Podcast Transcript - Episode Ten, Sean Anthony Pritchard

Patrick: [00:00:01] Here we are in the Mendip Hills, which is in Somerset, in south west England, and today I've come to meet the garden designer and author Sean Anthony Pritchard. So I'm just going to push through the gate and, um, knock on the door. Hello, I'm Paddy O'Donnell and this is the Chromologist from Farrow & Ball, the podcast where paint and colour meet life.

Speaker2: [00:00:27] I think we underestimate how much colour does influence us and how it makes us feel. And it's so easy to say, oh, I just love yellow. Why?

Patrick: [00:00:35] My life as a colour expert means I'm immersed daily in other people's ideas, fantasies and memories of colour.

Speaker3: [00:00:42] As a colour, it's this shocking, wild, really vivacious, in-your-face pink. And that's exactly what the club night was about.

Patrick: [00:00:52] And it's this inner landscape, how colour defines our lives, which fascinates me the most.

Speaker4: [00:00:57] I've always had a very strong connection with color. It's always just been a way of life for me.

Speaker5: [00:01:04] I love it. It's very peaceful.

Patrick: [00:01:06] It's that really lovely, lovely blue that you get through the backbone of the mackerel.

Speaker5: [00:01:10] It's quite like the color of your eyes, actually.

Patrick: [00:01:12] Is it? Yeah. Flirting with me?

Patrick: [00:01:21] For this episode of The Chromologist I've come to deepest, greenest Somerset to be with the gardener and landscape designer Sean Anthony Pritchard, who has just published his first book, outside, in which we'll talk about later on. And we're at his and his partner's beautiful cottage in the Mendip Hills. Sean has transformed and designed gardens across the UK, including an award winning show garden for the Royal Horticultural Society in 2022. He says what drives me is telling stories with plants, creating moments of tension that elevate outdoor spaces into dramatic performances, almost like a set designer might. Sean, it's so lovely to be here with you. Thank you very much for having me. It's lovely to see you. Lovely home. And here we are in your glorious sitting room, painted in a lovely buttery yellow. And your collection of Delft plates. And I can see your books about Bloomsbury. Vanessa Bell and everything. So all your influences kind of sitting around us on your Ottoman, isn't it?

Sean: [00:02:20] Absolutely. I mean, it's quite important to me that I have everything that inspires me close at hand all the time. So, you know, books, especially of my favorite artists and designers and, and places in the world, you know, they're always close at hand on tables and chairs everywhere in the, in the as it should be.

Patrick: [00:02:41] They just give a room spirit, don't they? As much as pictures and furniture and fabrics and everything. Books are an integral part of a feel of a room.

Sean: [00:02:50] I really believe so, yeah. And sort of. Yeah. But your own personality onto a space, you know. Although, to be fair, Dan, my partner, studied French at university, so a lot of his old French novels and things are all set around. And, and I can't claim to sort of have read those or even understand them.

Patrick: [00:03:09] So for our listeners, you recently published your first book. It is your first, isn't it?

Sean: [00:03:14] It is my first.

Patrick: [00:03:15] Can you give us a little precis? Because it's much more of a personal journey through plants for you, isn't it? Yeah.

Sean: [00:03:20] So it's actually nothing to do with with sort of my professional work. It is all about me and this cottage and sort of this whole idea of bringing the outside in. So for me, I'm a great believer in that the garden can work both outside and look fantastic and decorative as a garden. But also there are so many opportunities to bring what looks lovely outside, inside and create drama and spectacle and magic inside with with the plants that come from the garden. So it's really all about that. And it's about, I suppose, a journey through, through the year of sort of how I approach that, the things that I grow and cut and the way they're displayed in the cottage, I mean, it turned the writing almost turned into sort of a bit, a bit of sort of therapy for me, actually, because it was so personal, actually, the book that I sort of really discovered things about myself that I hadn't realised or thought of when I, when I was writing it.

Patrick: [00:04:32] So one of the reasons why you're here is because we're talking about significant colours at parts of your life. So without further ado, we're going to move on to the colour of your childhood. And what colour is that?

