12 minute read
Family
London’s first blended co-working and childcare space celebrates its first birthday ―
By Laura Burgoine
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West Dulwich’s Peace and Riot is the first of its kind: a workspace with childcare, kitchen and bar - all in one place. The shared work and play space works on an ad-hoc credits system where 1 credit gives you 30 minutes of childcare; children play at play stations spaced throughout the rooms, while adults work at generous handmade desks enjoying – finally - a hot cup of coffee. Designed in Scandiindustrial style, Peace and Riot is packed with modern, educational, and sensory toys, sitting beside an outside garden and onsite kitchen serving healthy meals. Founder Caroline Newte Hardie, 41, who has a background in education, created the business after having two children of her own and experiencing first-hand the difficulties working parents face with childcare costs. “Of the percentage of men and women who reduce their work hours when they become parents, only 21 percent are able to keep their reduced hours salaried, resulting in a death spiral of parental income,” Caroline, who has a 6-year-old and a 4-year-old child, says. “After my first child, I went part-time and I felt guilty when I was working and not with my child but equally when I was with my child I felt like I should be working. Then just before I had my second, I was made redundant. I just felt that there had to be another way.”
Peace + Riot became that brand new way of doing things.
The UK has the third highest rates for childcare in Europe. On average, sending a child to nursery 5 days a week costs parents around £1200-£1600 a month. Caroline designed Peace and Riot to be affordable. A monthly membership on the highest usage tier for two children provides families with 50 hours of childcare a month for just £199.95 a month (for up to 3.5 hours per day) and works out at just £1 per child, per 30 minutes. A monthly membership, which allows 8 hours a month, charges credits at just £2.50 and it’s still only £3.95 for 30 minutes for non-members.
“It’s never going to replace a nanny or nursery fulltime but you can reduce your dependency on full time traditional childcare and hugely reduce your costs and get to see your children a bit more too,” Caroline says.
For Freelancers, Part Time, Remote or Condensed week workers Peace and Riot offers a cost-effective alternative to traditional childcare options. On this, Caroline says “say you’re working from home, deadlines and workloads creep into your days off or you simply need a change of scenery in order to get the job at hand done; you can’t just appear at your nursery’s door and ask them to squeeze your kids in. Your only option -if you don’t have family support around the corner - is to continue to press on alone or take your child to a creche. You find yourself plonking them with someone you - and they - don’t know, go off feeling guilty, then use up valuable time (it’s £30 for 2 hours at a creche!) trying to find a café to work in only to find you spend the entire time feeling terribly guilty and distracted whilst you nurse a cup of coffee, only to head off after an hour to pick up your child.
“I don’t necessarily want to be separated from my child when I’m working either – I wanted to find a way for the two aspects of my life to co-exist instead of to constantly compete. Our Peace Keepers are the answer to that. The ratio is 1 Peacekeeper to 3 children which follows the NSPCC guidelines. Children are happily immersed playing with carefully selected toys to suit most children between newborn and 10-yearsold. On top of that we have the front of house staff who love kids and can’t wait to help. They’re all led by Ellen who’s a force of nature and as a mother herself is great at pre-empting parents’ needs. It just really has a village feel. We’re on your side.”
The space itself is calm and quiet, you only need to check out the reels on their Instagram for confirmation. “People are often amazed at how tranquil it feels. We always think it’s the kids that make the racket but grown-ups are the loud ones. A room full of engaged and cared for children are calm because their needs are being met!”
The design is Scandinavian “so it looks grown up,” Caroline says. “The coffee’s great, the food’s healthy and plant focused as much as possible; we’ve got a vegetarian and vegan menu and it’s all very eco focused. Peace + Riot members even get money off with eco toy library Whirli.”
The format seems to work with the most regular members averaging a visit every day to carry out 2-3 hours of work, having lunch with their child and taking the chance to chat and decompress. From there members will take their child home for a nap and get on with more work. Caroline adds “they’ve absolutely maximised how much work they can get done in the day but in a much healthier way for their mental health.” Parents enjoy the communal nature of the integrated childcare and co-working space and the change of scenery from working from home. After opening in June last year, it’s quickly become a destination venue with members coming from all over London: Camden, Kentish Town, Deptford, Lewisham, Balham, Crystal Palace, Croydon, Peckham, and Norwood. Currently Peace and Riot is pitching for funding to open more sites.
Visit Peace and Riot at 12 Croxted Road, SE21 8SP. Phone: 020 8670 5013. www.peaceandriot.co
Use the code: Firstbirthday to receive 20% of your monthly membership for 1 year.
For the first time ever, you can climb greenwich’s cutty sark ―
By Michael Holland
Inever thought I would ever find myself climbing up the side of the Cutty Sark - or up the side of anything to be honest at this point of my life - but now that the famous clipper has opened its rigging for potential sailors to ascend, I was up there like Jack Sparrow being chased by Captain Barbossa and his crew of skeletons.
This is the first time that this experience has been offered at the Cutty Sark (named after a witch who was very fast at catching her prey) and it was an offer I couldn’t refuse. My first job was to prepare for the climb. I knew I wasn’t scared of heights, which is a necessary fear factor to overcome before attempting this task. I did, though, need to ensure that I didn’t get halfway up and realise that I lacked the stamina to continue so early morning gym sessions on the stair machine gave me the last bit of confidence needed before I slipped into the gilet, helmet and harness.
