About The Venerables

The Venerables are among us. To many, they’re invisible. But to those who see them in all their wonder, they’re talismans. Keepers of priceless wisdom and inalienable truths that can only be acquired through a life well lived.

The Venerables is an endeavour to share the light of our noble elders. 

The idea is simple. I invite my guests to share the one piece of advice they’d like to offer the world and explore the experiences that led them to that view. 

This isn’t about saving humanity from making the same mistakes. 

It’s about reminding each of us to cherish the older people in our lives and communities. It’s about seeing them as they are – vital, cheeky, tough. And rejecting what they’re not – frail, irrelevant, invisible, useless.

Why do this?

I’m in that heartbreaking category of people who tragically allowed their grandparents to take their story with them when they died. 

I never asked Granny over a pot of tea how she felt, as a young nanny in Germany, seeing the U-boats docked somewhere on the Baltic coastline ominously preparing for WWII.

I never asked my infuriatingly belligerent Grandpa, if he worried the crops he tended to help feed a nation struggling with wartime rationing would fail.

So many amazing tales left untold. Not anymore.

Welcome to The Venerables.