massive fan of ethical fashion – I like the Ascension boutique in central London and also Equa in North London. For everything else, I pretty much live on eBay.

What one thing do you wish everyone did?
Try to holiday overland. I’m hoping that the silver-lining to the volcano ash drama will be that people will realize they can get to places easily and in an enjoyable way without flying.

How long have we got to save the planet?
The planet is going to be fine. It’s a silly idea that we’re saving the planet; it’ll sort it itself out, it just won’t be very comfortable for humans. I say that having written a book called 1001 Ways to Save the Planet (Duncan Baird)- which I’d like to mention, wasn’t my title. But in terms of making the planet habitable, we have a ridiculously short window of opportunity to act. I worry that we’ll look back in twenty years time and realize how much easier it was now.

Who is your Eco Hero?
Al Gore - his film was a turning point which made it ok to talk about all this stuff. He managed to get green issues on so many people’s agendas.

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Eco Hero: Siân Berry

Sally Hill | 13.07.10

Sian Berry portrait Since joining the Green Party in 2001, Siân Berry has been a candidate in numerous council and parliamentary elections, and was the Green candidate for London Mayor in 2008.

As a campaigner, she keeps busy working on a range of green and social issues, setting up the Alliance Against Urban 4x4s in 2004 and Reheat Britain, which successfully brought in a scrappage scheme for boilers last year.

Siân has also written a number of books on green issues and home improvement, including ‘50 ways to make your house and garden greener’ and ‘Mend it!’. Her next book will show how to make attractive household items from random articles of junk. Writer Anna Shepard gets her take on the issues.

How would you describe yourself?
Writer, campaigner and green politician.

What is your mission?
The cliché is to say you want to make the world a better place, which in some ways I do, but I’m also about trying to change people’s attitudes. I want to change the way people see green issues. I’ve worked hard to encourage people to see the Green Party differently -not just as an ideological party but also as a practical one. So you vote green not just because it reflects the principles you believe in but also because it’s going to make changes that will benefit your life.

Career highlights?
One of the most enjoyable and successful things I have done was to set up the Alliance Against Urban 4x4s (stopurban4x4s.org.uk). This was about changing social attitudes to 4x4s, to show that they weren’t cool anymore. I also worked on the Boiler Scrappage Campaign (reheatbritain.org.uk) which encouraged people to swap their old energy inefficient boilers for modern efficient ones. It was immediately taken up by Government, that provided a £400 incentive to households making the change.

What's your next project?
I’m working on DIY-related stuff. My generation has grown up without practical skills so we tend to chuck things out when they break. My last book Mend It! is a really accessible guide to how to fix things around the house. I’m trying to give people the confidence to open up that toaster and see if they can work out what’s wrong – it’s often not as difficult as you think. My next book is going to be about making things out of junk so at the moment I’m going around and picking things out of skips.

Found any gems?
I couldn’t resist bringing home an old rocking horse the other day, even though its head is hanging off and it’s got a really manky tail. I haven’t got any children, but it’s going to be lovely when I’ve finished with it, so I’ll have to find one to make the most of it. I also found a really beautiful hat stand.

What do you think is the next big challenge?
Dealing with climate change but in a way that involves everybody. What’s going on at the moment is a lot of debate about big technical solutions - whether that’s nuclear power or giant wind turbines - but bringing the project home into all our lives is the challenge. We want people to be conserving energy, being more resourceful and making a difference as a normal part of everyday life. There are lots of countries that are ahead of us on this, places in the EU where recycling is second nature. We have to catch up and make sure it is a collective venture instead of waiting for green measures to be imposed on us by the Government. There are already positive signs, such as the Transition Town movement, so hopefully we’re moving in the right direction.

What would you change?
There’s too much complaining about the possibility that green measures might be imposed. It’s like the JFK quote: “Ask not what your country can do for you; ask what you can do for your country.” We should be thinking about the ways we can do stuff that we enjoy but also that will help the environment, not worrying about how Government regulation might affect us.

