My Bristol Favourites: Gemma Thorogood

Gemma Thorogood is a festival and events producer who is one of the four directors of Wild & Well, a new festival coming to locations across Bristol over the weekend of October 20 and 21.

She also owns bell tent hire company Firefly Camping and loves being outside, sitting around fires and drinking red wine.

These are Gemma’s Bristol favourites:

Bristol Open Water Centre 

“I’m a bit of a water baby. I blame it on my being a fire sign, I crave the counterbalance of water, especially in the summer – the sea, a river, a lake. Bristol Open Water up the motorway at Bradley Stoke is actually a triathlon training lake run by Mad Mike who dug out his 12-acre large lake from farmland. A man with a dream, who is now 80 years old, still barks his training chants at you as you swim the mile around, but also turns a blind eye to you sunning yourself on his pontoons if you feel like sunbathing and chatting instead.”

Sky Kong Kong

“Sky Kong Kong owner and head chef, Wizzy Chung is a legend. Picking veg from her allotment each morning to bring back to her tiny little Korean kitchen near the Bearpit, she feeds 20 people around one long table, bento boxes and sharing plates where you don’t get to choose – because you (…well ‘I’) – wouldn’t know what I was choosing if I did, but get to experience new tastes, ingredients, food culture that blows my mind every time. She’s an artist, and a culinary queen, with bigger plans at foot to change the world while she’s at it too.”

Gloucester Road 

“I live just off it and feel proud and full of gratitude to be living so close to the longest road of independent shops in the UK. You want real bread – you’ve got it. You want grocers with no queue or pinging sound of people getting their packets scanned – you’ve got it. You want to find out what the catch of the day is – you can ask. You want to take your own containers and fill them up again – you can. And you can engage with other people while you shop, and feel like you’re supporting a community at the same time. We did our whole Christmas shop for nine guests last year, including our Christmas tree and we felt like winners!”

Underfall Yard 

“I weirdly only discovered Underfall Yard recently but it sends me to a place I feel I’ve known forever whenever I visit. I love the walk around the waterfront, looking at the boats and imagining what it would be like to live in such a small space; reminding myself I want to join a stand-up paddleboarding class with SUP Bristol from there one Saturday morning, what a great way to start the day; poking my nose in on the boatbuilders in their boat shed like they’re from another world, another time, and hoping one day I might find myself in there sanding some wood and talking life at sea with them… It’s dreamlike, a place to go to walk and think, or ride a scooter for ages without a bump (if you’re four or six like my niece and nephew were when I took them last time – apparently the tarmac is perfect for scootering).”

Better Food

“Better Food in St Werburgh’s was my first place of work when I landed in Bristol 12 years ago. I appreciate that it is expensive (it is a treat for me too) but it’s a go-to place for any discerning health and specialist ingredient enthusiast while telling us the story behind organic produce and how it can be of benefit not only to ourselves but for the planet. It also created a bonafide community for me in those early days on new soil, when I met new friends all with similar values and personalities while learning loads cooking for the cafe with such an array of ingredients at my fingertips.”

Kingsdown Wine Vaults

“There’s nothing like a local. Somewhere you can strut on into and they know your name behind the bar. I’m not a big drinker but I often find myself swaying back down the hill from this lush little home. You get a mean view of Bristol from up there too. And on Christmas Eve, Santa lands on the roof top opposite and drops presents down to all the kids below, I’m not kidding, it’s actually Santa. Magical, magical Bristol.”