Seasonally fresh apples through autumn

When Juli and Jeff moved to “Glen Loch” Apple Farm, their14-acre property on the river flats at Gellibrand, they had the dream of being self-sufficient in three months. That was in September 1981 before their first daughter Kaiti was born. The timeframe may have been pushed out but the dream is still alive. Like Kaiti and second-born Hana, it has changed and grown since then.

Juli was born in Launceston to parents who both came from farms. She describes her early experiences as “rural urban”: her father showed her how to grow vegies and she always kept chooks and picked berries. Somehow that background beckoned her 10 years after she moved to Melbourne at 18. She liked what she found in the creative community around Gellibrand. She kept working part-time in community health as she tried growing snow peas, then kept pigs and planned to have people come to pick their own berries. Growing apples was initially a five-year plan that now looks like being a lifetime goal. Late in 2005 Juli dedicated herself full-time to the farm.

The original idea was built on the principles of “organic and unusual.” Before any stock was planted, Juli was approved organic certification and grew to those guidelines. Of the 2,000 and more trees, half are commercial varieties and half are “unusual”, grown for their rare or special qualities. However, after two years of marketing them, Juli found that people wanted to know just three things: where are you from? Do you grow them yourself? And are they fresh? Yes, they’re fresh, and they pass the taste test first bite. Within seven days, the apples are hand-picked, washed, packed and delivered. Don’t expect them all at once, because Fujis, Galas, Gravensteins, Jonagolds and Pink Ladies, just to name a few, come into season at different times. The market gets only the best fruit at the right times, which is why you’ll only see Juli at the Apollo Bay Community Market in apple season, mid-February to late May.

As the orchard develops and the market grows, Juli wants to expand the way the farm works. Her community health background identified a need to promote a better sense of healthy living by people having a better understanding of food production. Juli also has a work place training certificate, which she would like to use to develop horticultural programs across local rural enterprises, beginning with the simple act of coming onto “Glen Loch” to pick apples. The vision grows with the fruit.

Ceramic art

John Smith became a ceramic artist by twists and turns, some of it by accident, some by choice. The first choice was not to be a panel beater. John had lived in the Bay since he was one, dividing his childhood between the harbour and the river, but come time to get a job, the only trade going in a small town was a panel beating apprenticeship. John hated working on cars so that was never going to last.

After meeting his wife Ngaira, who came to the Bay as an art teacher, John decided to do HSC as a mature age student at Princes Hill in Carlton. Being late to enroll, the last subject available to him was art. He studied photography and lino printing, which led to a lifelong interest in all manner of art. When John opened a craft shop in the main street of Apollo Bay in 1977, his interest in ceramics began, initially by buying stock from potters in Geelong and then by the example of Victoria Howlett, a renowned ceramic artist, who became something of a mentor to him.

Taking his interest to a professional level, John picked up formal qualifications, first at Holmesglen TAFE, followed by two years of study at Bendigo, where John obtained a Certificate in Applied Art, Ceramics. John now had expertise in the disciplines required for pottery production and developed decoration techniques using brush work and later the use of stamps on his domestic ware.

John was also interested in the freedom of painting as a decorative technique for his ceramics and sought to develop work of a more individual and expressive nature. This lead to the creation of his landscape pieces, which have a loose painterly aspect to them. His recent series of landscape ceramics combines technical skill and artistic expression.

His studio is in the foothills of the Otway Ranges where the rolling hills and views across Bass Strait provide visual images that influence decoration on his latest series of work.

Hand-painted fabric souvenirs

For two years Mary’s daughter-in-law Pam had pushed her to operate a market stall. She kept saying, “You’ve got the talent, use it.” Well, not just the talent, but the qualifications too. Mary completed a degree in Fine Art in the early ‘80s when the family was living in Mt Gambier. Prior to that they lived in the shadows of The Grampians at Horsham, where Lew had a successful business and Mary was doing theatre and media work. Mary was always interested in art, but formal studies led to a deeper interest in pottery. She designed and made Aussie bush icons that became a successful commercial enterprise. Myer stores liked her range of swaggies, wool bales and dunnies.

Pottery gave way to a line of natural fibre bags with hand-painted Australiana designs when Lew and Mary moved to Two Rocks in Western Australia, a crayfishing village similar to Apollo Bay. Mary sold them through the Yanchep National Park Gallery nearby. After eight years of crossing the Nullarbor twice a year to visit grand-kids on school holidays, Lew and Mary came back to Victoria. Remembering family holidays at Wye River, they looked along the Great Ocean Road and settled on Apollo Bay. They had always liked the views but, having lived here, what they most like about being here is “the people, purely the people”, says Mary.

Ever ready to innovate, Mary is developing a new range of painted bags for the market. Environmental shopping bags, plastic bag holders, book bags, that sort of thing. No two bags will be the same; each one will be individually crafted and painted. Already a big seller is the washable tailored dog coat, which some people with scratch-resistant arms also buy for their cats. Mary says that people have said that she sells her products too cheaply, but she says if she’s happy with the price she’s set, then that’s great, everybody’s happy. If you see Mary at her machine in her house in the town she loves, you can see why it doesn’t take much more to complete her happiness. The market money pays for their travels but she will never be long gone from the Bay.