Australian Country Issue #23.6 November/December 2020

As this issue goes to press, I’m looking back on what has been an extraordinarily challenging year for everyone. There is, however, much to be grateful for when we reach post-pandemic Australia. Not the least of which is how well, relative to the rest of the world, we have managed the spread of the virus and how responsibly most Australians have dealt with the restrictions. My heart goes out to everyone who has suffered loss or contracted COVID. Commiserations also to the many people who have had to cancel plans, postpone celebrations and not see family members or suffered financial stress because of the pandemic. I truly hope that 2021 is a better year for us all. Among the positive outcomes of the past year for me have been seeing people…

BRONTE CAMILLERI, STYLIST & LOCATION SCOUT Bronte’s career began in visual merchandising for major Australian retailers, including R. M. Williams, Myer and Cue. She has been a lecturer on the subject for the tertiary education system and has worked as overall coordinator on a range of projects, from small studio propping to major photo shoots for international corporations such as Nikon, Japan, and ING. ROSS WILLIAMS, PHOTOGRAPHER Ross has been a photographer for more than 30 years, shooting food, wine and commercial and residential architecture, as well as travelling overseas to photograph everything from mining projects to aircraft. He relishes the challenge of arriving at a previously unseen location and working on the best way to showcase it. australiancountry.com.au facebook.com/AustralianCountry @australiancountrymag zinio.com pinterest.com/auscountrymag…

It may sound an unlikely reason for relocating, but Naomi Hughes says it was education opportunities that inspired her move to Aldinga, on the Fleurieu Peninsula, south of Adelaide. She’d been living and working in Adelaide and felt herself becoming increasingly disenchanted with city life, traffi c and pressures. “I was a single mum, raising my son, Ryder, who was about six at the time,” Naomi explains. “I wanted space for him to ride a bike safely in the street but, more importantly, I wanted him to have an education that valued the individual and allowed him to be seen for who he is.” She was completing counselling studies, from which she is now graduated, and her research led her to the Steiner education model. Established by Austrian scientist, philosopher and artist…

By her own admission, Kate Owen has lost count of how many different careers she’s had. However, their common denominator has always been creative. The artist lives with her husband, Michael, and their teenaged sons, Ben and Sam, on Minnamurra, the HQ of their mixed-cropping and beef cattle farming operation near the tiny town of North Star, close to the NSW/Queensland border. Although she grew up near Moree on the farm her parents, Robert and Jennie Reardon, made the epicentre of their extensive Reardon Farms operation — which includes farms in the Goondiwindi, Mungindi and Moree districts — becoming a farmer never entered Kate’s mind. “I told Mick as much on one of our first dates,” Kate recalls. “I’m very happy to live in the bush and the amazing landscape in…

Hairdressing is practically a performance art as it requires constant social interaction, attention to detail, creativity and good listening and communication skills. No client wants a stylist to have an “off day”, therefore it’s also a pretty unforgiving profession. So it was hardly surprising back in the early 2000s when Newstead stylists Graham Young and Glenn Rogerson decided they needed an escape from their workaday world. Glenn is a keen gardener, so their search for a bolthole from the busyness of Brisbane led pretty promptly to the rich volcanic slopes of the Blackall Range in the Sunshine Coast hinterland. “One weekend, we went for a drive to Montville and saw a property,” Graham recalls. “By the next weekend, we’d bought it.” While they were very happy with their weekender in the historic…