Our Christmas store is now open

We’ve teamed up with some of our favourite brands to bring you six limited edition gift bundles – for explorers, botanists, campfire gatherers and all those in search of a bit of mystery 

The apothecary bundle

We’re delighted to team up with Kindred + Wild to offer a rejuvenating selection of balms and oils to keep the winter chills at bay. This bundle includes two copies of Ernest, a healing lemon + lavender balm, lavender + chamomile oil and one piece of ‘Holy Wood’, an incense stick derived from the Frankincense tree. £30

The lost explorer's bundle

For the intrepid at heart. We’ve teamed up withYorkshire leather crafters HÔRD to bring you a gift bundle inspired by the rugged topography of the Three Peaks. The bundle includes two copies of Ernest and a leather key fob with an etching of the contours of Ben Nevis, Snowdon or Scafell Pike. £35

The botanist's bundle

The perfect gift for an aspiring botanist, this gift set includes a copy of Ernest, an Art of Instruction paperback notebook (based on ‘Jung-Koch-Quentell’ charts, originally illustrated in the late 1800s) and Green Tea soap courtesy of our friends at Eastern Biological. £17.50

The Firepot bundle

Ernest is proud to present a gift bundle for those who love to peer down a misty mountain summit, raft through icy cold rapids or spend starry nights by a crackling fire. This bundle comprises two copies of Ernest and two pouches of slow-cooked grub courtesy of FIREPOT by Outdoorfood. (Meat, veggie or vegan options available). £25

The Mysterium bundle

Add a touch of the unknown to your Christmas stocking with a copy of Ernest and our brand new book The Mysterium: Unexplained and extraordinary stories for a post-Nessie generation. £20

 

 

The completish bundle

The perfect way to introduce your friends to Ernest this Christmas, this gift set contains issues 2, 3, 4, 5 and 6, plus our first book The Odditorium and our latest book The Mysterium plus an Ernest gift card. £75 

 

The slow adventure calendar 2018

Plan a whole year of adventure with this A5 clipboard calendar, featuring 12 remarkable images taken for Ernest over the past year. The calendar comprises of a clipboard and hook for hanging on the wall, plus 12 sheets of recycled, uncoated paper. At the end of each month, you can cut out the  picture postcard and write home to share your adventures. £10

The slow adventure calendar bundle

A 2018 slow adventure calendar plus an Ernest Journal issue of your choice. £20

Gift guide: gently rugged carry goods

We are proud to introduce one of our sponsors Rural Kind: makers of simple, functional and gently rugged waxed canvas and leather carry goods for everyday adventuring, handcrafted in the hills of Wales

Key Carry
A sturdy and dependable strap for carrying your keys, with a brass stud fastening for attaching to a belt or bag. Handmade with oak bark tanned leather and solid brass hardware. £28

Roll-top Rucksack
Rugged enough for the hills, handsome enough for the city. This refined roll-top design is made with heavyweight waxed canvas and Devon leather. £250

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Glasses Case
Be kind to your eyewear with this strong, refined and protective glasses case. Made by hand in our rural workshop from rich and characterful oak bark tanned leather. £89

Utility Bag
For everyday adventures, carrying tools, loading with books or filling with fresh groceries. Strong, durable and handcrafted from waxed canvas and oak bark tanned leather. £190

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Card Wallet
A simple and functional two pocket wallet for carrying a few cards and some notes. Crafted from oak bark tanned leather and hand-stitched with a waxed linen thread. £36

Musette
For city strolls, gentle rides and everyday rambles. This waxed canvas and leather cross-body bag is our gently rugged take on the classic cyclist’s musette. £129

To find out more about Rural Kind, visit our Directory. 

Uneek perspectives

Meticulously crafted to compliment the shape of your feet – while providing balance and flexible movement – UNEEK has been a firm favourite with Ernest since its launch in 2016, accompanying the team on many an adventure. We check in with KEEN to find out how their one-of-a-kind hybrid shoe has evolved.

Editor Jo explores the Galapagos Islands with her trusty UNEEK originals. Photo: Graeme Owsianski

UNEEK is the ultimate hybrid shoe: a versatile sandal, made from interlocking cords that adjust to provide custom fit for your foot, which is smart enough for urban rambles yet robust and ready for wilder adventures. Over the past year, this quirky piece of footwear has protected our feet from sea urchins in the Adriatic and accompanied us on rugged volcanic paths in the Galapagos and while springing for trains in the city. While the original design has found a firm footing with the team, and with its followers, there are now new styles, new colours and new materials to consider. Before we have a look, here’s a quick introduction…

Dynamic design: an introduction

It’s easy to recognise UNEEK for its disruptive aesthetics, but the form has always followed the function. Designed to create a custom fit on any foot, UNEEK provides unparalleled comfort and versatility for outdoor adventures. The interlocking cords adjust to provide custom fit for your foot, while the bungee entry system lets you adjust the tightness. Support, motion and flexibility are key design features in the shoe, with its lightly cushioned heel, flexible mid-sole and free-moving cord system – all and which work with the natural movement of your foot. On top of that, they’re lightweight and breathable – ready to ramble whether you’re roaming through the city or setting out into wilder terrain.

