Children have a way of throwing your plans in the air daily, and somewhere in the scramble to catch them, I stopped chasing perfect. I grew up in the UK and later made my home in Portugal — English and Portuguese, fluent in each, equally at home in both. Before any of this, I spent years inside fashion magazines — Vogue, Tatler, Harper's Bazaar among them — styling, writing, and editing other people's lives to within an inch of perfection. Then I built businesses from nothing, and kept finding myself behind the scenes making everything look effortlessly beautiful. What I actually needed, in the middle of the real-life chaos, was a straight-talking, clean guide for my family and my home, not more noise — which is what eventually led me to train as a homeopath, chasing the same clarity in health that I wanted everywhere else.

I don't believe in chasing trends, or in having more for the sake of it. I have no interest in perfect. I'm interested in discernment — knowing precisely what earns a place in your life, and having the confidence to let the rest go without ceremony.

That's what Mrs H is: intelligent living, worked out in practice — the home, the table, the children, the everyday health of a family, sorted through, so you don't have to spend your Sunday doing it. My hope is that it becomes somewhere worth spending a few unhurried minutes — a trusted corner, away from the noise, where you can think clearly and make decisions that are unmistakably yours. Come and see what's worth keeping. Start with the Journal, or let Sunday's letter land in your inbox.