Episodes

  • Join us for an inspiring and uplifting chat with our guest, best-selling author Freya North to kick off the new season. After taking her son to University, Freya was reminded of her own experience of leaving home for the first time and wrote her sixteenth novel, ‘The Unfinished Business of Edie Browne’. She describes it as a love letter to youth and also a love letter to a time and a place. Set in Manchester in the late 80’s in the golden age of clubbing, Freya talks candidly about that time and how it inspired her to write her moving tale about friendship. After back surgery in 2016, Freya took up cycling and talks about the joy of discovering a new hobby and the very special community that has come into her life as a result. A country girl at heart, she shows us the little silver horse that her father gave her as a child. Not a jewellery wearer as she now lives on a farm, she shows us her very special tanzanite ring - the rarest gem stone in the world and how she came to design it. She also describes how things have come a full circle and how her vintage watch has recently started working again. As well as her hugely successful Instagram chats with other authors, #wednesdaywriters, Freya is also raising money for the Book Trust with The Book Lovers Journal - which she has created as the perfect gift for anyone who loves books.  freyanorth.com

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  • Join us for some seaside fun as Alice and Josie wrap up Season 4 and look back on our inspirational guests and the nuggets of wisdom they’ve shared from ‘being more sloth’ to ‘never listening to the no’s’.  In a series where we’ve been talking bout re-invention, we’ve heard about the ingenious ways in which our guests have used their circumstances to take a different path to success - all of them flying the flag for women. Along the way, we discuss the post exam holiday mayhem, Love Supreme festival, Alice’s jaunt to Bergerac for a wedding as well as her tips for keeping your jewellery shiny.  And at the end of it all, we take a much needed plunge in the sea.  Happy summer! See you for Season 5 soon.



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  • Meet Jo Tutchener, who founded her amazing company Scamp and Dude after a life-changing brain haemorrhage made her completely reassess her life. She realised that if she were to die, she hadn’t done enough to help people and vowed that if she got better, she’d do something to make a difference. Terrified of leaving her young sons when she went into brain surgery, the idea of the Superhero Sleep Buddies was born. This was quickly followed by a clothing line for kids, all with the superpower button embroidered on the sleeve so kids could press it to feel better when they were scared or had to be away. Scamp and Dude launched into Liberty along with women’s sweatshirts also with the embroidered bolt. They were so popular they sold out instantly. Now Jo’s women’s collection has sky-rocketed and she’s expanded into stores around the country. But more than just a clothing brand, Scamp and Dude has become a community with women flocking to the stores and the Scamp and Dooders Facebook page.  Jo has also launched the superpower-infused printed scarfs and for every one sold, one is gifted to a woman going through chemotherapy. So far Jo has sent out over 45,000.  Thoughtful and passionate about her business and family, Jo shows us her most prized possession - a small pot of solid perfume from her Mum,  as well as a set of lucky charms that she was gifted when she went in for her surgery. Jo says she’s a believer in the power of positivity and that it’s never too late to make a change.

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  • This week, meet journalist and broadcaster, Bibi Lynch. Starting out as a performer and cabaret star, Bibi has never taken a conventional route. Realising she was better at writing than singing, she jostled herself into journalism, working in magazines, then on into TV, followed by a prolific career broadcasting and now podcasting. She’s fearlessly used her platform to shine a light on important subjects as hidden homelessness, grief, dating and being childless with humour and honesty.  Now at 58, she says she’s at a stage where she’s bringing all of the strands of her career together, doing lots of live events, writing a book and working on several more podcasts.  Bibi shows us her special diamond ring from her Dad, her vintage A-Z and a toy monkey that she says she cuddles all night. Find out more at bibilynch.com and @bibilynch on Insta and Twitter.

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  • Reinventing from a career in the entertainment industry in L.A. to creating the fastest growing underwear brand in the UK, Lemonade Dolls, we’re delighted to meet the inspirational Lemon Fuller.  Lemon is on a mission to create comfortable, fun and stylish underwear with inclusivity and diversity at the heart of her business. She is passionate about representing as many women as possible and explains how important sustainability is to her. With no background in fashion or business, Lemon went to drama school but says that is her superpower, as she does things her own way and refuses to take no for an answer.  Lemon shows us her show-stopping statement YSL ring that her friends clubbed together to buy her for her 30th birthday, a precious chain from her Mum as well as her brand new diamond engagement ring, Fizzing with energy and positivity, Lemon is a force for change and has just launched the ‘Swing It Girls’ campaign, encouraging the twenty percent of women who are undecided to vote. Find her products at www.lemonadedolls.com and on Insta @lemonadedolls

