Organising a literary festival is no mean feat. You've got to book the right guests, organise plenty of activities, and find somewhere to host it. Vicky and Charles Rangeley-Wilson joined the podcast this week to talk about exactly that, ahead of the upcoming Literature and Landscape Festival in Norfolk. With a star-studded lineup, there was plenty…

The bushmaster snake is on the one hand, very polite: it announces its presence with a two-tone whistle. On the other hand, however, it's utterly merciless: a creature which will chase humans through the jungle, attack aggressively, and should it miss with its fangs will leap on to its intended prey and attempt to whip them in to submission. Listen…

We were thrilled to discover that Charlie Bigham is a real person. It's a bit like meeting Aunt Bessie, and asking how she does her Yorkshire Puddings, or running swapping tips with Ronald McDonald about how to get your fries crispy. But real person he is, and he's a man with a fascinating story to tell, from ditching a hugely promising career in o…

Here at the Country Life Podcast, we like to think we deliver a useful and necessary service. We want to discuss the important issues. We want to talk to Norman Foster about why architecture matters. We want to speak to farmers about how they can help tackle the climate crisis. We strive to compress the beauty of nature into an audio format so we c…

If it wasn’t for The Stage, there’s every chance that Britain and, indeed, the world may have been deprived of such great names as Kenneth Brannagh, Harold Pinter, Michael Caine, Sharon D Clarke, Idris Elba, The Spice Girls and Steps. Listen to Country Life podcast on Apple Podcasts Listen to Country Life podcast on Spotify Listen to Country Life p…

It’s important to think about the past. I think about it often. Usually when I’m lying in bed and my brain decides that’s the best time to think of mistakes I’ve made, loves that have been lost, and, of course, the Roman Empire. A lot of history is about kings, queens and battles. Which is very interesting in its own way. But is it real history? Af…

When it comes to the world of British art, few names are more widely recognised than David Messum. From extolling the virtues of the English Impressionists to resurrecting interest in the Newlyn School, David has spent more than 60 years reminding us all that English art is as good as any across the world. Listen to Country Life podcast on Apple Po…

This week on the Country Life Podcast, Matt Thompson — Curatorial Director of English Heritage — joins our host James Fisher to talk history. · Listen to Country Life podcast on Apple Podcasts · Listen to Country Life podcast on Spotify · Listen to Country Life podcast on Audible Recent research from English Heritage asked people to name their favo…

The thing about good ideas is that they sound incredibly obvious only after they’ve been invented. Take Deliveroo, for example. Looking back, of course it makes sense to get restaurants to deliver food, above and beyond the old-fashioned takeaway. Of course being able to summon a cab using an app will be a successful business, considering we tell e…

The award-winning journalist Chris Haslam doesn't just like beaches; he loves them. Chris, chief travel writer for the Sunday Times, recently returned from spending seven weeks touring the coastline of Britain to produce his list of the very best beaches in Britain. It's a mammoth undertaking, in which he and his dog — a Jack Russell called Dave — …

Buckingham Palace’s East Wing has opened up to visitors for the first time in 2024. St James’s Palace did so at the tail end of 2023. Even Balmoral — a royal residence privately owned by the Windsors, rather than part of the holdings of the Crown — has opened up its doors, something which would have been unimaginable during the lifetime of the late…

Look around you. You might be reading this in your home. Or perhaps someone else’s home. The point is we spend a lot of time in our homes, more so now than ever before (apart from that year we don’t talk about). Listen to Country Life podcast on Apple Podcasts Listen to Country Life podcast on Spotify Listen to Country Life podcast on Audible They …

The landscape photographer Charlie Waite is a true national treasure. A fellow of the Royal Photographic Society, he has published dozens of photography books and founded the Landscape Photographer of the Year awards back in 2006. We're absolutely delighted that he joined us on the Country Life Podcast, telling host James Fisher about his life in p…

The Carbuncle Cup — the award given to the worst new building in Britain — has returned after a six-year hiatus. Competition judge and magazine editor Charlie Baker spoke to James Fisher about why pointing out bad architecture matters. You can see pictures of all the buildings Charlie and James discuss in our show notes. Listen to Country Life podc…

From the rollercoaster of mortgage rates to the calling of a surprise election, the economic landscape of Britain never seems to sit still these days. Thankfully, award-winning property journalist Annabel Dixon writes regularly for Country Life to help us make sense of what's going on and we're delighted that this week she joins James Fisher on the…

We lead busy lives these days — which might be all well and good for getting things done, but is the last thing you want on holiday. That's the central idea behind a new book by the travel writer Liz Schaffer, Slow Travel Britain, in which Liz travelled to 22 off-the-track parts of Britain to really take them in. From walking Hadrian's Wall to expl…