Sean: [00:04:48] So the colour that I've chosen for my childhood is rectory Red, and I suppose I arrived at that color because one of my favorite memories from being a young child was, or is, the sweet peas that my grandfather used to grow, and sadly, he passed away just last year. So I've been thinking a lot about those sweet peas recently, and actually those memories of of being a child and sort of seeing his sweet peas have become even more vivid and sort of more poignant over the past few months. You know, I think the image that sticks in my mind is of these beautiful deep maroon, red, crimson sweet peas that as a child would just fascinate me. And then the smell, of course, as a memory in my mind, just sort of completely filled the air, filled the sort of summer garden at my grandparents house and sort of my, my, my, my grandfather would always have a sort of bowl of cut sweet peas in the kitchen. And I just remember as a child sort of being in that house and it sort of, you know, just being completely intoxicated by the by the smell of them. Um, so when I was thinking about my, my childhood, actually, that was the first thing, that was the first memory that came to mind. And then relating that to colours, rectory Red felt sort of the most.

Patrick: [00:06:12] Which is a lovely sort of clean, sort of darkish red, isn't it? Yeah. No earthy quality, but you know. Yes, it's really beautiful. Sort of namesake, taken from a common colour used on rectory doorways and everything. So. But it's quite interesting your grandfather relationship with the sweet peas because my grandfather again. You know, I always remember him with his sweet peas. It was kind of like the most exciting thing happening every summer. But, you know, the one thing I always get, which I've never managed to achieve since, is he always used to get the most enormous stems. Yeah, I think he was very rigid and grew up sort of strict jute string. Yeah, yeah. And it was pinching out all the time where I tend to let mine just run amok. And so I end up with ten centimeters sweet peas.

Sean: [00:06:54] Yeah, I think they maybe that generation were sort of really into that sort of cable growing sweet peas and things. But yeah, they did produce the most magnificent long stems. Yeah.

Patrick: [00:07:04] The ones you took to the village show. Yeah. Exactly.

Sean: [00:07:06] Yeah. Top, top, top ward. Yeah.

Patrick: [00:07:08] I haven't noticed that in your garden. Are they hiding? Have you got some coming up? They're they're they're coming. Oh.

Sean: [00:07:13] Are they. They're very slow this year, actually.

Patrick: [00:07:15] So your grandfather and his marvellous sweet peas. Is that where it all started for you? That kind of love of plants? Yeah.

Sean: [00:07:22] What was so surprising about his love of sweet peas is he wasn't sort of a lover of flowers. Their garden was beautiful and really well tended to and kept. But, you know, it was lots of shrubs and greenery and, you know, flowers actually in their garden were few and far between. And so sweet peas stood out. But looking back, actually, you know, those days when you'd be there in the summer, when when he'd be growing them, or he'd be out sort of in the garden doing whatever he was doing. Actually, I can sort of look back and think, yeah, that's sort of where I remember sort of feeling excited about the outside, the outside world.

Patrick: [00:08:03] Are you allowed to muck in in your grandfather's garden at all? Because I remember I was given a patch at my grandfather's, and it's literally a square meter where I could grow or do whatever I wanted, and I loved it. Yeah. And and even to this day, because he never gardened with gloves. And you can see the state of my hands because I spent all weekend. Um, and I cannot be in the soil wearing anything protective. I need to have the earth in my fingers and kind of filth.

Sean: [00:08:30] I'm completely the same. I. I physically can't physically can't garden with gloves on, I find. I mean.

Patrick: [00:08:36] It's a real disconnect.

Sean: [00:08:37] Isn't it? I just can't do it. Yeah. But then there are some people that, you know, swear by only. I mean, my my partner Dan. When when he. When he decides he wants to do some gardening, he.

Patrick: [00:08:47] Will be massive.

Sean: [00:08:47] To the elbow.

Patrick: [00:08:49] With marabou feathers around the top.

Sean: [00:08:51] Yeah. And he won't do it any other way. So it's funny, isn't it? Yeah.

Patrick: [00:08:55] I suppose the one the the rule is brambles putting up brambles. Yeah. You have to have them.

Sean: [00:09:00] And when I'm cutting euphorbia as well I'll put some gloves on. Yes.

