There is something very transformative about returning to a place that once felt like the whole world. For me, a stay at Butterwood Ranch in Richmond Hill, in the Northern Rivers hinterland of New South Wales, was more than a few days away. Around 15 minutes from Lismore and a scenic 40-minute drive from Byron Bay, the property feels a world removed from the familiar rhythms of the coast, surrounded by the simple beauty of the region’s rolling countryside. Having grown up in the area, it was my first time returning home in 15 years – an opportunity to meet a familiar landscape with unfamiliar eyes, and to consider the distance between who I am and who I have become.
At Butterwood Ranch, time seems to invite a different kind of attention. Away from the familiar rhythms of everyday life, the days unfold at a gentler pace. There is room to notice the details that might otherwise pass us by: the changing light, the sounds of the surrounding landscape, the quiet moments between plans, and the feeling of being somewhere that asks very little of you beyond being present. It is a place that encourages you to slow down, to look a little closer, and to find pleasure in the simplicity of being somewhere else.
Throughout the residency, we were invited to compile our own ‘Pleasure Lists’, inspired by Bertolt Brecht’s poem Pleasures. A collection of small, personal observations, the exercise encouraged us to consider the things that bring us joy: a particular sound, a remembered taste, a favourite word, a colour, a passage from a book. Some pleasures belonged to the present moment; others emerged from memory. For me, returning to Richmond Hill and the Northern Rivers area made the exercise feel especially resonant. The residency also offered a chance to spend time with RUSSH Home Issue 05, stocked at the ranch. Its presence felt fitting within a place shaped by reflection, creativity and an appreciation for the considered details of everyday living.
Leaving Butterwood Ranch, I carried with me not only the experience of the stay, but a renewed relationship with a place I once knew so well. Returning after 15 years offered a reminder that home is never entirely fixed in time. It shifts as we do, holding traces of who we were.