Some time between the formation of the earth, and now, some human beings decided to draw some lines on the sand somewhere to define ‘our bit’ of the earth and ‘their bit’ of the earth. We now refer to these lines as borders. Journalist and author Jonn Elledge has always been fascinated by why and how this happens, and in this episode he joins the C…

On May 10, 1824, Britain's National Gallery opened its doors for the first time. This year, to celebrate its bicentenary, the gallery is hosting a whole string of events and celebrations to market the occasion. Of all these, perhaps the boldest and most eye-catching is National Treasures, a selection of just 12 from among the thousands of masterpie…

James Alexander-Sinclair is one of Britain's foremost garden designers and writers. He's a regular contributor to Country Life magazine and many other titles, and a regular presence on television screens talking about gardening. He is also one of the top judges at the RHS Chelsea Flower Show — and we're absolutely delighted that he joins us to give…

At the turn of the millennium, Isabella Tree and her husband Charlie Burrell faced a crisis. They were £1.5 million in debt after spending 17 years trying to run a farm that simply wouldn't grow the crops they needed for it to be sustainable. With all their efforts to effect change and introduce diversification failing, they took a drastic decision…

Paula Lester has been running the features desk at Country Life magazine for over a decade. So when His Majesty The King — Prince Charles, as he was at the time — agreed to guest edit the magazine, she was the obvious choice to guide him and his team through the process. The result, as Paula tells James Fisher on this week's Country Life Podcast, c…

The housing crisis in Britain has gone on for decades almost unchecked — but it's only thanks to voices such as Nicholas Boys Smith that we can use the word 'almost' in that sentence. Nicholas is the founder of Create Streets, a think tank and consultancy which looks at property development and town planning across Britain. He joins host James Fish…

Beyond the Monarchy and the Church, there is only one building in Britain which is designated with word 'palace': Blenheim Palace. This UNESCO World Heritage Site is beyond any doubt one of the world's greatest, and most famous buildings. It was built to commemorate a famous battle 320 years ago: the victory in the Battle of Blenheim led by John Ch…

How important an interior designer is Emma Sims-Hilditch? 'In my view, she has almost completely turned the country house aesthetic on its head, and reinvented it for the 21st century,' says Giles Kime, Country Life's Executive Editor and our resident interiors guru. 'She's a great believer in creating houses which are not just elegant, but also fu…

Kate Green isn't just the Deputy Editor of Country Life magazine. She's also one of the country's foremost equestrian journalists, having worked at four Olympic Games as well as countless other top events around the world. With her book on the 75th anniversary of the Badminton Horse Trials just launched, Kate tells the tale of how the crushing disa…

What is it all about? It's the question that Man has been struggling to answer since the dawn if human consciousness. And while we all have to figure out our own answer, it's never less than fascinating to hear of others who've found theirs. And in that light, this week's guest on the Country Life podcast is Colin Heber-Percy, a successful screenwr…

The award-winning architect Richard Hawkes is no ordinary designer of buildings. He has made his name and forged a career by creating some of the most astonishing new homes build in Britain in the past two decades. He joins James Fisher on the Country Life Podcast to talk about the homes he designs, many of which are built under the Paragraph 84 ru…

Millie Pilkington is one of Britain's best-known portrait photographers, with her work regularly appearing in Country Life as well as dozens of other publications. We were truly delighted that she joined James Fisher on the Country Life podcast this week to talk about life behind the lens. She talks about how she turned a hobby in to a dream career…

Country Life's Gardens Editor Tiffany Daneff is one of Britain's foremost gardening journalists, having worked at titles including The English Garden and The Daily Telegraph, where she launched the gardening supplement. But while she's spent years writing about other people's gardens, this time she talks about her own outside spaces in this very sp…

For the past eight years, the Country Life Top 100 has been the essential list when it comes to finding the best architects, builders, interior and garden designers in the UK. The list is the brainchild of our Interiors Editor Giles Kime, who has used his decades of experience to showcase two of our nation’s great talents — architecture and design.…

We tend to think of the British countryside as rural idyll, a patchwork of fields, farms and forests, rolling on through time until rudely interrupted by the building of a new housing estate, a dual-carriageway or some other man-man incursion. But the landscape around us is changing constantly, has always been doing so, and always will. Fiona Staff…

Helen Rebanks went from farmer, wife and mother to publishing sensation last year when her first book, The Farmer's Wife, earned huge success and a legion of fans — not least the likes of bestselling author Raynor Winn and Times columnist Caitlin Moran. Her bestselling tale of everyday life on the Cumbrian farm which she runs alongside husband Jame…

