Introducing PEYO in my series of eccentric allotment growers. Here is his story. PEDRO, who insists his English friends pronounce it “Peyo” has always hankered for a simple life. Originally from the Basque region of Spain but with French ancestry he has always felt like a nomad and travelled the world after university, working in bars and restaurants, gradually losing any motivation to pursue the product design he had studied for. In 2008 he was knocked off his motor bike, sustaining severe concussion and a lengthy time in hospital. A generous insurance payment bought him a period of reflection and he applied for an allotment, initially to stretch out the money and start living off the land but its appeal grew like his plants and quickly enveloped him. These new cultivation skills and constant reading inspired him to investigate the world of herbal medicine and to start making his own remedies. His back and arms still ache but his natural medicines and gentle digging are working to alleviate it. He thinks of himself as an alchemist although has no desire to create gold, just a simple ambition to use the natural properties of minerals and herbs to create change in himself and those around him. Thanks @alexpbickel our model and artist @victwymanamazing props and costume
Elena comes to her allotment every day in all weathers. She took over the plot when her son left home and found she had all this time to herself once more. She remembered growing up in Lithuania in the early 1950s and working on the family smallholding. They had pigs and ducks, and her father made his own “Namine”, a homemade form of Poitín or moonshine. That was his escape from the hardships and life without a wife and mother. Elena would escape to the woods full of moss and berries that she would collect and dry. She would store these along with feathers, egg shells, seeds and twigs in a jewellery box her mother left. As she grew older, she would create intricate brooches and headdresses and wander the dark forest as someone else, somewhere else. In the quiet, she would dream of leaving and moving west.
New project with the superb @victwyman Prop Styling AND Wardrobe with amazing casting by @scorpioredhair the incredible Sue Odell.
