Welcome

Heloise LOVED music! Dancing to it, relaxing to it, talking about it…..

Music was the electricity that sparked up her internal batteries, put a smile on her face and a boogy in her step.

And being a sixties baby, she grew up during the very best of eras for musical legends.

From singing Kate Bush songs into her hairbrush in her bedroom, with her best friend from school, to being absolutely over the moon, when she met the lead singer, Nick, from the band Chk Chk Chk , who actually remembered her from other gigs – particularly her crazy dancing and screaming at the front!

And it didn’t matter where she was – all togged up and off clubbing, or dancing in the kitchen in her slippers – she was a ball of energy when she danced!

She was completely OBSESSED with Frank Zappa, and loved The Rolling Stones, Bruce Springsteen and, of course, Talking Heads.

Heloise was one crazy lady, who was the epitome of the saying…

‘Marched to the beat of her own drum’.

She was a tiny firecracker, and certainly had – as Van Morrison so eloquently put it, in our intro song, Into The Mystic – a ‘gypsy soul’.

Heloise was just 5’ 1” and chock full of pizazz!

And, “She was bloody hilarious along with it!”, her friend Nicky told Sophia, while recalling all the laughter her and Heloise had shared over the years, talking absolute, in her words, “fuckwittery” to each other!

Music and dancing were the things Heloise loved most.

She hated getting older and not being able to dance how she wanted, or for as long as she wanted. She still felt, and mostly behaved, as if she were still in her 20’s, getting up to all sorts of badass-ery, smoking her spliffs and covering her face in marshmallow when she was on a Tunnoks Teacake binge!

She even taught her friends, while still a teenager herself, how to differentiate those wild mushrooms with certain ‘magical’ qualities, from those which were useless if you were looking for a good time!

Benny fondly remembers Heloise being an amazing friend to her growing up. Once she even had a fight for her in the toilets at school because Benny was too scared!!

She told Sophia that she remembered it so clearly…

“This horrible girl shoved your mum against the sink tap and it damaged her front tooth!”

And although she did feel bad about it, Heloise would use the memory to never let her forget it!

Heloise was the first one of her age group at school, to sneak into clubs underage – she was so bold, she just didn’t care what people thought!

Nicky told Sophia that her mum she was a fab dancer and would dance for hours and, that Heloise loved her Sultans of Swing album by Dire Straits so much … she wouldn’t give it back!

As well as having one of the best and most wickedly dark sense of humours, Heloise could be thoughtful and introspective too.

She was incredibly environmentally aware of the damage us humans are doing to our own planet, and in later years, became increasingly angry at the Universe.

As a result, Heloise did all SHE could to support, nurture and love all creatures and all humans who crossed her path.

She was an avid tree hugger and, if she ever got the opportunity, you’d find her hanging on to the biggest one she could find, a beatific smile on her face, as she soaked up the energy of the mystical power it had gained over however many hundred years it had been growing.

She would also be in her element convincing anyone with her to do the same and lose themselves in the feeling.

Sophia took her to Greenwich Park once, and said it took forever to prise her away from the huge, old, oak trees!

Heloise’s garden was her meditation. She would always be out there, mud under her nails, enjoying tending to her plants and flowers and how the birds got plump on her never-ending food offerings.

She particularly enjoyed the flying popsicles – which was her pet name for the visiting long tailed tits!

And she spent a small fortune on bird food for her garden. In fact, it’s only quite recently that it’s come to light, just HOW MUCH she did spend on bird food.

Let’s just say it was a good thing she was so thrifty with other things!

Heloise once worked with Sophia on a food stall at a shopping centre. and would go and feed all the pigeons in the loading bay – I don’t imagine that would have made her very popular, if management had found out – but she didn’t care,

Heloise would take Sophia along the canal looking for swans with scraps and food for them, and although they recently disappeared, Sophia still finds herself with a handbag of bird food just in case!

And then there was Ryan….

Ryan is one of Heloise & Sophia’s best friends, and although Sophia says he’s been a pivotal person in hers and Heloise’s life, I think it’s probably fair to say that the same is true the other way around.

