Nicole Clark

The Stuff she loves

Nicole Clark is a graphic designer and maker and long-term friend of all of our ventures who has worked with us at Glen Dye and The Good Life Society for many years.

Here, she shares here passions.

First, please tell us about yourself.

I am just entering the final year of my thirties. A graphic designer, sometimes artist and illustrator who specialises in small batch paper goods for sharing life's adventures - whether they be micro moments of the everyday or big life changing events.

I live with my husband and 2 children in a Yorkshire village that is situated on the very northernmost part of the Peak District and the southernmost part of the Pennines.

We spend most of our free time in our rented garden learning to grow our own food and enjoying the views across the valley onto our house and beyond.

I also have a deep love of cooking simple feasts over fire.

What’s the best place that you’ve visited and what did you love about it?

I had to make a list of the places that I've been to in order to whittle this one down. I haven't traveled much but am VERY lucky to have loved all of the places that I have been fortunate enough to visit.

After much thought of all the places I've been, large and small, far or near, I have to say Sri Lanka. A fallen palace atop a rock, majestic tea plantations, curry so strong/spicy it made my eyes water, ayurvedic medicine in the jungle, lightening storms across the sea watched from the beach, Buddhist temples, and people with an innate magic about them.

We visited an elephant orphanage and it was like a scene out of Jurassic Park, if you swapped the dinosaurs for Elephants that is. The sights and smells from that trip will stay with me always.

If a push comes to a shove, what’s your favourite album of all time?

I don't know that I could ever pick just one. Slightly envious of anyone that decisive or maybe even suspicious - on a sinking ship where I have to pick just one album of my collection to take with me, I would go down with the ship trying to decide I suspect.

However, dubnobasswithmyheadman by Underworld is where my hand probably reaches first. Until I spot Beaucoup Fish, and then The Race for Space (Public Service Broadcasting) and then The Killers (deliberation between Hot Fuss and Wonderful Wonderful costs me precious moments I don't have), Kylie (so great live), Massive Attack, Basement Jaxx, Shea Seger - The May Street Project, The Beach - because I love a good soundtrack too, and before I know it there's a lifeboat full of CDs and a bunch of very angry and disgruntled people frowning at me from life rings.

And re-reading this I remember The Cure - Head on the Door and think that probably settles it entirely. What a brilliant album and it has pretty much most of what you need from music. I had it on tape that accompanied me on many walks as a teen and I will always be humbled by Robert Smith's seeming sense of overwhelm and joy when they played Glastonbury a few years back too.

And your favourite book?

This one is easier. It has been different at different points in my life and usually a series of books rather than just one because I like to fall into a deep relationship with characters rather than partake of single serving stories. The Armistead Maupin Tales of the City series was an absolute favourite growing up (late teen years). I wanted to live at 28 Barbary Lane so very much. High Fidelity by Nick Hornby was a firm favourite for a time.

The Hunger Games trilogy gave me a female heroine and an easy read with a more complicated subtext that I needed when days wrangling babies / toddlers meant nights with little patience for "proper" books with complex writing.

Almost any picture book published by Flying Eye has a lovely story and beautiful illustration too and I refuse to believe they are just for children.

Right now it is The Life of Pi by Yann Martel.

It spoke to me in a way that a book or story has not done in a long time and when it was over I sobbed. I try not to re-read the same books now - there are so many to read it seems foolish, but I know that I will let Pi tell me his story again some day.

Oh, and what work of art do you love above all others?

If it forcibly had to be an artwork specifically it would be The Kiss by Klimt though I am endlessly in awe of Monochrome Bleu by Yves Klein and its absolute confidence.

However, the typographic works of John Warwicker are quite something and I have a deep respect for Oliver Jeffers dipped paintings too.

I think that fashion and architecture can equally produce some magnificent pieces. Ray Kappe paints in concrete and wood in ways that can provoke just as much emotion as any work of art.

My dream is to one day own a Ray Kappe house. Or something similar at least.