What is a stone circle? Who made them, and how? And just as importantly, why? This week's guest joining James Fisher on the Country Life podcast is one of Britain's foremost experts on stone circles and henges: Professor Vicki Cummings, the archaeologist who is head of the School of History, Archaeology and Religion at Cardiff University. Vicki exp…

Clive Nichols is Britain's top garden photographer. After originally starting his career in travel photography, Clive switched his focus to gardens — despite, by his own admission, knowing almost nothing about them at the time. It proved a brilliant move, however: he has since photographed thousands of gardens for publications including Country Lif…

Norman Foster is unarguably one of the greatest architects of the last half century. We're delighted that he joins Country Life magazine for a very special episode of the podcast. Speaking to Country Life's Carla Passino, Lord Foster describes how he left school in Manchester at 16 before eventually working his way through university in order to fo…

Country Life magazine's Rosie Paterson has the enviable task of travelling the world in order to report on where to go, when and why. She's also — and she probably won't mind us saying this — developed something of a reputation for being incident prone. Rosie speaks to Country Life podcast host James Fisher to share her tips on everything from the …

Tom Kerridge is one of Britain's best-loved chefs. In 2005, after years spent working at some of finest restaurants in London and the Cotswolds under the likes of Gary Rhodes, he took over The Hand and Flowers pub in Marlow, Buckinghamshire. He quickly earned a Michelin star, a glowing reputation and a high profile which opened up opportunities in …

'The ability to go in and specify everything for an interior might be within the powers of an interior designer,' says Giles Kime, Country Life's long-standing interiors guru. 'ButI think when we're doing on our own homes, it's really important to take your time and put a lot of thought and effort into it.' Giles has spent 35 years writing about in…

The journalist and author Patrick Galbraith spent a week on the uninhabited island of Scarba, a speck on the map in the Inner Hebrides. In the course of his adventure, Patrick fished and foraged, walked and wondered, and went from moments of joy and beauty to pure misery. He came to the Country Life Podcast to tell us all about it, share some of th…

Rosamund Young, the best-selling author of The Secret Life of Cows, has been a farmer for almost half a century. She joined us at the Country Life podcast to talk about her animals, the farms she's known, how the Cotswolds has changed in the years she's called it home, and her beautiful new book, The Wisdom of Sheep. You can read an exclusive extra…

This week's podcast features Country Life's long-standing property correspondent Penny Churchill, who looks back on three decades of writing about Britain's finest houses. From the ups and of the market in the past three decades to the quirkiest agents and owners, Penny speaks to host James Fisher to share her insights on the country houses that ha…

Britain's landscape is dotted with quite incredible castles, from towering and imposing masterpieces to crumbling, romantic ruins. In this week's podcast, we speak to Country Life magazine's Architectural Editor, John Goodall — the man who didn't so much write the book on castles as write a whole bookshelf's worth — to find out which five are his f…

Country Life's first ever podcast sees us speak to the magazine’s Editor-in-Chief, Mark Hedges. Mark has been in charge of the magazine for 17 years, presiding over circulation which has risen year after year, bucking the trend of the publishing industry, and winning every award possible in the process. He’s done everything from writing about fishi…

It's the last episode! This week Murphy is joined by his mates guys Rob Caruana, Timothy Clark, Simon Cumming, Sonia Di Iorio, Claire Hagan, Roland Hoffmann, Peter Jones, Tom Keele, Lucy Milinski, Nick Quon, and Jeremy Webb to drink McLachlan O'Hoplan Goodbye With Your Mates Guys See You Lager Ale, reminisce over the last five years of the podcast,…

This week Murph is joined by his mates guys Firdi Billimoria, Adam Knox and Jacqueline Mifsud at Temple Brewing to drink Rice XPA and discuss jogging, The 9 Club, flowers, The 12 Club, pudding, The 18 Club, stand up comedy, Coolio, and more! Check out everyone here: https://www.jacquelinemifsud.com/ https://www.facebook.com/firdicomedian/ https://t…

Beer Eye is back! Again! This week Murphy is joined by his mates guys Hugo Mylecharane & Beau Stegmann at Fitzroy Gardens to drink Local Brewing IPA and discuss the US election, schlacking, food wastage, the police, Fed Square, hops, Drapht, and more! Check out A Local Beer here: https://www.localbrewing.co/ Here's Beau's FB page: www.facebook.com/…

Boo! It's a spinechillingly spooky kooky scare-tastic Halloween bonus eppy of Beer Eye! Murphy reviews Dainton Blood Orange NEIPA and talks a bit of shit, and we hear some candy and beer recommendations from a few ghastly ghostly ghoulish mates guys! Enjoy! If you daaaaaaare Feel free to check out the Beer Eye socials: facebook.com/beereyematesguys…