Patrick: [00:09:03] Because the sap is really hideous, isn't it?

Sean: [00:09:07] Just double check.

Patrick: [00:09:09] If I put you on the spot. Do you know the names of the roses?

Speaker5: [00:09:11] That is.

Sean: [00:09:13] Roald Dahl.

Patrick: [00:09:14] It's a lovely, lovely blush. Apricot. Oh, gosh. Smell that scent. That's heaven, isn't it?

Sean: [00:09:20] It is lovely.

Patrick: [00:09:21] That's just what you want from a rose, isn't it? I tell you.

Sean: [00:09:24] What I have started doing, though, is trying to collect when I've cut the rose flowers. Collecting or keeping hold of the petals.

Patrick: [00:09:32] For your wedding day.

Sean: [00:09:33] Well, that and drying them and using them as a potpourri.

Speaker5: [00:09:38] Okay.

Patrick: [00:09:43] So we're going to be moving on to your second color. And this is the color of your youth. And I kind of think that seems funny really, because you're a wee whip of a boy. Um, so.

Sean: [00:09:54] Sticking with a red theme, the color that I've chosen for my youth is red earth.

Patrick: [00:09:59] Which is a much softer sort of almost like a baked terracotta, isn't it? With a bit of pink running through it. It's really. It's really beautiful. Yeah, it's a lovely. It's a classic Farrow ball.

Sean: [00:10:09] Yes.

Patrick: [00:10:10] Red.

Sean: [00:10:10] Soft red. It is. And, um, so the reason I arrived at that was, I suppose when I think about my youth, the sort of the moment for me that really sticks in my mind was, was sort of going to university and being away from home. And although I, I went to university in Manchester, so, you know, not a million miles from where, from where I grew up. But, you know, I did move out and moved into halls and.

Patrick: [00:10:35] That so your mum could still cook for.

Sean: [00:10:36] You. It's still a big element of that. Yeah. I mean, to be honest, I mean, you know, it's a digress slightly. I didn't feel ready. I don't think at that age to to move, to move too far away. And I admire people at that age, at 18 who do go away and travel to different parts of the country or different areas of the world, because I don't think at that age I was sort of ready to to do that. So I started doing a business degree, international business, finance and economics.

Patrick: [00:11:05] Were you going to be a politician? Which was good?

Sean: [00:11:07] Yeah. I mean, I was really conflicted. So when when it came to choosing a degree, it was sort of like because I loved art, you know, I sort of that was my passion. That was what I really wanted to do. But again, at that age I didn't have at that time yet, you know, the confidence, the self-confidence to say, actually art and something in the art space, design, whatever is what I want to go and do or explore. Instead, I obviously had teachers Cheers and everyone you know in my ear. And sort of, you'll never get a job if you go and do art, you know, go. And do you know, you've you've done well in economics or whatever. Go and do this business. And, and and I did and I didn't last, you know, I didn't I didn't like it. So I changed and did something completely different and did art. And I'm so glad that I sort of found that within me at that time to do that, because, you know, I remember being so scared at sort of the thought of dropping out of my university degree at the end of the first year. I was sort of terrified about doing it, but it's really.

Patrick: [00:12:14] Difficult if you've got loads of voices around you going, you need to do something vocational. Doing art or anything creative is self-indulgent and you won't get a job. You live in a garret, you'll be eating gruel. It's all these external forces. It is, unless you have the strength, of course, to find the strength to kind of go, no, I'm doing it.

Sean: [00:12:31] Definitely. And I really want to encourage anyone who is, you know, that age now and has an interest in something creative. Or art? Art or design or whatever. Gardens to go and explore it. Give it a go. Because it is. There's so many, you know, society sort of, you know, without getting to, you know, whatever about it. You know, there's sort of there are norms to things and perceived ways of achieving success and being successful in life and things. And, you know, we sort of put these on ourselves, but actually they don't mean anything. So, yeah, I'd encourage any, any young person at the moment who was in the same situation to, to follow their heart.

Patrick: [00:13:12] Hear, hear to that. Yeah. Just going back digging back to your colour, the red earth. So what's the significance of that at this particular juncture in your life?

