by Peter Hawkes | Feb 11, 2022 | Blog
Image Courtesy: Sandy Millar Pesticides are less than a century old but they have had a mighty impact on the way we grow food. During the Second World War, the insecticide DDT and the herbicide 2-4-D were developed. Since then, farmers have been using a growing list...
by Peter Hawkes | Feb 2, 2022 | Blog
Winter and early spring are times when we want to huddle indoors away from the cold and windy weather outside. But human hibernation comes at a cost: when all our windows remain closed, air becomes stale and condensation from heating, cooking, washing and drying all...
by Peter Hawkes | Jan 27, 2022 | Blog
Wild swimming or just ‘swimming’ or ‘bathing’ outdoors has a long history. In the early 19th century, the romantic poets Keats, Coleridge & Byron indulged in ‘hydromania’ (an obsession with sea bathing), mainly for the health benefits. Today, swimming in the...
by Peter Hawkes | Jan 18, 2022 | Blog
Image Courtesy – Erik Dungan If you live near the coast, a lake or river, you may have noticed some unlikely visitors recently. And we’re not talking about wildlife – we’re talking about wild swimmers. Often donning bright swimwear, bobble hats and accompanied...
by Peter Hawkes | Jan 11, 2022 | Blog
What is Provenance? Provenance is the history of the ownership and transmission of an object. The term comes to us from the art world, where provenance includes the auction houses, dealers, or galleries that have sold an item, the private or institutional collections...
by Peter Hawkes | Jan 6, 2022 | Blog
The damp, cool weather we experience in the UK in winter is ideal for the formation of mould. We have all seem it – the black goo that forms around cold window frames and covers walls near showers or tumble driers. There is also that musty smell we can recognise...