Join us for the virtual premiere of a new short film exploring the revival of farmhouse Wensleydale, followed by a live Q&A with the cheesemakers leading its transformation
Stonebeck - The Hattans
Andrew and Sally Hattan are first-generation farmers who embarked on their quest to make a farmhouse Wensleydale about a decade ago, with us first selling their cheese in late 2020. Andrew's background is in agriculture, while Sally's is in dentistry, and they are joined by their children Rachael and Sam at their farm in remote North Yorkshire. It is there that they developed their cheese to historic recipes found in cheesemaking books from 1917 and 1947, together with interviews with an 101-year-old local cheesemaker.
Whin Yeats - Clare & Tom Noblet
Tom and Clare Noblet are first-generation dairy farmers who turned to cheesemaking as a way of diversifying their farm's output. When a steep fall in milk prices in late 2014 made the viability of their beautiful Whin Yeats dairy farm seem increasingly tenuous, cheese was the answer. They signed up for cheesemaking courses and began building themselves a dairy. We began working with them in 2017 and are grateful to them for kickstarting the Wensleydale revival!
Yoredale - Ben & Sam Spence
Ben and Sam Spence started making cheese in 2019 after leaving their jobs in finance. They moved from Manchester back to Ben's family farm where they settled on cheesemaking after looking for a way to diversify the farm's output. They are now settled at their own site where they are currently building a new purpose-built dairy after having worked in a converted garage for a few years. The new site should enable them to make twice the volume of cheese they were able to in 2024.