Sean: [00:13:21] So the significance is that it reminds me of the colour that was on the door of my student house. And so we lived.

Patrick: [00:13:29] How sophisticated.

Sean: [00:13:30] Yeah. Well, so I lived in second year in an area called Fallowfield in Manchester, which is sort of notorious actually, as sort of, you know, it's a huge student area. Everyone there is a student and we lived on this big road, this long, long road. Typical Manchester terraced housing. And in every house there was about seven students, you know, every single house. And it was just chaos, you know, it was mayhem. It was, you know, every night there was something going on around you, some drama or some party or some, you know, it was crazy. And, you know, I lived with my friends who are still my friends now, and we sort of often talk about, you know, what a crazy time in our lives it was to sort of be away from home and all this craziness going on around us. And it's funny because, you know, when I think about who I am now, I sort of I sort of shudder when I think about, you know, I could never live like that again. You know, I could never live somewhere so chaotic and, you know, somewhere.

Patrick: [00:14:31] So it's a rite of passage? Yeah, we've all done it. Yeah, exactly. I remember my house in Southampton. It was shared with five other people. I remember we had slug trails on the wall. I mean, it was hideous, but party all the time and various flooding going on and kind of kitchen fires. It was it was a disaster. But it was huge, huge fun.

Sean: [00:14:53] Definitely. Completely. And I look back on it now and I think, you know what a time. You know, it's a time of your life. And even though even though now, you know, I'm quite glad to sort of not live there. It's such a nice memory to sort of think think back to. But yeah, that's what it reminded the door.

Patrick: [00:15:09] Your front door, the door of your crazy years as a student in Manchester. Yeah. So if you see that color now, red earth, you know, this lovely sort of soft terracotta. Does it make you shudder when you see it? Or does it fill you with kind of a fond nostalgia of the fun times?

Sean: [00:15:24] No, it's a really nice memory. It's a sort of good. It's a good memory of sort of been young and carefree and sort of having the whole world, you know, in front of, you know, it's a nice, comforting feeling. I think.

Patrick: [00:15:40] I'm feeling. Yeah. No. That's good. Your red themes going on everywhere, isn't it? We've got ticking stripe going on. We've got lovely red frames.

Sean: [00:15:49] I just love red. Yeah I mean it's a Welsh.

Patrick: [00:15:52] Kind of blanket motif rug in red and white too.

Sean: [00:15:55] There's a real red to me. Sort of. There's a real celebration with with red. It reminds me again as a kid of going to like the circus or the funfair or whatever.

Patrick: [00:16:05] Yeah, because there's that whole thing, isn't it? At the moment, that kind of belief that red brings something to a space, this kind of red theory. Yeah, but I kind of think if you put a strong contrast colour in any space, whether red, yellow, whatever turquoise, you know, it will always be an accent pop, won't it? Yeah.

Sean: [00:16:21] Yeah, absolutely.

Patrick: [00:16:23] So we are now moving on to a colour of your defining Finding decade. I don't even know how old you are, but you look sort of about 60 years younger than me. Um, but if you can tell us what that color is and what it means for you, that would be lovely.

Sean: [00:16:39] The color that I chose for defining decade was Beverly in my 20s, my early 20s. So after university, I moved straight away to London and I moved to bow in East London. And so the reason I chose Beverly was because it reminds me of the district line. The color of the district line. Oh, yeah.

Patrick: [00:17:02] District and circle. The ones yellow and green. Yeah.

Sean: [00:17:05] So when I when I think about that whole time moving to London was what really shaped or has really shaped who I am now. I think it was a time that it's kind of hard for me, for me to describe because like thousands of people do, you know, after university, you sort of move to London and, and everything seems really exciting and you've got a goal and you know the streets are going to be paved with gold and all the rest of it. But I actually found it quite difficult when I when I first moved there, I was completely terrified. And, you know, I was skint. I didn't know anyone, I didn't have any friends. All my friends were still back up in Manchester and I, I found it really difficult and, and sort of quite trying testing time. You know, there were many times when I thought, you know, should I go home where things are familiar, where my friends are and whatnot? But the whole time there was, there was something inside me that sort of it sounds cheesy, but sort of knew I had to be there. And I knew that sort of where my future was.

