The 'My Nest' series took a bit of a break for a while but it is back.....
So...today on Moon to Moon I am extremely excited and happy to introduce Rachel, one half of
The Silk Road and her fabulous Waldorf Inspired home in the Australian hills... Light, roomy and full to the brim with happy house plants and stunning finds from her travels across the globe I have been drooling over Rachel's pad for some time..... so was mega excited when she agreed to share her home on Moon to Moon and Answer a few questions....
1) Can you tell us a little bit
about yourself and where you live?
I am 33, married to my soulmate Gawaine
and a mum to two incredible girls, Zaala Zahara and Luna Indigo. I am a
registered nurse specialised in Emergency & Intensive Care and I am also a
remote area nurse for the indigenous communities of remote Australia. That
said, at the moment I’m taking extended maternity leave from nursing to enjoy
the bliss of being at home with my girls in the Adelaide Hills, Australia. I am
also co-founder of The Silk Road, an online shop with artisan made items
collected on our travels across the globe.
2) How did you find this beautiful
home and how long have you lived in it?
We have been extremely fortunate to have
been given the opportunity to live in the home that my husband grew up in. It’s
an incredibly quirky home that has had a beautiful history; his family
filled it with music, house concerts, visitors from all walks of life
from around the world and lots of love. For many years it was THE meeting
place and I’d hazard to guess that almost everyone in our community has a
beautiful memory tucked away of their time spent in this house. We moved
in two years ago and although it's much quieter these days, it is very much
home for us.
3) Your husband must have really
fond memories of the place. Have you altered it much since you moved in?
The amazing energy that came with this
home and the memories of the space was still fresh in everyone’s mind when we
moved in. It could have proven to be a challenge to make the shift in making it
our own space whilst being respectful to what the home once was; and give our
family time to adjust to the changes we brought. Luckily, our family were 100%
supportive and encouraging to change it up and make it our own.
4) What are your favourite things
about living in this area?
Our close circle and wider network
is thanks, in large part, to my husband and his family. He was part of
an incredible community-centered school and through it I have formed an
amazing circle of friends who I love. Like other Waldorf communities
around the world, his network has carried through into adulthood and our
daughter has now started her journey here. It is rich in heart and
generosity, encourages mindful and slow living, growing your own food
etc. I definitely miss my lifelong friends in Queensland that I've known
forever but although we sometimes dream of living back in the
tropics, we know our little town in the hills is definitely
now home.
5) Every item in your house is
absolutely stunning. Could you pick 3 objects with a history and tell us about
them?
Many of the pieces in our home have been
collected on our travels over the years. We have had some incredible
opportunities when it comes to travel and found ourselves in some fairly remote
corners of the world. One of the hardest things we have had to transport
home was a wooden carving of a Fulani lady carrying her child on her back. She
is over a meter tall and we found her in the amazing city of Ouagadougou in
Burkina Faso. We still had over a month in West Africa before going
home but we couldn’t leave her behind! So we cut up a foam mattress from
the local market to place her in a soft protected casing and then she took up
residence in Gawaine's backpack as we travelled onward through Mali and
Ghana.
I also love to collect handmade
textiles. My favourite piece is an old heavily embroidered young mans
jacket I found in Kachchh, Gujurat. This amazing area in western India is home
to the Rabari, a semi-nomadic group of pastoralists and anyone who has a thing
for Indian textiles knows that Kachchh is renowned for its incredible artisans.
This colourful jacket is actually the piece that inspired the creation of TheSilk Road.
Another special piece is an old silver
round amulet I found in the centuries old Esfahan bazaar in central Iran.
Historically, the Esfahan bazaar was an significant place of trade on the Silk
Road. The amulet was made by the Kuchi peoples of Afghanistan which borders
Iran, and it is such a symbolic piece to me of our journey with The Silk
Road.
6) Do you have a favourite place in
your home?
The bay windows in our kitchen and
living room are such a glorious source of natural light and are integral to our
day to day movements in our home. Everything we do revolves in and around these
beautiful bay windows. They are huge, with the added benefit of being north
facing which is perfect for our southern hemisphere seasonal changes. There is
also an old rambling grape vine that twists and winds its way along the entire
northern aspect of the house, just about the windows. In the summer months the
grape shades the sun with its expansive green vinery, and in the cooler months
the leaves turn a rich shade of auburn before falling off. The winter sun then
streams in and warms the entire downstairs living spaces. The downstairs of the
house has been built with rammed earth which encourages minimal fluctuations in
temperature year round; the thick walls of compacted earth stay cool in summer
and the sun warms the walls in winter.
7) What are you currently listening
too
Loren Kate, an Australian award winning
musician who I have the immense pleasure of calling a friend. She is a
remarkable human and story teller. Her music never fails to leave me with goose
bumps or in tears.
8) What are you currently reading?
We have a great collection of books,
mostly non-fiction and generally anything related to worldwide cultures, world
issues or stories exploring the lives of people who create change in the world.
I would love to say I was actually currently reading something
of that vein, but I just looked over to my bedside table and there is a very
dog-eared copy of the India Lonely Planet. I re-read sections of it before I go
to bed each night. India is my heartland, a country that has left such an
imprint on me....Plus we have two little people tucked up in bed with us so I
don’t read big books the way I used to.
9) If you could travel either back
in time or to a far off land to grab some interior items where would you go?
I feel that our home is full to the brim
with so many things, and although I love each and every piece that has found
its way to us, I feel like we have everything we could ever need and at the end
of the day it’s just stuff. As I grow older, I now would be
much happier to work and learn alongside NGO’s who are committed to working
with artisans to protect their traditional knowledge of crafts or provide
skills, a safe place of work and income to marginalised or minority
groups. This is what we have always been passionate about at The Silk Road and
this year we intend to make a strong shift in this direction.
10) You opened The Silk Road nearly
two years ago, how did that project come about?
The Silk Road was born out of a love of
wrapping our global wanderings around us. Lou and I wanted to have small
collections, sourced fairly and respectfully by us on our travels. We have been
committed to sourcing from artisans and we have grown steadily in the past two
years. This is in large part thanks to Instagram and the incredible people who
have supported our journey. We feel that many of our followers ‘know' us, they
have watched us travel around the world with our husbands and daughters and we
think (we hope!) they trust that we always source with integrity. We intend to
now use our small platform to bring awareness to issues that we feel passionate
about and share these stories with those who wish to give back alongside us. We
will still be artisan based, but with an emphasis on supporting individuals and
communities who are at risk or marginalised.
11) Whats next for you in 2016?
Fortunately The Silk Road has always
tied in perfectly with our personal plans, the two are very interwoven and
symbiotic. As a family we will be travelling to Cambodia early in the year
and then back to India in the second half of the year. We love our home, but we
are happiest when learning and living out in the world.
Thank You so Much to Rachel for taking the time to share her Nest.