On arrival at the ship, I was taken below deck to discuss all the security issues before being kitted up. My nerves were steady and my excitement was rising. Once I had the full gear on, I was led up to the deck while getting a history of the Cutty Sark on the way. This was the coldest day of spring and it had actually snowed on my way there so the wind chill hit me as soon as I stepped outside.
I was shown where I would be climbing from and where to - a platform way, way up - and then had to actually step out onto the outside of the vessel. Now it had got real.
There were certain ropes you could not step on and certain things you could not hold on to. I didn’t ask why, I just made sure I didn’t break those rules. I now discovered that ropes are not steady and were swaying in the wind. Only slightly, and not a fraction as much as they would have been on the high seas when 14-year-old boys with no shoes scurried up and down this rigging but its movement was a reality check for me. I counted my blessings and moved on.
All the recent training paid off as I made steady progress up. There was a continuous stream of advice and motivational support from both above and below: “Move your leg to the left… Hold the ratline on the right… You’re doing well, keep going.” I wasn’t afraid of looking up or down to see where these voices were coming from but I chose to remain focussed on where my hands and feet were going. I knew I was nearing my destination when the voices got closer. “Just a couple more steps” I heard, and very soon I was standing on a small platform with two of the climbing crew.
They took some photos and I took some photos and then I was asked if I wanted to walk out to the end of the yardarm. It was bitterly cold and the wind was blowing hard and there didn’t seem to be much to hold on to or stand on out there but how could I come this far and not have the full experience? And so I sidled along where so many less fortunate than I had once scuttled.
Yes, of course there was a safety line attached to me at all times but I never thought about it because I reckoned it would only get me thinking that it might fail so I trod carefully all the time, making that climb as if my life was in my hands. Descending was easy. I was lowered down to the ground in the harness where it took a little while to get my land legs back again.
The climb was exhilarating; I can’t remember the last time I had such an adrenaline rush. Would I do it again? Absolutely. I know this experience is not for everyone but for those that want to feel really alive then this is for them. The views from high up on the mizzenmast are spectacular. The Bucket Listability of doing this is fantastic.
©National Maritime Museum, London
The Cutty Sark, Greenwich, SE10. Admission: Adult from £41, child (12-15) from £26, student from £31. Up to 50% off for members. www.rmg.co.uk
celebrity alpacas retire as vauxhall city Farm welcomes spring arrivals ―
By Laura Burgoine
Spring is in full swing as Vauxhall City Farm welcomes a slew of new animals and bids farewell to beloved alpacas Ben and Jerry, who have been fixtures of the farm for 17 years, had a cameo in Star Wars and even rubbed shoulders with royalty.
When the South Londoner spoke with Rhiannon Carr, who began volunteering at the farm during lockdown and now does marketing and executive support, the farm family was eagerly awaiting the arrival of three new baby alpacas.
“Ben and Jerry are 20-years-old now and they had gotten a little bit grumpy in their old age,” Rhiannon says. “They’ve gone to a private owner in Hertfordshire, who also took two of our old goats; they were all very happy to be reunited. They’ve got acres of field and grass to graze on now so they’re having the time of their life.”
The alpacas have enjoyed an illustrious career, having hobnobbed with Princess Anne back in the noughties and getting the chance to meet the Earl and Countess of Wessex, Edward and Sophie, who visited the farm’s riding school in 2020.
The duo even landed a walk-on role in the 2015 Star Wars film the Force Awakens. “It was all kept very under wraps,” Rhiannon says. “We had to sign a Non Disclosure Agreement, there were no pictures allowed so there’s hardly any evidence of it, which is a tragedy. Our farm manager Michelle took them to a practice shoot and when the producers discovered how relaxed the alpacas were with her, they decided to use her instead of an on-set animal trainer.”
“Ben and Jerry are in the opening sequence of the Force Awakens. They’re meant to be aliens and they’re walking across the desert. They got really funny haircuts for it; they kept their bodies fluffy and then clipped them around the face and feet like poodles.”
The alpacas have also been featured in several television commercials and photoshoots.
“There’s very few alpacas in London and they’re very robust and unbothered by weather and people so I guess they’re pretty easy to work with,” Rhiannon says. “They’re also just very strange animals and I think that’s the attraction. They make this weird humming noise and they look so unusual. With all our animals here, they get a lot of exposure to people, as we’re an educational charity, so generally all our animals are very docile and sweet.”
After a tough couple of years during the pandemic, Vauxhall City Farm’s riding school is now back open. Several of the sheep and goats gave birth to lambs and kids in April, and three new alpacas have joined the family of barnyard animals (with big shoes to fill).
“Throughout Covid, we were lucky to stay open for most of it since we’re an outdoor attraction but we suffered from not being able to hire out rooms for children’s birthday parties and having to close our onsite café,” Rhiannon says. “It’s still really rough for the farm; animals are very expensive to keep. We’re free to enter, which is so important for us, to be accessible. That’s why we’re an educational charity.”
The farm has just started redeveloping the garden where they’ll grow vegetables and have educational spaces for visiting schools and groups. The spinners who have been spinning wool at the farm since the ‘80s will also be able to grow dye plants.
Vauxhall City Farm runs with a team of ten permanent staff and a couple of hundred volunteers. “The farm team are all so wonderful,” Rhiannon says. “This is reflected in the nature of the animals.”
