Table of contents for October 2017 in Country Style

I have built a few garden rock walls in my time. Not many of them are still intact though, thanks to small boys who liked walking on them and little Jack Russell terriers who loved nothing more than dislodging key stones in the pursuit of the lizards who lived in them. I’m sure they would not be crumbling today if I had done a course with Josh Bowes. This sculptor and stonemason from Daylesford in Central Victoria has mastered the art of dry-stone walling as you can see on page 16. A Country Style garden issue just wouldn’t be the same without the photography of Claire Takacs. I always look forward to her glorious images and I’m never disappointed — you won’t be either when you turn to page 62…

 JOSH BOWES HAS LOVED WORKING with stone from a very young age — and the more weathered, and lichen encrusted that stone is, the more he likes it. Josh is a sculptor, stonemason and dry-stone waller from Daylesford in Central Victoria, and selecting just the right stone when building a traditional dry-stone wall is not only his craft, but his lifelong passion. “My dad had a property at Korweinguboora that backed on to the Wombat Forest and when he was building a house up here, I came with him most weekends from when I was about eight,” says Josh, now 35. “My dad was a builder, a ceramicist, artist and furniture maker, and he had done dry-stone walling on the property. I loved the look of dry-stone walls, so my…

CERES HAS AN ILLUSTRIOUS past that includes royal connections. On his Australian tour in 1867, Prince Alfred, Duke of Edinburgh, famously stayed at the grand homestead at Learmonth, 22 kilometres north-west of Ballarat. In gratitude Queen Victoria sent a gift of a vine cutting from Hampton Court Palace, which today still grows in a conservatory — named The Vine Hall — at the heart of the house. For 150 years, Ceres has captivated all those who have lived here — past owners have attested to its aura. For the current owners, Jane and Geordie Charles and their four children, Ceres is first and foremost a warm and welcoming family home. “It’s a romantic place and a little snapshot of history. The house has a personality. We love to be here.”…

Flora meets fauna with botanical-inspired prints and ceramic pieces making a bold statement.…

 ONE OF THE YEAR’S VEGETABLE highlights for Erika Watson and Hayden Druce is the arrival of new potatoes. “They’re so small and the skin is so thin it can just come off with the brush of your thumb,” says Hayden. Erika jumps in with praise for carrot tops — she blends the delicate fronds with oil, garlic, sunflower seeds and parmesan cheese. Hayden and Erika are Epicurean Harvest, market gardeners who grow small crops of heirloom vegetables for Sydney restaurants. Their clients, chefs such as Peter Gilmore at Quay, will often use more than the vegetable itself; new shoots, flowers and leaves. The relationship with chefs is vital. “When they buy vegetables from people who are taking care of the landscape, they influence a lot of people about sustainable…

THE FRY-UP HAS BEEN PART of my morning ritual for most of my life. From the age of about 12, my dad and I would rise early to practice the monotony of lap swimming at the Harold Holt Memorial Swimming Centre, which was so named in the age before irony. Then we’d come home and promptly dismantle all of our good work with every shovelful of bacon, egg and toast steeped in butter. Along with my enduring fondness for a cooked brekkie, readers of this column may remember that I also have a great appetite for pies and even keep a bottle of tomato sauce in the glove box of my ute (those sauce sachets are too meager). So I’d like to express my eternal gratitude to the genius who…

HARRIET GOODALL FIBRE ARTIST, 42 This NSW Southern Highlands-based artist believes in dressing mindfully and with ease. What influences you as an artist? The rural landscape and it’s colours, my craft education and time spent in Indigenous communities — I want to continue to collaborate with other cultures, using craft as a means to preserve communities and connect people to place. Is fashion an interest for you? Ethically, I am actually quite anti-fashion, but clothing choices say so much about what you believe in and how you approach life. As a busy working mother, it has to be about ease and comfort. When I do dress up, I like to keep it fun and a bit edgy. Whenever I have a wardrobe crisis, my husband Mat says, “Just dress…

THE TRUE NATURE of the Australian country bloke — and those elected to represent him — is widely misunderstood. Few people, for instance, realise that there are more romantics per head of population here, than anywhere else on earth. For every Australian bloke whose ambition is to be locked in a Dan Murphy’s store overnight, or to land the richest trifecta ever recorded on a Melbourne Cup, there must be 50 whose dream is to own a country cottage. On weekends, like lemmings, they plunge over the escarpments of the Great Dividing Range and scamper through farmlands and rural villages in search of an abandoned chook shed they can renovate into a ramshackle country cottage. And the alliteration of ramshackle and romantic is far from coincidental. There was a time…

MARNIE HAWSON We sent this photographer on a road trip to Queensland’s Darling Downs, where she shot Hopewood, a family farmhouse, on page 34 . After working as an environmental scientist for nine years, Marnie loves the “feedom and flexibility” of her life as a freelance photographer. “I meet the nicest people on Country Style shoots,” she says. “I usually go home with things like wine, ceramics, a bellyful of cake and, best of all, a new friend.” For this issue, Marnie travelled from her home in Victoria’s Macedon Ranges to a property near Chinchilla, Queensland, to shoot the Playsted family’s farmhouse. “I was impressed with Susan Playsted’s ability to create an inviting home filled with beautiful artwork and handmade pieces,” she says. And what was her impression of…

