A blanket of smoke rolls in over the hills yet the reality of the devastation is still hard to fathom. Our region has been spared and we remain safe but the fury of mother nature perseveres and continues
to wreak havoc in other less fortunate regions of Australia. As we welcome in the warm month of February, gratitude flows for our nations heroes, our appreciation for a breath of fresh air is heightened and hearts are heavier than ever with a sense of what Australia has truly lost.
On the subject of photography, Henri Cartier-Bresson writes, “To take photographs is to hold one's breath when all faculties converge in the face of fleeing reality.” The current climate is testament to a different kind of fleeing reality; the decay of our natural environment. Marnie Hawson’s photography converges storytelling with social responsibility.
“As a former environmental scientist, I'm hardwired to tread lightly in everything I do,” says Marnie. She was raised on acreage and was quickly absorbed by the romance of the Australian bush. “I was rarely allowed to watch TV and instead spent hours outdoors making cubbies out of branches, exploring gorges down the back of our property and hunting for yabbies in the dams.”
As Marnie explored the natural landscape, she developed a curious eye for detail while fine tuning a purpose-driven philosophy. At the beginning of her photography career, Marnie captured “an honest trade,” a series of portraits highlighting twenty trades. “They are all what I considered honest trades.” She explains, “Honest trades involve manual labour and hard work. To me, there is far more value in something that has had love and sweat poured into the production of it.” In a striking set of portraits titled Farrier, the blacksmith’s face disappears in a cloud of smoke as heats the horseshoe.
Read MoreThe Italian designer Massimo Vignelli once said, “Good design is a language, not a style.” Bowen & Kenneth’s interiors don’t just conjure an artful voice, the homes they furnish become flirtatious conversations that highlight the luxury of living.
Amongst Egyptian chandeliers, French provincial porters chairs and a hand-carved Indian Mandala; a myriad of ornate furnishings illuminate the imagination of designers Johanathan Kenneth McMahon and Samuel Bowen Pridmore, co-founders of the Bowen & Kenneth boutique in Daylesford.
Read More“You've got a song you're singing from your gut, you want that audience to feel it in their gut,” writes Johnny Cash. “And you've got to make them think that you're one of them sitting out there with them too.”
As singer-songwriter Sean Dixon strums his guitar, his voice welcomes you into his past. On live stream videos he posts online, Sean stands barefoot with shaggy hair that sways as he wrestles with his guitar and cries out a poetic lament. “I can only do the best that I can,” sings Sean, “I find it hard to know what it is to be a man.”
Read MoreFor Sam White, it was a series of ‘a-ha’ moments that revolutionised not only the way he farms but how he lives his life. The first came in 2005, shortly after he’d acknowledged his passion for farming.
Sam had decided to return full time to the 850-hectare property his family has been farming in the granite hills around Sidonia for more than 150 years to work with his dad raising cattle and sheep. Sitting on the veranda of the modern rammed earth home that he built on the beautiful property with his wife Miranda and where they live with their two children Angus and Matilda, Sam explains the initial a-ha moment.
“I’d been learning about organic farming and alternative agriculture in Melbourne and I began to see that there was something that wasn’t working on the farm,” he says. “We kept having the same problems, the same diseases, the same lack of feed – some of the paddocks would be black from the sheep staying on them too long. There was just no grass left.
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Lavandula's Lavender Harvest festival is a celebration of all things lavender, and it's an opportunity for visitors to discover the many processes and uses of this wonderful plant. The process includes harvesting with hand sickles, bunching for drying, winnowing the owers and seeds, and distilling for essential oil and oral water. Its uses are many and varied from dried ower arrangements, lling potpourri satchels, culinary lavender used in cooking and lavender oil and water for therapeutic and medicinal use.
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Welcome back to the roaring 20’s! It’s the start of a new decade and wow it’s exciting!
A new year always sparks conversations of ‘change’ and ‘resolutions’, but I’m jumping off the ‘new year, new me’ boat and hopping on board the self care and compassion train. I’ve been volunteering once a week with a large young family in Melbourne - and I can’t begin to explain the positive change it has had on my life. This experience has de nitely guided my compassion and my increased focus on Lost Magazine. Collating these heartwarming stories and images is a special opportunity.
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It started as a joke. Mitch Duncan and his partner Steve had been coming to Daylesford for several years to visit friends and every time they visited, they’d end up at the Farmers Arms Hotel.
“We loved the feel of the place and it felt like our local, even though we only got there every couple of months,” says Mitch. “It was always a cracker night and we used to say – as you do drunkenly at the end of the bar – if this place ever comes up for sale, we should buy it.”
And then it happened. Four-and-a-half years ago, a friend rang Mitch to tell him the pub was on the market and so he and Steve decided it wasn’t a joke. Suddenly they were publicans.
“We loved the idea of having such an iconic place,” Mitch says. “But we’d never run a hospitality business before. Steve’s a doctor and I’d retired from the automotive industry and had interests in property development. For the first six months we worked there ourselves but realised pretty quickly that it was best for us to get out of the way and concentrate on the business side of the business and let the hospitality professionals, led by long-term team member Megan Evans, do the fantastic job they do.”
