In the beginning

Kate Humble was born in 1968 and grew up in rural Berkshire in a house next to a farm. She had what she describes as a ‘proper childhood’ – building camps, racing snails, climbing trees, interspersed with trips to A&E to patch up things when they broke. At the neighbouring farm she learnt to ride horses and developed a lifelong passion for mucking out.

Starting out

At 18 she left school and home, and worked odd jobs for a year to fund a year travelling in Africa, which, she says, taught her far more than she would ever have learnt at university. On her return to the UK Kate got her first job in television as a runner and met Producer/Director Ludo Graham who she married in 1992.

A love of travel

Kate travelled whenever she had the opportunity and in 1996 had her first travel article published by ‘The Telegraph’.

That same year she got her first job at the BBC as a researcher on ‘Animal Hospital’ and then ‘The Holiday Programme’.

It was on her second day in the Holiday office when she was asked by the programme’s editor if she had ever presented before. ‘No,’ she said ‘and nor do I want to.’ Kate has been presenting programmes and writing articles and books for the last twenty years.

Humble By Nature

In 2007 Kate and Ludo moved to a smallholding in Wales. They live with a variety of feathered and furry livestock and dogs. In 2011 they set up ‘Humble by Nature’ their working farm in the Wye Valley. Go behind the scenes on the farm with Kate and Farmer Tim in Escape to the Farm.

Watch Channel 5’s Escape to the Farm with Kate Humble