Giving back

The Herb Farm will give 5% of profits charitably. From the 1st of December 2025, we'll be supporting our little rural parish church, continuing a long association between Ivegill neighbours with a shared history.

Every morning we wake up and look across the road at our beautiful little church and the churchyard where Rachel's grandparents, the original herb farmers Harry and Rosemary, are buried. Christ Church, Ivegill, was built by R.J. Withers, a Victorian church architect very active in the Gothic Revival, in 1868. It has a distinctive polygonal bell-turrett on a small buttress. There are three stained glass windows by M. & A. O’Conner, 1868, with the East window depicting the Last Supper. Other windows containing floral and fruit designs are by Powell of Whitefriars, a big name in Victorian/Edwardian stained glass.

In his book, Ivegill: A Social History of Rural England (2019), Midge Todhunter writes that Rachel's grandmother Rosemary's father was a vicar in the village. She married her husband Harry at Christ Church, Ivegill, in April 1949. At the end of that year they bought the cottage opposite the church and began the Herb Farm business together.

In 1986 aged 67, Rosemary was licensed as a lay reader in the diocese of Carlisle. She served other churches on occasions, but the majority of her ministry was at Christ Church, Ivegill. She was said to be a practical, caring, compassionate person who brought sunshine into people’s lives, and there is a stone monument in her memory at the bottom of Ivegill churchyard in The Peace Garden.

The Peace Garden was made possible by the gift of land adjacent to the churchyard by the neighbouring family, for the whole community. The aim was to provide a space for the reflection on the theme of peace in the widest sense, for all ages.