Patrick: [00:18:09] What was your vocational goal at this point?

Sean: [00:18:11] I knew I wanted to do something in the design world. I didn't know what the thing that always sticks in my mind was going to Bow Road Station and getting on the district line into town.

Patrick: [00:18:23] It's really funny when you chose the green because I kind of thought, oh, well, you know, that's obviously natural. Yeah. Looking outside your living room window and there is this sea of green and obviously, you know, it's the dominant color for any planting, isn't it, because it's it's shrub foliage, it's leaf foliage, it's plant foliage and everything. Yeah. And a multitude of greens. But I quite like the fact that you pull that back to actually a tube line. Green and Beverly's obviously a color that one of our last colors we launched a couple of years ago. And it's a really beautiful, dense green, but there's some vitality to it. It's, you know, kind of leaf and shadow, I suppose, is one way of looking at it.

Sean: [00:18:58] Yes, yes. That's a great way of putting it. Yeah. No, it's a beautiful, deep, deep green. Who is Beverly? Is it Beverly?

Patrick: [00:19:06] Well, no. Beverly was this wonderful woman that worked for us in our customer services department. And she very sadly had a battle with cancer. And so it felt really appropriate for us to honor a very loved member of our team. So hence the name Beverly.

Sean: [00:19:22] Oh, wow. Absolutely. Yeah. I'd like to have met her. Yeah. Yeah, she.

Patrick: [00:19:26] Was absolutely grand. Everybody loved her. So at what point did in your defining decade did the gardening come into it?

Sean: [00:19:33] Actually, I spent a lot of time walking around London when I, you know, first, first arrived there. It sounds like a sort of tragic novel, doesn't it? But, you know, I didn't. I didn't really know anyone. I didn't have any sort of friends, really. So. So I spent I spent a lot of time on my own, walking round London, discovering areas and whatnot, and I spent a lot of time walking through the parks and the gardens and sort of looking at plants and the way plants were put together and how outdoor space was used in different ways to different effects. And really an interest started to grow from there. And from there I started discovering the great gardens of London and sort of got to know them quite well. Chelsea Physic Garden, like Chelsea Physic Garden, um, and Ham House, you know, going, going into those spaces and exploring them. And it was, it was something I did on my own and quite inwardly started to develop a real passion for planting and, and the way plants were, were being used and also sort of in the quite municipal areas of London, sort of. I always found planting and the way greenery was being used fascinating. So, you know, council planting, you know, where the council come in and sort of plant a roundabout, for example, or, you know, with often bedding or whatever.

Sean: [00:21:09] But the way that in an urban environment, how plants can sort of cut through that sea of grey concrete and provide a sort of sense of. I suppose, hope and joy was something that I really started to, to become interested in. So places also like the Barbican, I was fascinated by, which is all about that, I guess very sort of brutalist architecture with, with, you know, these, these great swathes of planting and water and things that sort of cut right through it. I suppose all of this philosophy and thinking is what I'm all about now, and what I look to achieve now in my work as a garden designer, so I can look back and see that the the seeds of things were starting to, if you forgive the pun, were starting to to sort of germinate back then. And then when I got a bit older into my late, later 20s, I then I then realised that this is what, you know, what I want to, to be doing. And I'd also got really into flowers and by that point and sort of there was a local market to me on a Saturday morning. There was a lady who lived in Dorset, and she would come up, drive up on a Saturday to Dulwich, and she'd sell her flowers, and I'd not seen anything like them because.

Patrick: [00:22:34] It'd be about seasonality, wouldn't it? And they'd be quite relaxed and the roses would be flopping and probably have two day vase.

Sean: [00:22:40] Yeah. Exactly. Yeah. So, you know, you're used to. I was used to sort of walking around London and seeing florists with their perfect displays of lilies and hydrangeas, and this was like a revelation to see sort of garden flowers being sold. And from that point on, I got really interested in in the flower side of things.

Patrick: [00:23:03] I'm looking through your willow hurdles, and I'm having teasel envy, which I again can't grow at home and have those naturally seeded here.