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  • It’s all about books this week, as Josie receives the proof copies of her new novel, Miss Beeton’s Murder Agency and presents one to Alice. We have a special guest, author Eve Chase, who has been hailed as the modern Daphne Du Maurier. Her gripping new book, The Midnight Hour is set between Notting Hill in 1998, (when the movie was being filmed) and the present day when a devastating family secret is in danger of being revealed. Eve talks candidly about her route to being an Internationally best-selling, prize-winning author and reveals some wisdom about her writing process and how she makes her books so layered. Happily married, Eve tells us the stories behind the beautiful rings, the filigree gold sun pendant her husband bought her, and the antique art deco diamanté bracelet she wore on her wedding day. Eve says that being a writer isn’t lonely as she has so many characters in her head, but it is insular. Which is why she cherishes her author friends and shows us the gold birdcage necklace, gifted from her friend Sarah Vaughan. The Midnight Hour is out in hardback on June 27th. Find Eve Chase on Instagram and Facebook @evepollychase.

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  • We’re foodies this week with the co-founder of Bill’s restaurant, Tania Webb. With decades of experience in the restaurant business, she’s lived and worked worldwide, being responsible for creating some amazing restaurant concepts. But back in her home town of Lewes, she spotted the opportunity when her brother-in-law Bill had a veg shop and fate, the big Lewes flood, conspired to make them set up a restaurant together.  The rest is history, with Bill’s becoming a High Street favourite nationwide. In recent years Tania has set up another Brighton institution, Marmalade with which she's carried on her love of nourishing, fresh and healthy home-cooked food. Tania shows us the Rolex she bought for herself when she made it in Hong Kong and the sparkly ring she's never taken off which connects her to her Mum. Down to earth and inspiring, Tania is proof that following your passion and hard work gets results.


    https://www.cafemarmalade.co.uk/


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  • We’re all about wellbeing this week, as Josie returns from a retreat in Spain. We talk to very special guest @nicolaelliottneom founder of @neomwellbeing 


    She talks us through her journey from working in glossy magazines to realising her ambition to be an entrepreneur. When she started suffering from anxiety and realised she wasn’t taking care of herself, she started blending essential oils to help her and her friends.  


    Starting out with a business selling four candles she’s grown Neom into a multi-national global empire and the biggest wellbeing platform in the UK. As well launching her new book ‘Four Ways To Wellbeing’, Nicola is passionate about getting the right work-life balance, especially for women, and encourages budding entrepreneurs with her Instagram Live interviews. She says her secret is to do less and to be more sloth. 


    She shows us her Cartier love bangles and the ‘biting jewel’ she inherited from her grandmother - still with the bite marks in!  


    Visit her Neom stores or go online at www.neomwellbeing.com


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  • We’re being luvvies this week and talking theatrics as Alice embraces a dozen shows in one weekend at the Brighton festival. Our guest is Theatre Director of the iconic Theatre Royal in Brighton.  Sophie talks us through her fascinating job and the huge restoration project the theatre is undergoing, as well as some of the fascinating history including the inside scoop on the resident ghosts. Taking after her eccentric grandmother, Christiana, who worked in the theatre, Sophie started working as an usher selling ice creams at the age of seventeen and has never left the theatre.  She tells us the stories behind her grandmother’s jewellery and how she’s learnt that if you work very hard and are very nice to people, it’s amazing what you can achieve.

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  • Alice and Josie are springing into summer with jumpsuits and fake Chanel. They are joined by glamorous guest, Josephine Pembroke who shares her incredible journey from being the naughtiest girl at school to getting chucked out of drama school to setting up her girl band Pussies Galore and taking Soho by storm in the early 90’s. After a stint working in radio, she set up Radio Gorgeous in 2009 which has become the longest running female podcast in Britain. During lockdown, newly single, Josephine re- invented again and says she’s now in the best season of her life. She tells us about her new one-woman show, ‘Dinner Darlings Dinner’ which she’s performing at the Brighton Festival. Along with the most bling diamond costume ring, Josephine show us her granny’s gold wedding ring, which she uses to help her make life decisions. Funny and inspiring, Josephine says if you want anything in life you have to rely on yourself. 


    http://lanterntheatrebrighton.co.uk/dinner-darlings-dinner/



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  • Kicking off Season Four, Alice and Josie are delighted to interview former editor-in-Chief of Elle, Sunday Times Style and Cosmopolitan and co-host of the phenomenally successful podcast, Postcards From Midlife, Lorraine Candy. In her latest book, 'What’s Wrong With Me’ from Unravelling to Reinvention, A Midlife Memoir, Lorraine tackles everything from empty nest, career reinvention, sex, marriage, brain fog, burnout, perimenopause and menopause. With advice from experts, celebrities and personal stories, Lorraine is a torch-bearer for this liberating and transformational new stage of life. Funny, inspirational and full of tips, Lorraine shares her own challenges, how she combats stress and has learnt to embrace change. Currently undergoing a process of shedding, Lorraine says she’s not sentimental and isn’t a hoarder of jewellery or keepsakes, but she shares the touching stories behind the three items she’d save in a fire, including an ashtray she had to buy from Tiffany’s for Donatella Versace. So if you need some advice and inspiration about your own reinvention, then do listen in.

