Photographer Mark Harrison left London for North Yorkshire six years ago with his family
(Picture: Mark Harrison)Gillian and Mark Harrison didn’t leave London because they didn’t love the capital. But with a new baby to consider, they decided to get out of town to avoid ever getting to that point.
“I had lived around Leyton and Walthamstow for about 12 years, and I was very happy there,” said Mark, a photographer (markharrisonphoto.com).
“But the hustle and intensity of it was getting a bit much and we didn’t want to get to the point where we fell out of love with London, so we pre-empted it.”
London’s sky high prices were another factor. The couple had a two-bedroom flat in Walthamstow, but after Milo, now six, was born, it began to feel rather cramped. And upsizing locally was impossible.
The fact that both Mark and Gillian, who works in human resources and office management, come from small towns made the decision easier, and they opted to relocate to Mark’s hometown, Harrogate in North Yorkshire.
Financially, the move made fantastic sense.
They sold their flat, in 2016, for £405,000 and bought a compromise three-bedroom detached house in Harrogate for £240,000.
“It is a not particularly good-looking mid-70s house, which was not at all what we thought we’d buy because we had imagined some sort of Yorkshire stone townhouse, but it did mean we became mortgage free,” said Mark.
Over the past six years, Gillian, 50, Mark, 48, and Milo have settled happily into their new lives.
They spend much of their downtime exploring the glorious nearby countryside with their rescue dog, Mishka, a huskie, and Mark has reconnected with many of his old school friends.
Their social life, he thinks, is actually better than it was in London, partly because it is so easy to get around Harrogate, meaning that visiting friends in another part of town doesn’t involve an hour on the tube.
Life in Yorkshire is, of course, very different to London. “I think if you had spent your whole life there you would find it a culture shock,” said Mark.
“It is a much slower pace of life, and more laid back. It doesn’t have the 24-hour culture you have in London; you can’t go out and get a bagel from Brick Lane at any time of the night, but there are good restaurants and decent shops and it does have a bit of a buzz.”