STYLE YOUR HOME The Country Style Homewares range will add a touch of classic country elegance to your home with soft furnishings, tableware and home and garden pieces now on sale. Available at madraslinkonline.com.au BOOK IT IN To revisit the stunning country homes and gardens you’ve seen in the magazine, see Country Style’s range of books. They’re filled with inspiration and ideas. For more details, visit harpercollins.com.au SOUL FOOD Memories of cooking are powerful. In Country Style Heirloom Recipes, readers share their family recipes, and the stories of the people who made them special. Available at magsonline.com.au/country-style-heirloom-recipes Feeling inspired? To shop Country Style’s full range of books, magazines and beautiful homewares, visit homelife.com.au/country-style/style…

GOING HOME TO Innisfail, an hour south of Cairns in far north Queensland, can at times be an overwhelming experience for star National Rugby League (NRL) player Billy Slater. Most vividly, the Melbourne Storm fullback recalls a trip in 2004. He was 21 and had just played a pivotal role in Queensland winning the second game in the State of Origin series. The locals threw a street parade in his honour — complete with a brass band and screaming fans. “In the same town where I was once just another little kid riding his bike or his horse around town, I am now noticed,” Billy writes in his newly released autobiography. Born in Nambour in 1983, Billy and his family moved to Innisfail when he was three years old. His…

FOR SOMEONE WHO is so passionate about gardens, Jeremy Goodman is happy to confess that his own green thumb extends to being pretty handy at mowing. His real expertise lies in capturing other people’s gardens in his exquisite watercolour illustrations. Since 2010 — when Jeremy chanced across a book of famous landscape designer Edna Walling’s garden plans and was inspired to resurrect old skills with pencil and paintbrush — he has been creating his own garden maps for clients. Garden Portraits is both the name and nature of his business. And Jeremy’s framed paintings are indeed artworks in their own right. “I love gardens but I’m not really a gardener myself — my wife Ann is the very keen gardener... I ride the ride-on mower very well,” he quips. “I’m…

WHEN ASKED TO DESCRIBE her mother’s coconut biscuits, 34-year-old Kacy Mateljan replies, “Can I just say they taste like childhood?” Growing up in WA’s Swan Valley, Kacy says she spent most of her time barefoot, playing with her brother and cousins among the grapevines on her family’s property or sneaking into the orange-packing shed to push each other around in wooden crates on the roller conveyors. But her fondest memories are of time spent baking with her mum, Lorraine Griffiths. “Sitting on the kitchen bench as we made the coconut biscuits is such a good memory of mine that it’s something I can’t imagine not doing with my own children one day,” Kacy says. Lorraine (pictured here with son Ben) came up with this recipe in the early 1980s. “I…

Breathing in the scent of jasmine releases feel-good brain chemicals that boost energy, improve focus and reduce anxiety. WHEN GWYNETH PALTROW declared that her heart skips a beat when she sees a zucchini flower in the garden, it prompted a frenzy of mockery. In hindsight, it was the first budding sign of what is now a trend in full bloom: the beauty of common garden flowers. Not just their visual beauty, but the positive benefits they offer our skin and body. There is no doubt that flowers can lift the spirits — they are proven, potent mood elevators. Scientists have discovered that breathing in the scent of jasmine, for example, releases feel-good brain chemicals that boost energy, improve focus and reduce anxiety. The flower’s power doesn’t end there; it is…

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INSTAGRAM Our followers went crazy over this gorgeous cottage in the northern NSW town of Bilambil. With its carpet of magnolia petals at the rustic front gate, who could resist? Tag @countrystylemag and hashtag #countrystyleeditor for the chance to appear in our feed. Follow us on Instagram @countrystylemag JOYFUL GETAWAY We all need an escape from the everyday once in a while, and while I may live in Sydney, my heart seems to reside in the country. My favourite part of Country Style is Annabelle Hickson’s offerings. What a treat in the August issue to have the extra story from her about Yamba. Her honesty and delightful observations and humour must endear her to many of your readers. I also love the new addition of ‘The Style Diaries’. I hope…

WEEKENDS AWAY VICTORIA The Royal Mail Grampians Peaks Trail Luxury Walking Package from mid October Includes two nights in the recently refurbished Deluxe Mountain View room, a completely catered day of walking on the Grampians Peaks Trail with an informative guide, dinner each evening at the Royal Mail Hotel, delicious à la carte breakfast daily, return transfers from the Royal Mail Hotel to the trail, a tour of the hotel’s wine collection and a chef- led harvest tour of Australia’s largest kitchen garden. $1750 per couple twin share. 98 Parker Street, Dunkeld. (03) 5577 2241; royalmail.com.au WA Sal Salis Ningaloo Reef October is the last month for the year to swim with the mighty humpback whales on Ningaloo Reef, a World Heritage Site and Australia’s largest fringing coral…