Sean: [00:23:13] Those have all self-seeded. Yeah. Teasels around here are everywhere. But I just love them. That to me, they're so quintessentially English. Summer. Wildflower. Yeah. I love seeing them, you know, as they are here en masse when teasels sort of mature and then start to go over. Yeah, that's when they look fantastic, when they sort of dry out and.

Patrick: [00:23:35] Yeah, I love them.

Sean: [00:23:36] No, they come into their own for me at Christmas actually. So I cut them. And then I used them in the house at Christmas for decoration and things. Lovely.

Patrick: [00:23:48] And now we move on to where you are now. Yes.

Sean: [00:23:52] So I sort with the reds for the first two, and I'm sticking with the greens for the last two, but my one for where I am now I've picked is arsenic. Okay. Which for me is, I think, just one of my favorite colors. Just ever generally I think.

Patrick: [00:24:08] Glorious isn't it?

Sean: [00:24:08] I just love it. I love.

Patrick: [00:24:09] Using it. I suppose people don't know what arsenic is as a color. I suppose the fairest way of describing it is this slightly. Sort of almost a pale, washed out verdigris. Would you say it's like, you know, it's got that kind of oxidized copper, but softer, and it's quite vibrant, isn't it? It's really it's a really smart color.

Sean: [00:24:28] It's just there's something so evocative about it. I think when you see it, this. Yeah. It's hard to, hard to describe for me, but yeah. Something really. Yeah. Just evocative about it and yeah, I had to choose that for now. I think when I think about where I am now, you know, so I think I've spoken about sort of those periods in my life where I didn't really know what I was doing, where things were difficult, where, you know, I sort of had challenges and moved away. And now I'd like to think that I've got myself to a place where I've kind of figured myself out. And this is the big.

Patrick: [00:25:01] Confidence, Sean.

Sean: [00:25:02] Talking. This is the new me. Yes. And asking it to me, just on the one hand, it's, you know, it's a green. So it sort of makes sense with sort of my work in gardens and flowers and plants and things. But for me, with that color, there's something, just something. There's an edge to it. There's there's something else about that color that.

Patrick: [00:25:19] It anywhere here.

Sean: [00:25:20] You know, I would love to. Well, yeah, we need to do our bathroom, so.

Patrick: [00:25:24] No, it's a good color for a bath.

Sean: [00:25:26] Yeah, I was just actually the cogs are turning in my head. I haven't used it in the cottage, but, yeah, I would love to. I think there's just something about that color. To me, that is just a.

Patrick: [00:25:37] Lovely energy to it, hasn't it?

Sean: [00:25:38] That's the word. An energy to it. Yeah. A sort of spirit. Yeah, yeah. So that's why I chose it. So I'm sort of wrapping myself up here with the now one. And I'm saying right now I'm, I sort of feel confident and I feel more self-assured and know what I'm doing. And to me arsenic represents that and sort of is a bold, strong color.

Patrick: [00:25:59] If we just roll back a bit to, you know, the new fabulous, confident you, which is just brilliant and everything's going really, really well. When did you start moving into plants? Because you went to restudy, didn't you? Yes.

Sean: [00:26:12] In my early 30s, I went to the garden design school in Bristol, and by this point I knew I wanted to design gardens, and I wanted to sort of work with the landscape in that way. And whilst I was still studying, I got commissioned to do a show garden for Macmillan Cancer Support, and so I was really thrown in at the deep end whilst I was still sort of studying.

Patrick: [00:26:39] So that was quite a big ask, isn't it? Yeah. Student.

Sean: [00:26:42] Yeah.

Patrick: [00:26:43] Terrifying.

Sean: [00:26:44] Yeah. It was, it was I mean a huge learning curve straight away. I mean yeah, but that's what was great. And yeah, haven't looked back because.

Patrick: [00:26:52] I know obviously we talked about Bloomsbury and so obviously you know not only the Bloomsbury Group, you know, sort of writing sort of the famous Charleston farmhouse and everything and pictures, you know, painting. Um, but obviously, you know, the great gardens at Charleston, the great or the great, especially the great garden at Sissinghurst and stuff like that. When did all that come to inform how you wanted your gardens to look, or your former style as Sean Anthony Pritchard signature?