Your UNEEK. Your way.

This footwear is all about self-expression and this year there are even more styles so you can find the right sandal to suit your individual lifestyle and performance needs.

UNEEK Original

Back by popular demand – the classic design returns for another season in a fantastic new range of colours and a choice of flat or round cord. Featuring a free-moving cord construction, heel strap for stability and a durable but lightweight midsole for arch support, it’s a versatile shoe, which now boasts some special editions!

UNEEK Original: Leather (special edition)

This is the original style but upgraded with soft leather cords. A cushioned strap supports the ankle, while the midsole offers the support of a sneaker. Fancy.

UNEEK Original Leather: £84.99

UNEEK Original: Urban Trail Pack (special edition)

Premiering this summer, the special edition UNEEK Originals: Urban Trails Pack offers an eye-catching aesthetic with a distinctly athletic profile. A lightweight PU midsole in a bright sporty finish contrasts with tan gum rubber pods on the outsole for versatile traction and cushioning.

UNEEK Originals: 79.99

UNEEK O2

Twenty five per cent lighter than its predecessor, this robust style – part sandal and part sneaker – has a lightly-cushioned enclosed heel as well as grippy rubber outsoles. It’s a pioneering, athletic design and the cords adapt to your foot so you’re assured a cosy and customised fit.

UNEEK O2, £69.99

UNEEK curation

It’s not just new styles either, each month KEEN curates a special collection to show off key threads and themes within the UNEEK range. This month sees a collaboration with Zebu – a dynamic illustration and artist duo from Berlin, who take inspiration from abandoned spaces in the city and produce bold, abstract artworks through screen printing, drawing and mural painting. The collection draws on bold blues and greens as well as urban shades of aluminium, slate grey and bright white. Or perhaps you prefer the Camp Life Pack? Natural tones, perfectly suited to slipping on by the campfire after a day of climbing, hiking, paddling, or just chilling. Watch this space for the latest pack.

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This is a sponsored blog post, created in collaboration with KEEN. Read more stories from the Ernest x KEEN partnership in our directory. 

Choose your style on the KEEN website.

Follow and share your UNEEK adventures on Instagram using hashtag #UNEEKPERSPECTIVES

Essence + Alchemy: the relaunch

Lesley Bramwell of Essence + Alchemy spends a lot of her time in her laboratory mixing batches of rapeseed wax candles that crackle and smell of wild gardens and the sky above the clouds. We've spoken to her about her relaunch...

Lesley, tell us about what you've been up to in your laboratory the last few months.

It’s been a busy time, working on the E+A relaunch and designing the new store and products. I’m also in the process of designing and building a new garden laboratory. 

A garden laboratory, you say? Tell us more.

I was struggling to find a place in Sheffield that ticked all the boxes – clean, light, warm, nice view etc, so I decided to look into building a lab at home. My house is built on 1/3 acre – we have the space so it made perfect sense. 

Building starts end of July. A local timber frame company will erect the frame and my husband is finishing the external and internals. Hoping completion will be end of September.

It will have a dedicated lab store room, a desk area facing double doors onto the garden and lab area with benches under the windows facing the garden. Water used will be filtered and collected for reuse in the garden. 

The dream is to eventually grow and distill my own oils, which I can use in products. I like the idea of distilling my own rose essential oil but I might need to plant a few bushes before I can do that! 

What's been the inspiration behind your redesign?

The look of the brand has always been about my scientific background and the formula behind the name E+A.  I wanted a fresh and clean look that reflected this and with the help of local Sheffield designer Sean Coleman, I think this has been achieved - a combination of scientific text and pastel colours to reflect the natural scent of the products with a clean minimalist edge.  

Tell us about some of your new products.

There is a new handy travel size gold tin candle, great for popping into your bag or giving as a gift.  There are also candle refills for tea-light holders and large beaker candles and I’m also offering a candle refill service now whereby you can return your candle beaker for refilling.  

What is the candle club?

