THE TEAM

WE ARE

WildEast’s three founding trustees, Hugh Somerleyton, Oliver Birkbeck and Argus Hardy are all East Anglians. They are committed conservationists with a passion for the WildEast of England, its landscapes, its people and its wildlife. 

All are part of the local farming and business communities, and look forward to collaborating on exciting conservation projects with different people & partners on multiple scales across the WildEast.

Olly Birkbeck
Founder & Trustee

Formerly a soldier and journalist, Ollie now directs Little Massingham Estate, where he is putting restorative farming practices into place alongside the restoration of 500 acres of heathland nature reserve.
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'In many cases, the birdsong that lifts our hearts belongs to the last remnant, clinging onto the brink of collapse. Our ruthless neatness and efficiency in agriculture, development and even gardening has simply swept nature up and tidied it away. We MUST try now to bring it back in our lifetimes.
 

Hugh Somerleyton DL
Founder & Trustee

Owner of Somerleyton Estate, North Suffolk. Creator of successful brands Dish Dash, Hot Chip, regenerative farmer, rewilder and conservationist. Trail runner, wild swimmer and agitator for change. WildEast Foundation was created to make decisive impact across the WildEast region to re-educate, restore and reconnect people and nature to ensure sustainable abundance and greener lives. 
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‘Al Gore’s seminal film ‘An Inconvenient Truth’ came out in 2006. We are now a fifth of the way through the 21st century, but for the most part we still aren’t listening. Covid19 has been a transformational event. As we emerge from lockdown, let us remember this unnatural and unhappy state is how the natural world is forced to survive all the time and this is why it is in precipitous decline. We are all complicit in this tragedy and we must all work together to fix it.’

Hugh Somerleyton DL
Founder & Trustee

Owner of Somerleyton Estate, North Suffolk. Creator of successful brands Dish Dash, Hot Chip, regenerative farmer, rewilder and conservationist. Trail runner, wild swimmer and agitator for change. WildEast Foundation created to make decisive impact across the WildEast region to re-educate, restore and reconnect people and nature to ensure sustainable abundance and greener lives. 
––
‘Al Gore’s seminal film ‘An Inconvenient Truth’ came out in 2006. We are now a fifth of the way through the 21st century, but for the most part we still aren’t listening. Covid19 has been a transformational event. As we emerge from lockdown, let us remember this unnatural and unhappy state is how the natural world is forced to survive all the time and this is why it is in precipitous decline. We are all complicit in this tragedy and we must all work together to fix it.’

Argus Hardy
 Founder & Trustee

 Argus is a Suffolk Architect with a passion for vernacular buildings and the East Anglian landscape. He comes from a family of naturalists, zoologists and farmers with strong links to nature conservation. The family farm was the Regional Winner in the RSPB Nature of Farming Awards and received a Special Award for Conservation from the Suffolk Agricultural Society.
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‘We need to rebuild networks, corridors and hotspots of abundance back into our region, on our farms, in our villages, towns and cities and not to make space for nature but to find our own place within it’

Argus Hardy
Founder & Trustee

 Argus is a Suffolk Architect with a passion for vernacular buildings and the East Anglian landscape. He comes from a family of naturalists, zoologists and farmers with strong links to nature conservation. The family farm was the Regional Winner in the RSPB Nature of Farming Awards and received a Special Award for Conservation from the Suffolk Agricultural Society.
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‘We need to rebuild networks, corridors and hotspots of abundance back into our region, on our farms, in our villages, towns and cities and not to make space for nature but to find our own place within it…’
 "When despair for the world grows in me and I wake in the night at the least sound in fear of what my life and my children’s lives may be, I go and lie down where the wood drake rests in his beauty on the water, and the great heron feeds. I come into the peace of wild things who do not tax their lives with forethought of grief. I come into the presence of still water. And I feel above me the day-blind stars waiting with their light. For a time I rest in the grace of the world, and am free."
– Wendell Berry
The Peace Of Wild Things
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