Finding our place

Britain is a small place — but it rarely feels that way. One region’s accent or landscape seems to give way to the next, too many multitudes for it to be written off as ‘small’.

But when you grow up, you leave, then return, you realise the winding paths and long, narrow streets are indeed narrow. You find yourself discovering that the island containing us all is not as vast as it once seemed in your childhood imagination. And yet, we all know our little patches - the streets and neighbourhoods that tell the stories of the people we came to be.

In recent weeks and months, there has once again been a question, a challenge, to our willingness to sit alongside one another on our little island nation.

In many ways, it’s easy to feel gloomy, to give way to a feeling of anger and resentment at what or who we’ve become. But if you explore and speak to people about their little patch, you hear something else. Problems, yes, but also a deep love for the place around them.

As we say in our piece from Birmingham, a feeling of wanting to make the place around them the best it can be. In truth, the brilliance of Britain lies in finding those places that provide you with the twin needs of connection and calm—your own Piccadilly Circus, but also your Chesil Beach.

In this edition of Citizen Portraits, published in Magazine 10, we visited Newmarket, Oxford, and Brighton — three places that, in their own way, offer sanctuary from the bustle of London.

Each is under 100 miles from the capital, and yet each their own distinct feeling. Crafted by both locals and new arrivals, these small communities are alive with a contained energy, embodying the possibilities of a small place with big institutions and ideas — home of horse racing, beach holidays, or big thinking. Each has its own tale to tell.

Our final stop, Newmarket, has, of course, had its own long love affair with the British punter. From pauper to prince, it’s hosted them all for a day out — a chance to let off steam. And no one was more of a fan of racing than the late Queen, who, it was said, was only truly happy talking with trainers amongst the stables — her own break from reality.

The long gallops offering a space to sit with her thoughts and perhaps, for some fleeting moment, feel ordinary. In these times, when all around us is noise and there is an attempt to play to that sense of madness, we do well to find our own quiet.