Research Team Profiles

I work with old documents, mostly estate papers, charters, copies, drafts, and the odd thing someone has kept in a box for too long. I started in Edinburgh, looking at materials, handwriting, ink, paper, and all the small details that usually get ignored until there is a dispute.

Most of the work is quieter than people expect. Someone sends me a document with a big story attached, and I try not to get pulled into it too quickly. I usually start with the object itself: what kind of paper it is, where the writing changes, whether the folds make sense, whether the margins have been touched later.

I spend a lot of time with Highland charters and estate papers, especially older material with several versions floating around. I like documents that still show wear. Once something has been cleaned up too much, it can start looking more certain than it really is.

I work between Galicia and Skye, which sounds more organised than it is. In Galicia, it is often small plots, old family land, abandoned fincas, and paperwork that does not quite match what is happening on the ground. In Skye, the details are different, but the feeling is familiar.

I got into valuation through fairly practical work: walking land, checking access, reading files, talking to people, then going back because the first visit never tells you enough. I am interested in the gap between the official shape of a place and the way people actually use it.

I keep a lot of notes. Weather, gates, paths, names people use that do not appear on the forms, small things like that. They do not always belong in a final report, but they help me understand what the land is doing before I try to describe it properly.

I work mostly as a research editor, which means I spend a lot of time cleaning up other people's drafts without making the history sound cleaner than it is. Most of my projects are around Caribbean estate histories, family papers, plantation records, and the way those things get written about later.

I started in publishing, then moved into research support almost by accident. Now I help writers, families, small institutions, and researchers make sense of material that is usually scattered across archives, old catalogues, private folders, and half-finished notes.

I am not trying to make every story neat. Usually I am trying to keep the uncertainty visible without letting the whole thing fall apart. A name changes spelling, a property appears under two versions, a letter says one thing and an inventory says another. That is where most of the real work is.

I work in documentary development, mostly on historical projects that are still too messy to film properly. That usually means months of reading, calling people, checking archive leads, and trying to work out whether there is actually a story there or just a pile of interesting fragments.

A lot of my work has been around Caribbean history, family memory, land, migration, and records that do not sit in one place. I am less interested in the polished version of history and more interested in how people explain what they inherited, what they were told, and what the documents do or do not confirm.

I keep development folders for each project, but they are never as tidy as I want them to be. There are transcripts, archive stills, estate names, voice notes, location photos, and questions I keep coming back to. Some projects become films. Some stay as notes for years.