The backstory

I hate writing. There, I said it... April 22, 2025

It’s true, I do hate writing. But given this is my first piece on Substack, I feel I should explain... Writing has never come naturally to me. It’s always been a case of me struggling to retrieve the desired words from a jumbled mess of language in my brain. I blame the parents. In a good way. Even though I was born in Duncan, the smallest city in Canada, and went to schools located on indiginous land of the Songhees First Nation, my Mum decided I should do all my school lessons in French. And just to confirm, British Columbia is an English-speaking province… My Mum was from Kent, and my Dad grew up in North Wales. Later, I lived in Victoria’s China Town. So, I guess you could say there was a lot going on in terms of language and cultural influence, and maybe that’s why I sometimes feel overwhelmed by choice of words… But if there are too many words to choose from, there’s also a lot to say. I might find writing hard, but I find chatting very easy. So, I’m going to try to write in chat form. If that makes sense! I’ll tell you a bit about me and a lot about the things I love. So, here goes…

I guess, like all of us, I’m a product of where and how I grew up. My Mum and Dad came to Canada in the Sixties with their parents, all of whom were looking for a new life and new opportunities, far away from the challenges of austere, post-war provincial Britain. In many ways, my Mum and Dad were chalk and cheese. My Mum was into horticulture, interior design, and loved hunting for English antiques. My Dad just loved hunting. Growing up, we ate so much venison, moose and salmon we got sick of it. As a boy in North Wales, Dad had shot rabbits before school, riding up the Little Orme on his bicycle with his shotgun. For somebody who already loved the outdoors, Canada was like a dream come true. My Dad tried to get me as excited about hiking, hunting and camping as he was, but as much as I could appreciate the beauty, this girl’s passions lay beyond a musty, mosquito-ridden tent with wolves howling outside…

My Dad loved being out in the wilds all alone, being faced down by bears and surviving on tins of stew and moose. But like a good frontiersman, he was practical too. Dad built houses, renovated houses and Mum’s eye for interior design sold the houses. I was born in their first project, an old barn that they completely renovated, learning construction skills as they went along. That humble agricultural building has come a long way. I was recently surprised to see it serve as backdrop to Pamela Anderson’s, “Cooking with Love”. It brought back a lot of memories of where I came from and the life my parents strived to build for me and my brother and sister.

In many ways, my Mum and Dad lived a life they might never have enjoyed in the UK. They had space, opportunity, and they were free from the stifling constraints of British society. But the funny thing was, my Mum – perhaps more than my Dad – always harked back to Britain. Or some idealised vision of Britain. And maybe that’s why, from as early as I can remember, Britain was always a bright light on my horizon. The Brit-pop music of the 90s helped give my dreams a soundtrack, and the copies of British Vogue I bought with my pocket money gave it a wardrobe...

I studied marketing, and declared to my Mum and Dad that I was going to work in fashion. Doing what, I had no idea… My parents, ever the realists, told me there were no ‘real jobs’ in fashion, but I’d made up my mind to get to London… And secretly, perhaps vicariously, I think my Mum was quite pleased...

I was already spending a lot of my spare time in the local Eldorado of vintage clothing, Value Village. Back in the day, the closely-packed aisles were stocked with the wardrobe artefacts of a dwindling generation of well-heeled British ex-pats. I’d leave with armfuls of Scottish cashmere, fur coats, crocodile handbags and well-cut winter coats. I’d use my sewing machine to do alterations and sometimes re-cut garments to make them a little less conservative. I’d sell some of my finds and make money to buy more. By this time, I was working on one of my favourite boutiques in Victoria and saving up to make my move…

A few years and about seven thousand miles later, at 21 years old, I landed my first big job in the UK, managing the menswear department at Liberty of London. It was – and is – one of the most quintessentially British stores, and a design institution. I felt like I’d arrived. Of course, what I really wanted was to manage women’s wear, but beggars can’t be choosers, and serendipitously my time in menswear resulted in me meeting one very dishy customer who I now call my husband. So, it turned out alright I guess... 

From one British style institution, I landed at another, Alexander McQueen. In many respects, it was the other end of the style spectrum to Liberty, but in terms of craft, it was part of a long tradition that I was thrilled to be part of. I served starlets, supermodels, and Gulf princes who rolled up in chinchilla-lined Bentleys... Bond St was a long way from Duncan… And anyone who’s spent ten hours a day in heels, fetching, carrying, biting your tongue and smiling, will tell you, it’s gruelling work... I met fabulous people who are still my friends, and I encountered my fair share of toxic divas – of both sexes. I also experienced that now predictable phenomenon of individuals who own institutions and think they’re entitled to browse the staff too… I never thought seriously about moving home to Canada, but I began to realise that all that glistens isn’t gold. I guess I did want to be closer to something a bit like the world I’d grown up in. I moved to rural Sussex and ended up in a Medieval house older than Canada, and with about as much insect life…

Fast forward many years, two kids, lots of animals and an extensive knitwear collection, and I can honestly say, I’m pretty darn happy. Somehow, I managed to create a job that allows me to do all the things I love, and to talk about them.

My Instagram account went from a little lockdown hobby documenting the things I was growing, cooking, and wearing, to a career I didn’t expect, and could not love more. When I started, I was really dubious about social media. I was late to the game and worried how I would be judged if I put myself out there. But when I started to post content, a peculiar thing happened. I wasn’t bombarded with criticism. The shocking reality is that the vast majority of people are really quite nice. Don’t get me wrong, I’ve had my fair share of negative comments, but the great thing about getting older is that I can honestly say it doesn’t really bother me. Because one thing I’ve learned over the past few years is that comfort zones are dangerous spaces in which to rest. Stepping out of that boundary is the only way to grow and to stave off the discontent we all sometimes feel - even if that not-so-quiet voice in your head is providing every excuse under the sun not to try something new…

Back to the story. Things came full circle when my Mum and Dad left Canada after fifty years, and moved back home to the UK, just down the road from us. It may all sound like a fairytale fit for Instagram, but of course it isn’t really like that. Sure, the camera never lies, but it certainly chooses the frame. Life might all look like a bed of roses, but I can tell you, like everybody else, there’s a compost heap of stress, obligation, chores and anxiety just out of frame… I have kids, a mortgage, and all the associated worries. My parents are getting older, and I’m getting older... Don’t get me wrong, I know I’ve got it much, much better than many people, but what you see on Instagram isn’t the entire story. And perhaps that’s what this is all about. A chance to say more than you can with pretty little posts and reels.

So here I am, two decades and thousands of miles from where I started out, forcing myself to write, and hoping it feels like the thing I love best, a chat with my friends. It’ll be about everything I’m loving, from gardening, cooking, antiques, fashion and beauty, to bright pink pickled quail eggs... There’ll be a little more of a candid view into my days, filled with plenty of photos, recipes, guides, lists and random tales of my life in the English countryside. 

I will be offering a post at least once a week (at my pace it will take me all week to write) to subscribers and am really excited to put together something that can be enjoyed with a cup of tea and a quiet moment. 

Yours sincerely, 

Mrs Trufflepig.