When Sophia started going clubbing as a teenager, following in her mum’s footsteps in being just as sassy as she was at her age, they joined forces & went clubbing together!

And it was on one of their crazy nights out at Speedqueen – Hallowed ground for Heloise and Sophia, because it was a melting pot of weird and wonderful people – that they met Ryan and had an instant connection.

Heloise offered him her love, support, and a place to live, for a good few years, before he headed off to the bright lights of London to become an epic fashion designer.

Heloise was immensely proud and always in awe of the ambition he had, and she adored the fact that he would whisk her off in some of his epic adventures – to incredible settings in the Cotswolds, Amsterdam and Ibiza.

Those times were so precious to Heloise, because they would bring her back around to who she felt she really was.

The 20-something livewire, living her best life, in fantastic locations, nightclubs, on speedboats and flying out of the warm Mediterranean water with a jet pack strapped to her back, of all things!

Ryan would always tell his 'fancy friends' (as Heloise would call them) about how life changing his younger years were with her.

But Sophia said that her mum never really got it, and always felt she didn’t deserve the credit.

Even though the reality was, that she had made a deep and lasting impact, on that young boy they met by chance, in a nightclub.

And he wasn’t the only welcome addition to the family home. Heloise was always one to take in lost souls and any friend in need.

She’d be glad to offer support and put a roof over anyone’s head whilst they got back on their feet, and they'd tend to not want to leave too soon, since there was always tea and crumpets delivered at some point!

Many of the heartfelt comments Sophia has received about her mum were about exactly this, with….

“Heloise was one of the warmest and loveliest human beings to ever walk this planet. A truly beautiful person.” Coming from Tin Tin.

And Matthew saying, “she …was a massive influence on my younger self, and was there for me in some difficult times.”

Born on the 31st of October 1961, youngest of four siblings, after brother Myron, and sisters Nicky & Karen, Heloise was very nearly marked for life as a Hallowe’en baby, since originally her full name was to be Heloise Andrea Greenwood, making her initials HAG!

Fortunately, that was spotted in time, and she was named Andrea Heloise on her birth certificate.

Although, as mean as kids can be, Sophia, when she was very young, would point out to her mum, that with her long dark hair and big nose, she looked like a witch!

I’m very sure Heloise was much happier when the name Moomin became Sophia’s favourite name for her instead!

Right from the off, Heloise was rebellious and ballsy. Always the first to do the next ‘in’ thing, and more than happy to head off on her own, into whatever trouble she could find!

In 1981, with no thought for their own safety, Heloise and Benny hitched their way from Harrogate to Stonehenge – which was an absolutely crazy thing to do!

They ended up being picked up en route, by a van full of army men and shoved in the back! Two teenagers and 8 army blokes who, bless their steel toe-capped boots, took them all the way to Stonehenge, and dropped them off at two in the morning!

Benny said they were completely fine, until Heloise managed to procure her an acid tab from somewhere, and she shook for four hours in the tent – although even that was fine too, as she remembers being perfectly happy sat there shaking away!

What neither of them ever realised, was that they’d actually managed to be there, and attend, the very first Glastonbury Festival!

Heloise only realised when she went along with Sophia and Theo to work it last year, with their food truck, and she worked out how long it had been going!

Heloise would always think that things in her life would go wrong for her, but there are so many great stories, and incredible ‘right time, right place’ coincidences that she never took into account, showing that her life was actually, full of things going right for her.

And she wasn’t scared of having a go at setting her own luck either!

Some of her most sage advice to Sophia, when she was struggling, and had no idea what to do with her life, was….

“Just ‘follow your feet’….”

Which Sophia found hilarious, but Katie, another one of Sophia’s best friend’s and, whom Heloise was always in awe of, for her ‘shit together’ attitude, just groaned and rolled her eyes!

Sophia knew though, that her mum didn’t want to be anything other than herself, and do the things that made her happy, so it always made sense to her that Heloise would think like that.

Katie always says she can never look at a tree without thinking of Heloise, and her holiday snaps always end up containing a tonne of tree pics, taken just for her.