What top green principles do you live by?
I’m really keen on working with my hands. Grabbing a bit of wood from a skip, cutting it in half, painting it and making something from it is deeply satisfying. We are otherwise in danger of losing these creative skills, such as woodwork, knitting and crafty things, because most of us sit in front of screens all day. I’m pretty green in my daily life – I haven’t flown for years, I’m very careful about the energy I use, I avoid food leftovers and compost food waste. But I understand that no one is perfect and I don’t think anyone should be too preachy about it.

Any green sins?
I eat meat. Not huge amounts as my boyfriend is vegetarian but I love eating it in restaurants and I don’t think I could give it up completely

Is organic important to you?
I don’t think it’s compulsory but yes, I do choose organic food. I know it’s more expensive but if you’re minimising food waste carefully then it works out ok.

What one thing do you wish everyone would do?
People have got to believe that they can take things into their own hands and change them – we need more optimism about the power of the individual, to come up with a good idea and follow it through, join a local campaign or get involved on a Government level.

What's the best way of spreading the green message?
Every way possible, whether it’s guerrilla marketing, conventional voting, campaigning or personal action at home. We’ve got to do it all.

How long have we got to save the planet?
We’ve got to get going, there’s no doubt about it, but how we do it is just as important. Are we going to do it in ways that makes people feel in charge of their own lives? Or are we going to do it in a top-down way that reduces people’s feeling of freedom? Those are also big questions.

Who is your Eco Hero?
At the moment, I’m inspired by an American campaigner called Van Jones. Last year, he was appointed to the newly-created position of Special Advisor for Green Jobs by Barack Obama. He has managed to get a whole range of people from all different walks of life demanding green investment and green jobs, not just because caring about the environment is important but because it’s the best way to build a better economy. I’d like to do the same thing here.

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green, eco hero, anna shepard, green party, alliance against urban 4x4s, politician, sian berry, mend it

Camping it up: Yurts make for eco-friendly luxury camping

Sally Hill | 09.08.10

Interior of yurt, California

Writer Anna Shepard's recent review of 'yurt' accommodation in the UK got us thinking about the host of new travel experiences convincing holiday-makers that they can have a much greener holiday, and get very close to nature, without giving up creature comforts.

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anna shepard, yurt, travel, campaign, tourism, cornwall

Greenhouse Weekly Round-Up

Sally Hill | 13.08.10

Episode 1: Creamy Eggs With Thyme -- powered by eHow.com

eHow has launched a new series called 'Grow Cook Eat' which demonstrates organic garden-to-table cooking. The video above walks you through how to make creamy eggs with thyme. Mmmmmm.

Speaking of delicious, naturally-grown food, things are gearing up for the 2010 Bristol Organic Food Festival who launched their new website this week. The festival boasts cooking demos by a host of celebrity chefs, The Food Market, the Kids Taste Experience Tent, a Sheep Show, and lots of surprises to entertain families and food lovers.

A new initiative called 'Carbon Calculated' provides software solutions for carbon and greenhouse gas management. It's an independent, free, open platform that aggregates carbon and green house gas emissions for "everything in the world", including passenger transport, raw materials and consumer goods. Definitely worth a look.

Energy secretary Chris Huhne lifted the ban on the sale of surplus electricity, giving local councils the lead in 'green energy revolution'.

Here are the links we loved this week:

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organic food festival, eco hero, organic, anna shepard, climate change, george monbiot, richard leyland, chris huhne, yurt, carbon calculated

Eco Hero: Sallyanne Flemons

Sally Hill | 28.10.10

Two years ago, Sallyanne Flemons was appointed the founding editor of daisygreenmagazine.co.uk – a woman’s magazine with an ethical twist. The online magazine now has around 30,000 weekly subscribers and is a leader in its field. Sallyanne is married with two children and lives in Newcastle upon Tyne.