I created candle club to encourage the reuse of the large candle beaker and offer refills at discounted rates. Customers can either sign up to a 3 month or 6 month package and choose which candle scents they’d like and they also receive little gifts each month. 

What's on your bedside table?

A hardback copy of Culpeper’s Complete Herbal and an E+A Aroma Mist.  At the moment I’m using Unwind with lavender and sweet marjoram to help create a relaxing atmosphere before bedtime.  

This is a sponsored blog post, created in collaboration with Essence + Alchemy. Find out more about them in our Directory.

Photo boards: mastering the backdrop

The art of creating a beautiful backdrop for small-scene photography has been made far simpler with Photo Boards – rigid, lightweight background boards where every splinter, grain of wood, rusty nail and thread of linen are true to size. We spoke to Lyndsey James about her designs...

'French linen' Photo Board

Lyndsey, Photo Boards® is such a clever, yet simple, idea. How did you come up with the concept?

Thanks! As a commercial photographer, I have spent a lot of time looking for backgrounds. I had the idea about three years ago, when some vinyl backdrops I purchased just weren’t of the quality I needed for close-up work, like jewellery, but I had just started teaching online and knew it would be a huge undertaking to manufacture, market and ship products to customers at a time when I was already super busy. 

I decided back then that if someone still hadn’t produced something like this in three years, then I'd go ahead and do it. It helped that I had a huge customer database of photography students to market them to, but I didn’t quite expect them to go viral in the way that they have – after just two months we were dispatching worldwide from a warehouse! 

What exactly are Photo Boards? 

They are table-top sized background boards for small scene photography with two essential features – they are true to size replicas and in a board format. As a photographer taking close up shots, you want a fake background to look like the real thing, so every splinter, rusty nail and thread of linen in the designs is actual sized. 

It being a rigid lightweight board design is also important for photographers, because it means that your set becomes mobile, allowing you to pick it up and move to a window for more light, or rotate your board to adjust your shadows without having to set up from scratch. To use a Photo Board, you simply use it like you would an actual piece of board, placing it on the table or floor or propping it up for a vertical background.

The textures of each Photo Board are strikingly crisp and as close as possible to the real surface - how do you achieve such clarity?

Yes, they look so real sometimes we do a double take! We spent a lot of time researching the base materials, inks and processes used to create the boards. They are created using the latest in high-resolution scanning and printing techniques, and laser cut to perfection to ensure each board looks smart before being wrapped in a clear sealed wrapper. 

People often think they're just prints of stock images but you just couldn’t get the true replica quality without having full control of the resolution at every stage. Each board starts out as an actual board from my collection of backdrops or we paint new designs when we fancy introducing a new colour or texture to the collection.

Which Photo Boards are the most popular? 

The most popular designs are neutral because they are the most versatile. Our customers can add a splash of colour to a neutral background with their subjects or props, layering their scenes on top of the neutral Photo Board base. We have seen the same wooden design used as an effective wooden floor, cabin wall, kitchen table, rustic desk – our customers always delight us with their creativity!

Why is it important for makers and bloggers to carefully consider backdrops for shooting their products?

A good background can really make or break an image, which of course is important for makers and bloggers who want their shots to be shared on social platforms to pull traffic and interest to their blogs and stores.

Readers and buyers love to aspire to a lifestyle, and for effective lifestyle shots you should always ask yourself does this photo look like real life? One example is that solid surfaces, such as wood and marble, don’t usually bend and curve, so if you use a wood or marble effect paper that curves behind your subject, it won’t look like a real lifestyle setting. Using a flat wood or marble effect base for the table and plain wall behind would look more effective in that scenario.

What's your personal favourite go-to Photo Board?

We particularly love the marble designs and bloggers and food photographers love them too – marble is very on trend at the moment because it adds a touch of style and glamour to scenes. If I had to choose a personal favourite, it would be our French linen design because it looks so wonderfully real, yet, like all our boards, it's wipe clean!

You also run Photocraft, an online photography school that teaches makers how to tell the story of their products - when's your next course?

There are exciting changes going on at Photocraft – we're about to embark on the summer season of live workshops here in Rutland, which are fun, relaxed days of styling with lots of pretty props.

Online we're moving towards mini workshops and free webinars. Photo Boards has taken over big time so after three years of hosting tutor guided courses, Photocraft will now become the place to go for free webinars and mini courses about specific photography topics, such as how to create dark and moody lighting. Watch this space!

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Discover more about Photo Boards at photoboards.org and follow @photoboardshq on Instagram. Find out more about Photocraft in our Directory.

This is a sponsored blog post, created in collaboration with Photocraft.