The Simple Things

Taking time to live well
  • Home
  • Subscribe
  • SHOP
  • Newsletter
  • About
  • Work with us
  • Home
  • Subscribe
  • SHOP
  • Newsletter
  • About
  • Work with us

Blog

Taking Time to Live Well

  • All
  • Chalkboard
  • Christmas
  • Competition
  • could do
  • Eating
  • Escape
  • Escaping
  • Fresh
  • Fun
  • gardening
  • Gathered
  • Gathering
  • Growing
  • Haikus
  • Interview
  • Living
  • Looking back
  • Magazine
  • magical creatures
  • Making
  • Miscellany
  • My Neighbourhood
  • Nature
  • Nest
  • Nesting
  • outing
  • playlist
  • Reader event
  • Reader offer
  • Shop
  • Sponsored post
  • Sunday Best
  • Think
  • Uncategorized
  • Wellbeing
  • Wisdom

Photopraph by Alamy

Discover | Little Known Glastonbury Festival Facts

Iona Bower June 20, 2023

Glastonbury is a weird and wonderful place at the best of times, but it gets weirder and wonderfuller for a long weekend each summer as Worthy Farm opens its doors to the world again. The festival runs from 21-25 June this year, so in celebration of that, here are a few fascinating facts to casually drop into conversation while standing in a mud bath in front of the Pyramid Stage with friends (or watching from the comfort of your sofa with a cuppa in hand and your wellies nice and clean in the shed). 

1. The first Pyramid Stage (built in 1971) was modelled on the Pyramid of Giza, built at one tenth of the scale of its namesake. It was built to be on the Glastonbury Abbey and Stonehenge Ley Line to benefit from the line’s auspicious energies. 

2. Glastonbury has had many monikers in its time but since 1990 has been known as Glastonbury Festival for the Contemporary Performing Arts as Michael Eavis felt invoking theatre was more likely to get the event a licence from the local council.

3. In 1999, co-founder Jean Eavis died and a giant wicker angel was ceremonially burned at that year’s festival. REM dedicated their rendition of ‘Everybody Hurts’ to Jean that year. 

4. The wettest Glastonbury was in 2007 when 60.1mm of rain fell in a single day…

5. …And the highest wind speeds recorded at Glastonbury occurred in both 1985 and 1987 when gusts reached 41mph. Hold onto your tents!

6. Free milk from the farm was available at the first ever Glastonbury event in 1970. Worthy Farm still produces more than 10,000 litres a day and you can still buy the milk from the trucks that drive around the festival. 

7. Each year there is a secret stage called The Underground Piano Bar, which appears on no maps of the festival at all. You just have to find it (or find someone in the know). 

8. Glastonbury Festival has a Guiness Book of Records mention, not for its music but for a World Record in juggling! In 1984 826 people at the festival juggled at least three objects simultaneously, managing to keep 2,478 objects in the air at one time. 

9. Glasto 1987 is still fondly remembered as The Year of the Trouser Thieves. Many pairs of trews were nicked from tents overnight and later turned up in a ditch, but the trouserless masses emerging from their tents in the morning was a sight to behold. 

10. It’s not all about the music. Glastonbury has also hosted The English National Ballet, the Dalai Lama and The Wombles over the years.


You can read more about summer festivals in our feature ‘Best of the Fests’ in our June issue, in shops now.
Buy this month's The Simple Things - buy, download or subscribe

More things to do this summer…

Featured
starfish-f copy.jpg
Aug 20, 2022
Eye Spy | In a Rockpool
Aug 20, 2022
Aug 20, 2022
Getty canal.jpg
Jul 6, 2021
Outings | Places to Seek out Cool
Jul 6, 2021
Jul 6, 2021
crab.JPG
Aug 4, 2019
Crabbing for grown-ups
Aug 4, 2019
Aug 4, 2019

More from our blog…

Featured
July playlist.png
Jun 18, 2025
Playlist | Fruit
Jun 18, 2025
Jun 18, 2025
Deal_129_WEB.jpeg
Jun 18, 2025
Competition | Win a night at Updown on the Kent Coast worth up to £450
Jun 18, 2025
Jun 18, 2025
ESSE_GardenStove-151.jpeg
Jun 18, 2025
Sponsored post | Enjoy a pizza the action with ESSE
Jun 18, 2025
Jun 18, 2025
In Fun Tags festivals, glastonbury, facts
Comment
Photography: Cristian Barnett

Photography: Cristian Barnett

Geography corner | Clipsham stone

Iona Bower August 7, 2019

Learn something new with our one-minute Geography primer

Question: What links Parliament, Windsor Castle, York Minster and a market town in Lincolnshire? 