 EARLY MORNING, AS SUNLIGHT floods through the double hung windows of this Hopewood farmhouse, Susan and Matthew Playsted have breakfast at the large silky oak dining table with their sons Clancy, 16, Will, 14, Sam, 11, and eight-year-old Archer. The table once belonged to Susan’s grandparents. Outside the window, a lone kookaburra sits quietly on the heritage gate in the rose garden, framed by the towering gums and brigalow trees that line Canaga Creek. “I love how still and calm it is in the morning — it’s the best time of day and makes me appreciate where we live,” Susan says of the 330-hectare property north-east of Chinchilla in the Canaga district on the Western Downs. Before long, the day gathers momentum. The boys divide between the shed and the…

 MAUREEN GARDNER HAS a way with plants and is the creative spirit behind the oasis known as Green Lane in Bowral. It all started when a friend opened a shop overlooking the concrete loading dock of Dirty Jane’s, a well-known antique emporium on the main street. The space needed a little beautification, so Maureen bought in a ute load of plants from home. Then another. And another. As she made her deliveries an idea started to form — maybe this empty concrete slab could be a garden centre. “I spoke to the landlord, bought the site office that was sitting empty, put an awning on it and away we went,” Maureen says. Knowing she couldn’t compete with the big nurseries, Maureen decided to specialise in topiary, citrus, formal plants, heirloom…

ALMOST THREE YEARS AGO, chefs Darren Robertson and Mark LaBrooy realised a dream when they flew north to open Three Blue Ducks in Byron Bay — a restaurant on a 36-hectare farm at Ewingsdale in northern NSW. The pair have always been passionate about sustainability, so they jumped at the chance to be involved in The Farm, an enterprise that grows much of the produce used in the Blue Ducks’ kitchen and strives to educate visitors about food production. Being involved in The Farm has been a learning curve for Darren and Mark, and it’s changed their approach to cooking. “I think [my food] has become a little less complicated,” says Darren. “I want to use every single thing that’s grown on the farm — it’s seriously amazing produce.” Their…

MEET THE PRODUCER Terrence Rattray, Yum Tasmanian Gourmet Potatoes, Tasmania Tasmania’s new-season Dutch creams have an enviable reputation. “We’ve had people drive to the farm and fill their suitcases with potatoes to take back to the mainland,” says grower Terrence Rattray, who with his wife Wendy, owns Yum Tasmanian. Seed potatoes are sown in spring and harvested through summer and autumn, which means the first new-season potatoes are available now. The Rattrays have two farms; they bought Anchor Farm in the North East Highlands in 1995 and, as demand for their potatoes grew, expanded to a 380-hectare farm near Devonport. “The move here is an investment in the red soil and vegetable-growing microclimate of the north coast,” says Terrence. The Rattrays grow more than a dozen varieties, from King Edward…

IT MAY BE RENOWNED for its historic streetscape, bucolic, evergreen setting and close proximity to the coast, but it’s the supportive community that makes the small town of Milton, in the Shoalhaven region of the NSW South Coast, so special. “It’s the friendliness — everyone looks after each other,” says Jo Delly, who, with her chef husband, Alex, runs acclaimed local restaurant St Isidore, which sources many ingredients from its large kitchen gardens. “There’s comradeship between people, and businesses are really great at supporting each other. It’s just so welcoming and laidback.” Jo estimates that as many as two new families are moving to Milton each week, ensuring the town’s vibrant mix of food, retail, education and medical services continues to develop and evolve. A proposed bypass — which would…

 IT’S A THREE-MINUTE WALK from the boarding dormitory to the stables for the students of New England Girls School (NEGS) at Armidale, NSW, who rise early to feed, change rugs and check on their horses before school. At the end of the school day, the riders return with a sense of purpose and anticipation, ready to begin the weekday training sessions. The eventers and showjumpers assemble at their arenas, while the polocrosse and campdraft riders head to the fields. Sixteen-year-old boarder Cassie Drummond, from Melbourne, competes in eventing and showjumping on her bay gelding Tangles. “The Equestrian Centre is so close to the boarding house and is on the same campus as school, which means I can visit my horse easily and whenever I want,” she says. “I love…

ON THE TRAIL The spring collection from Yarra Trail combines effortless style and comfort in equal measure. Pair the soft pink and blue ornate print shirt with olive cropped utility pants for an eye-catching look. 1800 629 308; yarratrail.com.au TRY IT ON Not sure what to wear this summer? Take your time shopping using Birdsnest’s online ‘changeroom’ where you can order up to $1000 worth of styles to try before you buy. Simply return what you don’t want — easy! 1300 696 378; birdsnest.com.au GREAT COVERAGE Designed by Anne Millet of Bonjour Diary, this lush, 100 per cent cotton tablecloth from the ‘Petite Chambre Noire’ range is hand-block printed in India. 0400 007 484; littlefrenchheart.com INDIAN SUMMER Fashion brand Read and Bell specialises in dresses, tunics and shirts inspired by…