Nine favourite Dorset views
We look back at fifteen years of Dorset Life centre spreads and pick our favourites
Published in June ’19
The team behind the magazine that you are holding in your hands is a small but stable one. Along with our peerless sales team of David Silk and Julie Cullen, there are just three of us in the Dorset Life office: Publisher Lisa Richards, Administrator Bryony O Hara and Editor Joël Lacey. Between the three of us, we have 74 years of experience in magazine publishing, 45 of them at Dorset Life.
As this month’s issue was making its way to the printers, we had just finalised our choice for the next twelve covers and next twelve centre-spreads, to run from August 2019’s issue through to July 2020’s edition.
This issue marks 26 years of the magazine featuring an A3-sized image of Dorset as a centre-spread every month and 2019 is also the 15th anniversary of the first use of a digital image as a centre-spread in the magazine, so we decided it was time to have a little look back through our own pictorial history.
Since that first digital image, there have been 180 centre-spread images printed, so the three of us decided to each pick out our three personal favourites from those images. It was not an easy process discarding 95 per cent of those stunning images, with each of us applying different, very personal criteria. Over the next five pages, prepare to relive the past 15 years as we look from that first ground-breaking image, up to an image published last year.
With locations from Bramble Bush Bay to the Marshwood Vale, from Swyre Head to Melbury Down it’s a pretty wide geographical mix.
We are indeed fortunate all to live and work in Dorset, which means that there is a huge range of scenes with which we have personal connections. Having said all that, we would have nothing to look at without the stellar talents of these photographers who consistently manage to capture the quintessence of Dorset through their lenses. The magazine as a whole would be a shadow of itself without their extraordinary ability to capture the scenes we love in such splendour… and without those photographers, the centre-spread just would not exist.
With the exception of each issue’s cover image we never run text over pictures, whether in the centre-spread or anywhere else. We believe the images of Dorset that we print need no clever design to show them at their best, just the space to show their charm.
Folded hills at Melbury Down
Published: November 2012
Photographer: Roger Holman
Why Joël chose it: ‘I used to walk my dog up to Melbury Beacon and I’d park just by a field entrance near the top of the hill coming south out of Melbury Abbas. This view is bang opposite there and I must have taken a couple of hundred shots over the years of this very view. I am a bit loath to include this shot as it’s better than any shot I have of the scene, but this image is now how I always remember this view.’
Marshwood Vale rainbow
Published: March 2011
Photographer: Kris Dutson
Why Bryony chose it: ‘I love this image of the rainbow and the sunlit area it overarches. It’s just a really cheerful, uplifting and peaceful view of Dorset.’
Sika stag in Arne morning light
Published: September 2004
Photographer: Ken Ayres
Why Lisa chose it:
‘This was not the first digital photograph that Ken had brought us, but within the space of just a few months, the quality went from being not quite there (artefacts in the shadows, no detail in the highlights) to being good enough to print as an A3 image. As well as its historical significance in our magazine, this image would simply not, Ken said, have been possible to take on a film camera in that lighting. Plus, of course, it’s a really lovely image emblematic of the Arne peninsula.’
Queen Victoria Walk, Athelhampton House & Gardens
Published: June 2018
Photographer: Christopher Nicholson
Why Bryony chose it: ‘I just love the warmth, the colour and the freshness of everything in this garden. I love gardens like this and with this image it looks like you could step into the garden.’
Stour Valley from Hod Hill
Published: October 2017
Photographer: Mark Bauer
Why Bryony chose it: ‘It’s just a perfect example of the kind of view you get when you get out early to walk the dogs. I remember reading an author describing a scene like this one as the ground being covered by a wedding veil.’
Bramble Bush Bay boats
Published: October 2015
Photographer: Andy Farrer
Why Lisa chose it: ‘When I was a child, my family used to moor up in Shell Bay and this image evokes one of the strongest memories I have of that time of my life. It’s also a wonderfully serene scene of Poole Harbour.’
Up Cerne
Published: October 2011
Photographer:Mark Bauer
Why Joël chose it: ‘There is something absolutely timeless about this shot; it could have been taken at pretty much any point from when the church was rebuilt in 1870. This is rural Dorset at its finest.’
Swyre Head
Published: April 2013
Photographer: Andy Farrer
Why Lisa chose it: ‘It’s one of the best views in Purbeck and it’s on a route that I used to run. It’s just breath-taking.’
Steam engine at Corfe
Published: June 2016
Photographer: Ian Alcock
Why Joël chose it: ‘It’s Enid Blyton, Dorset’s history, green fields, blue skies, fluffy white clouds, all rolled together in an image of Dorset that is so iconic that there really isn’t anything to say about it other than just “wow”.’