Sean: [00:27:17] What's interesting, I think with with what interests me in gardens is I often quite like the bones of a garden to be quite structured and rigid and quite definite. So paths and planted areas and level changes and things like that. For me, where it becomes interesting is when the planting is overlaid on top of that. And that is the exact opposite. And that is very informal.

Patrick: [00:27:44] And softens that rigid nature.

Sean: [00:27:46] And there's a play there between the soft landscaping and the rigidity of the bones and the structure of the garden. So it's about sort of understanding the fundamentals of what sort of makes something aesthetically pleasing, and then your own personal exploration of, you know, which bits you can just unpick slightly without making the whole thing fall apart. Yeah. So at the bottom of the garden next year I'm going to be creating a new orchard. So I'm quite passionate, especially around here in Somerset, about the sort of loss of English orchards just in this village where we are right now. There used to be seven orchards dotted around this cottage and all scrubbed up, and there's now one one left. And that basically is just what has happened all over the West Country and the whole of England. So I'm quite sort of passionate about reintroducing orchards where I can because they are fantastic for wildlife. And so, you know, if ever I'm doing a sort of with a client doing a project in Somerset, I'll always try and persuade them to put.

Patrick: [00:28:51] And are you using heritage varieties as well? Yes.

Sean: [00:28:54] So there's some great people in this village who have these old records of the apple trees. And they used to use for, for cider in this, you know, in the neighbouring neighboring villages and things, and they've actually hunted down sort of where there are specimens of these trees and things.

Patrick: [00:29:10] Fantastic. Well, this is the moment where we give you a color and you can slap me afterwards because I've made, as is my want, a really cheesy pun. Okay. So choosing a color for you actually wasn't that difficult sometimes. I find it really challenging, but because a couple of your colors were red and I know red is quite a recurring motif for you, isn't it? You know, red stripes. You know, you're sitting in this most beautiful red ticking armchair with a lovely slip cover on. And so we have a really lovely color, which is kind of pertinent as well because it's fruit veg related, called radicchio. And that is the correct way to say it, people, not radicchio. Um, nobody looks at me when I say, you know, you got that wrong. Yeah, I don't think I have. And I'm calling it because also you do vases. Sort of fairly unconventional. Yes. So sometimes you'll have a vase of chard. Yes. So I'm renaming radicchio to Ruby Pritt in brackets. Chard. So Ruby chard. But, Pritchard. So there you go. Really cheesy. Really bad. Took me four days to come up with that.

Sean: [00:30:18] That's fantastic. No, I love it.

Patrick: [00:30:20] I'm honoured. Here is your tin of paint. Amazing. And I hope you love it, I love it. It's kind of ridiculous. It has that amazing colour. It's kind of sort of magenta y blackie sort of richness. You know, I'm obsessed with it in salads. I know some people don't like it because they find it too bitter, but I absolutely love it. It's just one of those wonderful colors. So this is for you? Yeah.

Sean: [00:30:40] And it almost looking at it, it sort of it reminds me of Autumn in a way. It gives me a feeling of those sort of late October days when. Yeah. Things like the ruby chard are the last of the borders.

Patrick: [00:30:53] Exactly.

Sean: [00:30:54] Are hotter, aren't they?

Patrick: [00:30:55] The viburnum leaf is turning to that colour as well.

Sean: [00:30:58] Yes, yes. I'm flattered.

Patrick: [00:31:01] Our little gesture to you. Thank you. We love coming here to your cottage. So thank you so much for hosting us today. Thank you for having me. It's been brilliant listening to your story.

Sean: [00:31:10] I've thoroughly enjoyed it. No. Thank you. Thank you for having me. It's a pleasure to to chat with you.

Patrick: [00:31:16] If you'd like to follow Sean, he is at Sean underscore Anthony underscore Pritchard on Instagram. You can also follow us at Farrow & Ball. And of course you can discover all the colors we've talked about today on our website. And if you've enjoyed this conversation, please, please do spread the word. My guest next time in celebration of London Design Festival is textile designer Christine Van Der Hurd. The Chromologist is a Farrow & Ball and Feast collective production. The producer is Sarah Cuddon. Until the next one. Goodbye and big hugs.