Homing

The spaces we inhabit shape who we become. But what does that mean for the people who have no choice where they live?
Yvonne Jewkes is a professor of criminology, author, and leading expert on prison architecture.
She has spent her career studying what echoing corridors, metal doors and harsh fluorescent lighting do to the people living inside prisons — and designing spaces that restore rather than punish.
This conversation is also very personal. Yvonne spent more than a decade restoring a crumbling Regency townhouse, only for her partner to leave midway through the project. The house became tangled up with grief and the slow unravelling of the relationship itself.
 
We explore the strange overlap between prisons and homes: the human need for dignity, sanctuary and control over our surroundings and the instinct to create beauty even in the bleakest places.
 
If you enjoyed this conversation, Yvonne's book An Architecture of Hope: reimagining the prison, restoring a house, rebuilding myself is a powerful exploration into the universal need for sanctuary.
To hear more from us:

YouTube: Subscribe to our channel, Homing with Matt, to watch the video version
Patreon: www.patreon.com/HomingWithMatt
Instagram: @homingwithmatt
Contact: Email us at [email protected]

Matt Gibberd’s book, A Modern Way to Live, is available here: https://www.penguin.co.uk/books/320176/a-modern-way-to-live-by-gibberd-matt/9780241480496

Music by @simeonwalkermusic
Identity & design by @lena.winkler.creative.office 
Produced by @podshoponline

★ Support this podcast on Patreon ★

Sue Stuart-Smith is a psychiatrist, gardener and the author of The Well-Gardened Mind. She has spent her career making the case that going outside and getting your hands in the soil is one of the most powerful things we can do for our mental health.

Sue runs the Serge Hill Project, along with her husband, Tom Stuart-Smith — a garden and events space where children and groups from disadvantaged backgrounds come to learn about the profound link between gardening and wellbeing.   

Her research isn’t just scientific; it’s rooted in her own family history. Her grandfather found solace in gardening after the trauma of being a prisoner of war and her mother restored a large garden to cope with the death of Sue’s father. 

The episode builds on these stories to explore the positive hormonal effects of gardening on the body, the growing movement of green prescribing and how beauty can be a lifeline to those in recovery.

This is a conversation about stepping outside, tuning into the natural world and finding a gentler rhythm.

A full tour of Sue’s beautiful private gardens is available to our Patreon community.

Patreon: http://patreon.com/HomingWithMatt
To hear more from us:

YouTube: Subscribe to our channel, Homing with Matt, to watch the video version
Instagram: @homingwithmatt
Contact: Email us at [email protected]

Matt Gibberd’s book, A Modern Way to Live, is available here: https://www.penguin.co.uk/books/320176/a-modern-way-to-live-by-gibberd-matt/9780241480496

Music by @simeonwalkermusic
Identity & design by @lena.winkler.creative.office 
Produced by @podshoponline

The full catalogue of home tours is available to our Patreon community.
Patreon: http://patreon.com/HomingWithMatt

★ Support this podcast on Patreon ★

We tend to think of home as the space inside our four walls. But for David Engwicht, home doesn't stop at the front door – it extends out into the neighbourhood beyond.

David is a master placemaker and urban designer – he explores how the design of our towns and cities can either bring us closer or push us apart. With his cowboy boots, heavy-framed glasses and 'Pat Cash' hair, he's more like a rock ’n’ roll philosopher than an urban thinker. 

His philosophy was shaped by a nomadic childhood, living in 30 different homes and attending 26 schools. This experience taught him that home isn't something we find; it's something we create.

In this conversation, David talks about the social bonds modern life has eroded and the small, everyday gestures we can make to rebuild that trust.

From turning his own garden in Brisbane into a public park, to travelling the world with a folding throne in a suitcase, David’s work is a lesson in how designing for community can lead us to a deeper sense of belonging.

To hear more from us:

YouTube: Subscribe to our channel, Homing with Matt, to watch the video version
Instagram: @homingwithmatt
TikTok: @homing.with.matt
Contact: Email us at [email protected]

Matt Gibberd’s book, A Modern Way to Live, is available here: https://www.penguin.co.uk/books/320176/a-modern-way-to-live-by-gibberd-matt/9780241480496

Music by @simeonwalkermusic
Identity & design by @lena.winkler.creative.office 
Produced by @podshoponline

★ Support this podcast on Patreon ★

Artist Sue Webster built a career and a home by refusing to fit in — it’s why she identifies with the Mole Man so much. 

She found fame alongside her husband Tim Noble, as part of the post-YBA generation — their anarchic self-portraits, made from found objects and discarded rubbish, made them the “rock stars” of British art. Together they built the Dirty House in Shoreditch, which helped define the area as the epicentre of London's art scene.

More recently, Sue has created an equally radical home for herself: the Mole House in Hackney, built on top of the tunnels where the so-called Mole Man spent forty years digging underground. Where some saw an oddity, Sue saw something worth preserving. The house is a love letter to eccentricity, and a rare pocket of creative chaos in an increasingly polished city.
From growing up in a caravan in Leicester to carving out a place in the art world and becoming a mother at 52, Sue’s story is one of fierce independence and how to live a life that is truly authentic to yourself.

Sue's first solo exhibition, Birth of an Icon, is on show at Firstsite in Colchester.
A full tour of The Mole House is available to members on Patreon:
http://patreon.com/HomingWithMatt

To hear more from us:

YouTube: Subscribe to our channel, Homing with Matt, to watch the video version
Instagram: @homingwithmatt
Contact: Email us at [email protected]

Matt Gibberd’s book, A Modern Way to Live, is available here: https://www.penguin.co.uk/books/320176/a-modern-way-to-live-by-gibberd-matt/9780241480496

Music by @simeonwalkermusic
Identity & design by @lena.winkler.creative.office 
Produced by @podshoponline

The full video home tour is available to members on Patreon:
http://patreon.com/HomingWithMatt

★ Support this podcast on Patreon ★

Most of us think we need more — more space, more things, more possessions. Japanese architect Takero Shimazaki believes we may already have enough.
Takero has designed some of the most elegant private houses in Britain, including one that was nominated for the Stirling Prize. His buildings are never grand or showy. Instead, they are thoughtful and restrained.

He grew up in Japan, where there’s a long tradition of embracing imperfection and accepting that materials age naturally. His grandfather — also an architect — taught him that light and proportion shape not just a building, but how we feel inside it. It’s a philosophy Takero has carried with him ever since.

When his father died two years ago, he found himself confronting a simple but liberating truth: we don’t really own anything. Today, he tries not to own much. He still wears the cashmere jumpers he inherited from his grandfather.

In this conversation, Takero reflects on the Japanese idea of “enough” — the belief that most of us already have what we need. He speaks about his own modest Victorian house and about how good design can create spaces that feel calm and private even in the middle of a dense city.

This is a conversation about impermanence, intention, and how taking care of the things around us allows them, in turn, to take care of us.
To hear more from us:

YouTube: Subscribe to our channel, Homing with Matt, to watch the video version
Instagram: @homingwithmatt
TikTok: @homing.with.matt
Contact: Email us at [email protected]

Matt Gibberd’s book, A Modern Way to Live, is available here: https://www.penguin.co.uk/books/320176/a-modern-way-to-live-by-gibberd-matt/9780241480496

Music by @simeonwalkermusic
Identity & design by @lena.winkler.creative.office 
Produced by @podshoponline

★ Support this podcast on Patreon ★