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  • Our guest, journalist, radio and TV presenter Daisy McAndrew is a Royal Commentator for NBC the big American network, so her work is cut out with their obsession with our royal family. Daisy shares some of her stories from her fascinating career, including what it was like to report on the late Queen’s death. But politics is her first love she shares how, at the age of 13 she wanted to be a spy and that led to her working in the Houses of Parliament at 19, then her career took her to the BBC and ITV. Now, a broadcaster of over 20 years, Daisy has interviewed nearly every prime minister and has her own politics show on Talk TV.  


    She describes what it’s like to be on screen and the harsh public scrutiny that comes with that, but how she’s got more confident as she’s got older with her fashion choices. A committed shopaholic, Daisy says her wardrobe, jewellery and accessories collection is embarrassingly large, but that she’s a ‘more is more’ kind of girl.  However, she’s very practical and buys and sells everything on eBay and Vinted.  


    Having been the victim of several burglaries, she buys costume jewellery and, following in the footsteps of her father, believes that antiques are the way forward. She tells us the story of her treasured antique diamond  ring that her friends clubbed together to buy her for her fiftieth. She also shows us the round pendant with pearls and rubies gifted from her mum to her dad. Her every day jewellery includes three rings, she never takes off, including her wedding ring, a ring from her late cousin,Janey, plus a gift from her daughter, a gold and silver ring with an amethyst.  


    She showed us her many perspex colour-co-ordinated jewellery boxes full of drawers filled with necklaces, rings and earrings in every colour.  With so much choice at her fingertips, Daisy loves a bold statement necklace for her TV show, which she says often raises a few eyebrows and cause a problem with the sound engineer who has to get the microphone just below her chin. 


    Savvy, funny, down-to-earth and full of common-sense advice, Daisy shares her fashion top tips as well as her life hacks to find confidence in what you do, and to stop caring what others think. You can find Daisy on Vinted @DMCA1234 Insta @daisymac1 and on X @daisymcandrew.


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  • There are 27 armed conflicts in the world going on right now and this week we’re talking to Sara Bowcutt, the Managing Director of Women For Women UK, an incredible charity that invests in the power and potential of women affected by war. 


    The charity enrols women into a twelve month programme and helps them by supporting their health and well-being, teaching them about their rights, gives them practical skills and business training so that they can start to earn and save money. Sara describes how these women, often in the most war-torn, poverty-stricken places in the world, find hope and strength in the sisterhood the programme helps create. 


    Sara’s awe-inspiring life involves travelling to far off countries to meet and support these displaced women and their families, then a few days later organise and attend glamorous events and meet high-end brands and individuals in order to raise much needed funds to support the charity. This is how I became involved and was invited to Kosovo to pass on my skills and meet these incredible women affected by war, whose stories inspired me to make the @W4WI 'share a hug' collection. The proceeds of which help support the charity.


    Sara talked very movingly about her work and then shared the stories behind her dainty and chunky pieces that mean the most to her, including some of the 'She Dares' beaded bracelets each made by a woman in one of the programmes, as well as the beautiful vintage diamond ring which she bought for herself, when she achieved her dream. 


    Someone who firmly believes in the sisterhood, Sara says that all of her most meaningful jewellery pieces were gifted to her by the special women in her life. 


    This is an enlightening episode and well worth a visit. 


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  • A podcast full of sunshine with photographer, director and videographer Jerome Maas, who talks to us from Cape Town. He’s living his dream life, shooting campaigns for International travel and lifestyle brands. Born in the US, but growing up in the UK, Jerome describes how his childhood was inspired by his parents’ monthly subscription to National Geographic magazine and says he was always the kid with a camera. A business entrepreneur, Jerome found his future path was shattered when Covid hit and he had to fold his agency and lay off all his staff. But always seeing a silver lining, in 2022 he took the brave decision to pursue his childhood dream of becoming a photographer, getting his first gig in Brazil. And he’s never looked back.  He believes in a flow state and that the trick to life is to find that thing that comes most naturally to you and that when you’re in it, time just disappears. Always on the move, Jerome describes how he’s cut down on having lots of stuff, but jewellery is his non-essential item that he wears everywhere, and he describes the stories behind his treasured silver rings.  