Read MoreIt’s doubtful a dose of the flu would figure in too many business plans, but for Clay Watson, the flu helped launch his business. Bed-ridden in his Daylesford cottage one weekend, Clay was working on the website for a vague idea he’d been playing around with about starting a company specialising in bespoke tours of local wineries. In his delirium, Clay inadvertently published the website. The next day, he started getting enquiries. When his wife Renai asked him what he’d done, Clay replied: “We’ve just started Daylesford Wine Tours, babe – we’d better buy a bus”.
Read MoreHow does it feel to live as though you are at one with nature? The answer might be nestled high on Wombat Hill in Daylesford; Hardwood House. The country home represents a sanguine escape that captures the mood of the respective culture through design that is drenched in history.
Read MoreIn The Importance of Being Earnest, Oscar Wilde writes, “I hate people who are not serious about meals. It is so shallow of them.” In another time, Leah Johnston would circle Wilde’s orbit, draped in lace Victorian dress with Irezumi tattoos blossoming up her back. “My small farm is surrounded by various gum trees; I like to bring our local fauna into the grazing tables to really showcase the land element.” At Musk Farm, Leah glides around a table with leaves and owers that blossom on the ends of an opulent feasting table. A decadent assortment of soft cheeses dripping with honey, caramelized crackers and buttery pâté ow from the centre. She's launching her new catering business, Daylesford Grazing. As people pass by the room, littered with Renaissance paintings and French curtains, they quickly snap a photo.
Read MoreMeg Ulman zips past my car on a bicycle with her Jack Russell, Zero, in the front basket and her son, Woody (Blackwood), on the back seat. “We've been car-free for 10 years. And the first day we got Zero, he was 11 weeks old and jumped straight into the basket.”
Read MoreTAKING ITS NAME FROM THE 90S HORROR FLICK NONE HAVE HAD THE COURAGE TO ORDER FIVE OF THESE WHILE HOLDING A MIRROR.
Read MoreThe Farmers Arms Hotel Daylesford is not your average pub. It boasts a truly seasonal menu, focusing on highlighting local and in-season produce. We deliver dishes that re ect the best of the region, sourcing from local organic farms and produce growers to ensure not only sustainable and tasty dishes, but also generous and deliciously flavoured meals.
Read MoreCome along and enjoy a wee bit of Scotland in the picturesque tourist town of Daylesford, Victoria. The Daylesford Highland Gathering is held annually on the 1st Saturday of December and is the rst gathering of the season.
Our charming Gathering includes a captivating Street March in the Main Street of Daylesford and thena full days Drumming, Piping and Dancing at the picturesque Victoria Park, located at the southern entrance of Daylesford. The end of the day is heralded spectacularly with the Massed Bands, which is an experience not to be missed!
Read MoreWait... is that the month!? Cue Maria Carey and Michael Buble, it’s time to get festive. What better time than the twelfth month to reminisce about the year gone by. It’s been a big year for Lost Magazine. So many amazing stories have been explored and presented. It is always worth saying how proud and lucky we are to be here.
Read MoreIt might come as a surprise to learn that Alla Wolf-Tasker, the one-woman revolution who created Daylesford’s iconic Lake House out of a weedy paddock more than 30 years ago, has anything left on her to-do list.
But despite running the lauded restaurant along with its boutique accommodation and spa, its sibling Wombat Hill House café and being an all-round champion of central Victoria - with the Order of Australia to prove it - Wolf-Tasker still longed for the authenticity of her own freshly-baked bread.
“It was a dream of mine to offer a larger variety of good bread to our guests at Lake House but our kitchens were operating to capacity,” she says. “With the Bake House we’ll be able to produce slow-fermented sourdough breads as well as beautifully laminated croissants, viennoiserie, donuts, breakfast buns and all sorts of deliciousness.”
Read MoreWhen Nina Isabella had her first taste of chai 20 years ago she knew it was good – but she also knew she could make it better.
“A friend made it for me the traditional way: he added the tea and spices to the pot, brought it to the boil, added milk and let it simmer,” says the founder of Atelier Botanica. “The spices were amazing. I loved the drink but the tea after that process was completely destroyed.”
Back then it was impossible to find a commercial version of the chai travellers tended to discover for the first time on their backpacking adventures in India. The appeal of the warming spices such as cardamom, cinnamon and cloves in a silken, milky warm tea was hard to deny, though - so Isabella set out on her own journey, experimenting with her own blends and quantities until she found the perfect recipe. What began as a small cottage industry (“basically I was peddling it in small packets to my girlfriends”) eventually turned into Atelier Botanica and a seven-strong range of all-organic artisan products.
Read MoreIn Andrew and Trevor’s property “Maggies at Trentham,” what reads like history on the outside blossoms with imagination within. The regal Victorian home neighbours St Mary Magdalen Catholic Parish Church and was dedicated to the local priest by the archbishop of Melbourne in 1906. Three years ago, the property was metamorphosed by interior designers Andrew Danckert and Trevor Salmon - the result has blossomed into a carnival of wonder.
Built in the late 19th century, Maggies was originally commissioned over one hundred years ago for the local parish Priest, who serviced not only Trentham, but also Kyneton and the surrounds. These days, the interior offers accommodation for up to eight guests in four bedrooms that dissolve the stately posture of faith with a quirky aesthetic that foregrounds fun.
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