While Heloise was immensely proud that Katie is now so into, and enjoying, gardening herself.

So, did I already say Heloise was a badass?

In 1982, whilst carrying, but before she knew, she was pregnant with Sophia, Heloise was getting thrown out of Roundhay Park, where she’d gone with her sister-in-law Annette, to see The Rolling Stones on tour.

Thing was, they’d not got tickets, and were caught a couple of times after climbing the fences to get in!

Also, in the early 80’s, Heloise became part of a Hippie cult called Lifewave, with her husband Robert, where members were encouraged to study a wide range of subjects, from Astrology to Zen, which fitted perfectly with Heloise’s interests at the time.

They would spend up to 6 hours a day meditating, and from then, Heloise became a vegan for a few years, before remaining mostly vegetarian, for the rest of her life.

During meditation, Heloise would practise astral projection, and whilst pregnant, met a fairy called Lorien on the astral plane, who told her that her baby would be a girl.

And indeed she was – born in March 1983, Heloise and Robert’s baby girl was named Lucy Lorien, in honour of the fairy.

Although, at around 2 months old, they decided that name didn’t suit their gorgeous girl, and asked the Elders of Lifewave for their help.

The Elders agreed she should instead be called Sophia, which means happy and complete.

And so she was, and still is now, Sophia Lucy Lorien – although, it could just as easily have been the name ‘Small’, as Sophia, since Brunty, another of Heloise’s friend’s, called Sophia ‘small child’ from the very first time she met her. And Sophia has continued to be called by the nickname ‘Small’ ever since!

Throughout Sophia’s childhood, Heloise worked in various eateries, such as the Salsa Posada, a Mexican restaurant in Harrogate, and the posh café at NEXT.

She had a TONNE of fun at the Salsa Posada, meeting friends like Mark, Janey, Claire, Chloe and Trish. ‘Margarita Mondays' were a thing for them all back then, and they had a blast.

Getting hammered out the back of the restaurant on their 'stone throne', which was really just a random junk chair! And at NEXT, Heloise met Elaine, Lisa, Julie and so many more, leading to going to illegal raves, and clubs like Orbit, Up Yer Ronson and The Pleasure Rooms!

Heloise and Sophia have been like two peas in a pod all the way through Sophia’s life. Not many people get to be as close to their mum’s or spend as much time with them as Sophia did.

Growing up just with Heloise as a single parent, then spending her wild years alongside her equally wild mum, out clubbing and getting up to all sorts of shenanigans, including dancing to Hard House music until 9am in the morning, at The Glasshouse or Sundissential.

Although not the times when Heloise and Andy would end up talking to absolute weirdos, before bringing them home to after parties ...!

Sophia and Ryan would despair of them then, although, to be fair, still teenagers themselves, they just thought they were too cool for those ageing hipsters!

And more latterly, working with her, in Sophia’s business, on the food truck and Festival circuit, utilising Heloise’s ‘can do attitude’, and her ability to just get stuck in!

Even there, Heloise was her own unique self. Sleeping in the back of the Luton Van and wandering around the festivals with an inflatable unicorn – which used to belong to Quinn, the toddler son of Luke, a chef they’ve all known and loved for years!

The food truck team brought so much joy and laughter to Heloise over the past few years. And despite the often very stressy situations they’d be dealing with; they'd always have such a laugh and lots of crazy fun.

Heloise was once on the breakdown crew for a Red Hot Chilli Peppers gig, that Sophia was working. But, despite needing to be wearing togs it didn’t matter if she mucked up, she turned out, super dolled up, because Sophia had said she could go watch the gig first!

Last year, on the way to Glastonbury, Heloise was driving the food truck, bringing all the staff and food to the festival, where Sophia and Theo were waiting, having arrived earlier to set up – and at the exact same time – Sophia got electrocuted at the venue, and the truck Heloise was driving broke down!

It was a nightmare, for both mum and daughter (and Theo too, I might add), but thankfully, all got sorted, and they continued on, to have an utterly exhausting, but awesome time!