    Find out more at www.jeromemaas.com Insta: @jeromemaas


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  • Join Alice and Josie as they debrief about Mother's Day and the Oscars. They're also talking about puppy training with Pickle, and Alice learning to interpret tail signals in the park. Plus, Josie gives her verdict on her cultural weekend which included Dune II and The Duchess Of Malfi. And, with a sixteenth birthday on the horizon Alice and Josie discuss the etiquette of shooting people in Laser Zone. 

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  • Alice and Josie are looking back at the inspirational women they’ve interviewed in this series so far, and are talking about International Women’s Day.  With it being awards season and the Oscars coming up, they’re discussing their love of movies and Alice’s continued love affair with the Barbie movie and her Oscar favourite, Poor Things. Our guest, Denise Parkinson is no stranger to the red carpet and, in fact, often gets to watch a movie a day. A marketing guru in the Film Industry, Denise is a Bafta voter and regularly rubs shoulders with the likes of Christopher Nolan and Julianne Moore. She shares her Oscars gossip, plus her red carpet routine, from shopping for her glamorous dresses in charity shops and TK Max, to her daily yoga classes. Denise who is often too busy to think about jewellery is never without her precious old-school Omega watch and her diamond studs. Her special keepsakes include her lanyards from the Apollo 11 anniversary at Nasa and the gorgeous brooches she wears with her handbags on the red carpet. 

    One of life’s survivors, Denise is living life to the fullest and doing some extreme travelling whilst her knees are good, from Machu Pichu to Everest basecamp to trecking in Bhutan. She says her life hack is to adopt an ‘I Tonya’ like mentality and to stay hungry.  And also 'to keep on keeping on'. 


    Check out Denise on Insta @denparkinson @deniseparkinson on FB.


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  • Meet the delightful Adele Parks, author of 24 internationally bestselling novels, from family dramas, historical sagas to psychological thrillers.  Her latest, Just Between Us, out in paperback at the end of March is an unputdownable page-turner about a missing female bigamist and the two devastated families she has left behind.

    Having always had a vivid imagination as a child and being fascinated by people, Adele is a born writer. She shares her creative process, from her discipline of daily word count to her tips for character development.  Plus, she shares her secret hack for getting young people to read.  


    In 2022, she thought it was a prank at first when she was offered an MBE and deleted the email. When she realised it was real, she went to the palace and met the King, receiving her medal for her services to literacy through her charitable work.


    Very close to her grandparents and great grandparents, Adele tells us the touching story of collecting charms for the precious bracelet they gave her. They also inspired her love of crockery and her hobby of taking vintage plates and adorning them with feminist pictures and slogans. 


    Inspiring, funny and down to earth, Adele says life is not about being happy so much as finding your purpose. 


    Find her on instagram @adele_parks and on X and Facebook


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  • After artist Mary Jane Ansell was a guest last week, Alice has been collecting some of her favourite things - ones that might possibly appear in a portrait. She shows Josie her grandmother's religious relic - a fancy glass case apparently containing saints ashes. Unlike the rest of her family who find the whole concept rather spooky, Alice says 'Saint Carlos' brings her luck. We discuss getting to the end of February, mother's day on the horizon, daughters returning from far flung climbs and, of course, Princess Pickle, the podcast puppy. 


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  • This week we meet celebrated portrait artist Mary Jane Ansell whose incredible life-like paintings are in the National Portrait Gallery (newly revamped and well worth a visit if you haven't been). She also exhibits in New York and LA, taking commissions from some of the world’s richest art collectors. She’s a very old friend of Alice’s from the earliest days of Posh Totty Designs when Alice was exhibiting in the Open Houses here in Brighton. Talking to us from her farm house in Wales, Mary Jane describes how she persevered with her passion for portraiture at college in an era when it was very out of fashion. She describes the process of how her portraits develop, from choosing her models, to the first sitting, how she discovers the background story of each of her subjects, to the big reveal. Fascinating and wise, Mary Jane says that if she were to sit for her own portrait, she’d wear her Abby Mosseri tourmaline ring and necklace that she bought for herself when she became successful. Please do check out her work on @maryjaneansell or www.maryjaneansell.com 

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  • With the new year well under way, we're talking about the new trend of habit stacking (Alice is weaning herself off sugar in her tea) plus Alice's first ever viral Tik-Tok post. Puppy excitement is building with the imminent arrival of Pickle, the podcast puppy and Josie dispenses some advice on how to prepare. So grab yourself a cuppa and join us for a natter. And please do get in touch @showusyourbitspodcast on Insta and Facebook.

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