For anyone who hasn’t come across Lydia Millen, she is an influencer-turned-writer who has embraced a life of bucolic bliss. Her debut book, Evergreen: Discover the Joy in Every Season, came out last autumn and encourage readers to be inspired and soothed by connecting with the natural world. With over three million followers across her social channels, her fans have seen her evolve from student fashionista to a new life in the country. When we meet over Zoom she describes herself as follows: “I’m 36 years old, and I live in the English countryside with my husband, my cat Lumi, my two sausage dogs, five chickens and about 50,000 bees”.
Tell me, how did you come to write Evergreen.
It’s a culmination of a number of years of my life where I was trying to make sense of all the lessons I was learning. Why I was moving at the pace that I was, and then reaching the point where I felt like I had something to put together into a book. I think is different, and inspiring, and will help a lot of people in the generation that are dealing with a new age and a new world. I don’t think we're necessarily equipped with a lot of the tools in which to deal with [technology] – I know that I didn’t have those tools, setting out in a career on the internet. Even if you’re not looking for a career, you have to use the internet every day. It’s learning to exist in a world that is constantly showing us what everyone else is doing, what everyone else has.
The book is a reminder, almost a guide to existing nowadays. That’s what I like to think, anyway, and it’s a book I wish I had read when I was younger about where life is really wonderful and really beautiful. I think we've probably been sold a dream of happiness that actually we already have, existing on our doorstep. There are many books that I could have written about this industry and about my life but for me it was important that this was the book that I put out. It started off very differently, so it was even a journey in itself, but it is my proudest achievement to date, for sure.
So, what lead you to ‘escape to the country’?
About 14 years ago I moved to Thame to live with my grandma in a little village called Haddenham for about two years. I eventually ended up buying my first home with my husband (who wasn't my husband at the time) and it wasn't a conscious thing, that we were moving to the countryside. We viewed the house for the first time in the dark, so we didn’t see where it was situated – we knew it was very difficult to find, but it’s actually set in a hamlet of about nine houses. Our house is the gardener’s house of a stately home next door, but we didn’t see any of this until the next day when we came back for a second viewing. It is probably as off-grid as I think is comfortable: the water supply comes from the local farm, so every so often the farmer pops over and hand writes our water bill; we're not on mains sewage; we were on mobile internet until about last year. We weren't actually aware how rural we were going to be, but now it is the best decision we have ever made.
Looking at your social media, you seem as excited now by seeing bugs come out of the ground as you are about goodie bags at fancy events.
Arguably I’d say I’m more excited about the bugs nowadays.
I think you really do have to learn what actually is important. I take so much joy from nature, so much happiness from what is naturally occurring and the inspiration that I get from each season change. It almost gives me a renewed freshness and keeps life exciting for me – although of course I’m grateful to be in a position where I’m able to have the lovely things as well.
How did you come to enjoy gardening?
It was one of those things that was born out of lockdown. I was just sent a packet of seeds by a brand. and I’d never grown anything in my life – everything in my house was fake, the plants were fake, the flowers were fake. I thought, I’m just going to pop these seeds in these tiny little white pots. Within a few days tiny green shoots were coming up in the soil and I could not believe the joy that I experienced from something so simple. It just progressed from there, and before I knew it I was ordering myself a greenhouse. Now it’s just part of my life: I’ll never not garden because that’s where I go to escape. I’ve got my greenhouse and I’ll go in there sometimes for an afternoon of back-breaking work with my hands in the soil and other times I’ll just potter around in there cleaning, tidying…that kind of thing.
And do you reflect the changing seasons indoors as well as out?
Yes, in fact that’s one of the things that I take a lot of joy in doing as it gives me a sense of freshness in my home. It’s nice to give things a new lease of life without having to redecorate, so whether that’s different coloured tea towels or napkins, or different potted plants to reflect what’s in the beds outside. In autumn it will be very rich with a lot of dried flowers and then at Christmas it takes on more of that spruce, festive vibe. In spring we get to have a lot of fun and then summer obviously is florals and colour.
I really enjoy doing it, I love just pottering to the garden centre, picking up a few pots, a few flowers, and just thinking about how I’m going to arrange them.
Evergreen: Discover the Joy in Every Season (Orion Spring, 2023) is available from all booksellers. For more on Lydia including latest blogs and links to social media, visit lydiaelisemillen.com