Do you believe in a god?

The peculiarity and miraculousness of life and our very existence seems too great to be in a world without one, but I don't hold faith in a divine being.

I'm interested in ideas around atoms and energy and charge and the elements and how we are drawn to forest, mountains and sea and the like.

The idea that no new atoms are made is a fascinating one and opens the doors to lots of interesting ideas around attraction and energy.

Do you have a route that you walk or run that’s particularly special to you?

A few short minutes up behind our house there is a pathway that takes you right up on to the moors. It is a steep walk and there is a pretty angry looking dog that is reminiscent of the beagle in Fantastic Mr Fox, but when you get past that guy and up past the cows you can walk and walk and seem to be in the middle of nowhere, but know that home is less than a mile away should the weather turn.

A few miles further up is a reservoir with a small beach. Fun in summer, even more so when it freezes in winter. In late summer / early autumn it is difficult to get more than ten minutes from the house though because the beginning of that path has so many blackberries and wild blueberries that you can pick and eat all afternoon and not make so much as a dent in them and they are too tempting to stroll past.

What’s your guiltiest pleasure (or at least the guiltiest pleasure that you’re prepared to tell us about)?

Marvel. If I had to sum it up in one word.

I spent years refusing to watch thinking they'd just be boring action blockbusters, which now I come to think of it is madness given that the wider heading that I would give here is action movies. James Bond, Jurassic Park, The Bourne movies. Our Christmas Eve film on a yearly basis is Die Hard.

Conversely, I love Pitch Perfect too. My mother gave us a projector last year that we beam onto the wall above the fireplace and it makes us actively look forward to the nights drawing in rather than dreading it.

We well and truly fell down the Marvel rabbit hole during those stay at home times and watched all of the movies in chronological and then release order.

Our family is pretty bonkers for the MCU and I especially loved WandaVision with its take on studio filmed sitcoms like I Dream of Jeannie and Bewitched that I remember watching when I was little.

What possession, more than any other, means the most to you?

Sentimentally probably my engagement ring. It is a symbol of new chapters, great adventures and the diamond makes me think of seemingly impossible things being doable.

Materialistically (but probably also sentimentally actually) we were all pretty miserable when our Aga went down for a while a couple of months ago. She is the heart of our home, has had cloth nappies dried on her, soaking wet mittens sizzle briefly on the top in winter to eek out a few more hours of snow play and when we are done we all pile into the kitchen for hot chocolates done on the hob. In summer herbs dry over her and fruit is dehydrated to preserve. She is seemingly the full stop to the poetry of all seasons. I can't imagine living with a "normal" cooker ever again, she is like one of the family.

What’s your favourite word?

Petrichor. The earthy scent that comes from a rain fall on dry soil. The smell of that sweet relief after a hot summer day when the garden and veg patch finally get a soaking after baking under the sun. It makes me think of monsoon season somewhere hot. Also, discombobulated - it's fun to say.

Cheese or pudding?

Both. I can't think of a single pudding that is made with mascarpone that is bad.

Wine or water?

Becoming more and more partial to a nice tall glass of water with lots of ice.

What’s the best thing about Sundays?

They're generally unhurried and leisurely affairs which seem a stark but welcome contrast to the rest of the week. A bit of a lie in and slow start to the day and a big brunch. An afternoon out walking or at the garden and occasionally a roast dinner to top it off with. Perfect.

Who is your hero?

Karl Hyde - of Underworld fame but he's also a brilliant creative and all round awesome guy. I have seen Underworld many times over the years and been lucky enough to meet Karl a couple of times. He has a quiet but spectacular energy and passion for what he does and it is quite infectious.

Also, my daughter Eve. She has an unmatched zest for life and confidence in her own being. She is ten and gives no weight whatsoever to what anyone thinks about how she dresses or what she does. Her life's ambition is to be Black Widow, a ballet dancer, an illustrator, author and cook and she's on her way already to accomplishing at least three of those!