A wise old Scottish man of the
woods once told us that “if the foonds are nay richt” then you are doomed to
failure. He was referring to foundations and making sure you get these right before you do anything else.
It’s been a phrase that’s been
ringing around our heads a lot these past few weeks as we really start to ramp
up the next phase of our project. That and “shit just got real”. There’s
nothing like some rather large numbers and frightening financial forecasts to
focus the mind (and freak out the soul!).
But no better time of year for it
than a new term. As our eldest daughter skipped off happily to start the
foundation phase at the local school, so too we (quite literally) bought a new pencil case, sharpened our
colouring pencils and opened our new books before staring vacantly
at the blank pages, looking for inspiration for our new name and logo.
Fortunately, we’ve enlisted some professional help, working alongside some
creative hipsters whose definition of ‘foonds’ involves terms like ‘mood boards’
and ‘basecamp concepts’. It basically involves them sending us loads of stuff to look at and us saying “don’t
like it” and “want that one" A LOT. As long as they don't mind us being high maintenance clients I'm hopeful that we're laying the building
blocks for something awesome. Watch this space…
But there’s no point in having
some state-of-the-art branding if there’s nothing to actually brand. So it’s
been full steam ahead with the platforms for the bell tents and the composting
toilets. Much sawing of wood and hammering of nails as we design these things for
the first time, using as our guide the oracles that are Pinterest and YouTube. First
rookie mistake was constructing something so large inside the barn that we
couldn’t actually get it out again. Even more tricky was transporting the thing
to the top of the field (now affectionately known as ‘Bell End’, the end of our
land where you will find all the bell tents – thank you to our inspired
Facebook friends for the name). Yet slowly but surely things are starting
to take shape and it is actually starting to feel very real.
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| And we're off |
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| Taking shape... |
Especially now we are in discussions
with a company to build a road, yes an ACTUAL FREAKING ROAD, across our land to
get the punters from the gate to aforementioned Bell End (don’t worry, I’m sure
our design agency will advise us against this as our working title…., or
perhaps not. It might increase the number of Google hits exponentially…?). You
wouldn’t believe how much shale and stone you need to build a road. Somewhere
in the region of 600 tonnes. WTF?! I can’t even fathom what that looks like.
But apparently you can just scoop it off your own hillside et voila! Job done.
It will make such a difference – rather than re-enacting the Bear Hunt, every
time we welcome guests (swishy swashy, splishy sploshy, squelch squerch, etc.
etc.) and playing a game of ‘will they, won’t they’ every time someone attempts
to get their flashy, low-slung urban motors up the hill, it will be like the M6 only
probably faster (given our recent experience of motorway queues and closures). And
with a car park. An actual CAR PARK. And not just one but TWO. We've even been wandering about, arms outstretched, working out whether we have enough room to turn a bloody bus around! Yowsers. Nothing has ever sounded more
grown up or scary.
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| Squelch, squerch |
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| Room for a bus? |
So fair to say the new term has
kicked off with a vengeance. Whether or not all of these foundational plans are
‘richt’ or not, time will tell. But one thing is for sure, I'll bet if our dear
old Scottish friend was still with us today, he would be telling us to go for
it – better to have a given it a shot than never to have tried at all.
