As a keen fly-fisherman and columnist for Fly Fishing & Fly Tying Magazine, Radio 2 DJ and comedian Mike Harding lays out his considerable expertise on one of the most well-loved and beguiling traditions of fly: the Northern Spider. These designs of fly, conceived in the north of England around Bolt[...]
It was invented immediately after the war, in the factory a far-sighted English military man had set up to turn the German economy from making machines of warfare to more pacific products. By the seventies that dream had been amply fulfilled, as the VW Campervan became the conveyance of choice for W[...]
He stares down at us enigmatically from the corbels and capitals of churches across Europe -as well as from innumerable pub signs. Leaves and foliage issue from his mouth, or even sprout luxuriantly from his face. He is evoked in the leaps of English Morris Dancers -but he also pops up on the walls [...]