Answer: Clipsham Stone. 

All three iconic buildings, as well as the Lincolnshire market town of Stamford, were built using the beautiful, honey-coloured Clipsham Stone. 

Clipsham is similar to Bath stone in that it’s an oolotic* limestone formed in the Jurassic era. It’s produced in an area around the village of Clipsham (yep, clue’s in the name) in Rutland, and the stone is known for its resilience, particularly in the acidic conditions of large cities, where smog might damage other stones. Parliament was originally built from Anston limestone from West Yorkshire but it was later replaced with the more hardy Clipsham stone, picked to be able to stand up to London’s sulphurous emissions from all the factories and houses. 

Clipsham has been used in many Oxford Colleges and other notable buildings, but its earliest use was for the building of Windsor castle between 1363 and 1368. It was also used for the beautiful honeyed Georgian buildings of Stamford, home to many a British costume drama. It’s said Colin Firth lived on a diet of Clipsham stone in the early nineties.**

In our August issue, you can take a virtual tour of Stamford in our ‘My Neighbourhood’ piece. We think you’ll be searching out local B&Bs quicker than we can say ‘early Autumn weekend break’. Enjoy!

*Oolots are small, egg-shaped grains that form by gradually building up layers, the same way hailstones do.

** It isn’t.

Get hold of your copy of this month's The Simple Things - buy, download or subscribe



More from our August issue…

Featured
BACK COVER.jpg
Aug 22, 2019
August | a final thought
Aug 22, 2019
Aug 22, 2019
TheWayHome, MarkBoyle.jpg
Aug 17, 2019
Lost arts | writing a nice, newsy letter
Aug 17, 2019
Aug 17, 2019
Earth's Crust Castle douglas Europe’s Best Bakeries by Sarah Gu.jpg
Aug 14, 2019
Nostalgia | Forgotten bakery goods
Aug 14, 2019
Aug 14, 2019

More interesting things to know about…

Featured
Dragon new.jpg
Feb 10, 2024
Outing | Hunting for Dragons
Feb 10, 2024
Feb 10, 2024
sheep.jpg
Nov 16, 2021
How To | Shear a Sheep
Nov 16, 2021
Nov 16, 2021
Bee_Illo.jpg
Jul 10, 2019
Hive mind | reviving a bee
Jul 10, 2019
Jul 10, 2019
In Think Tags knowledge, facts, geography, Britain
Comment
Featured
  Buy ,  download  or  subscribe   See the sample of our latest issue  here   Buy a copy of our latest anthology:  A Year of Celebrations   Buy a copy of  Flourish 2 , our wellbeing bookazine  Listen to  our podcast  - Small Ways to Live Well
Feb 27, 2025
Feb 27, 2025

Buy, download or subscribe

See the sample of our latest issue here

Buy a copy of our latest anthology: A Year of Celebrations

Buy a copy of Flourish 2, our wellbeing bookazine

Listen to our podcast - Small Ways to Live Well

Feb 27, 2025
Join our Newsletter
Name
Email *

We respect your privacy and won't share your data.

email marketing by activecampaign
facebook-unauth twitter pinterest spotify instagram
  • Subscriber Login
  • Stockists
  • Advertise
  • Contact

The Simple Things is published by Iceberg Press

The Simple Things

Taking time to live well

We celebrate slowing down, enjoying what you have, making the most of where you live, enjoying the company of of friends and family, and feeding them well. We like to grow some of our own vegetables, visit local markets, rummage for vintage finds, and decorate our home with the plunder. We love being outdoors and enjoy the satisfaction that comes with a job well done.

facebook-unauth twitter pinterest spotify instagram