Best Of Belfast: Northern Ireland's #1 Interview Podcast

Julie   Andrews is the current Director of the Linen Hall Library: Belfast's oldest and last-standing private Libary.   Located just opposite City Hall, the old Linen Warehouse has some of the most interesting and important historic collections in Northern Ireland.   In today's episode we chat with Julie to discover: The history of the Linenhall Library What is was like for her switching from the...

Dennis Coppel is an 85-year-old former Anesthetist and the current President of the Belfast Jewish Community.     Some of his early memories include growing up in North Belfast, exploring Cave Hill and seeing the Antrim Road on fire after the WW2 bombings.      After juggling Hebrew School in the evenings with his ‘full-time’ education as a boy, Dennis later went on to become a medic.     This car...

As part of our documentary on Otto Jaffe and the history of the Jewish Community in Northern Ireland, we paid a visit to the Belfast Hebrew Congregation on the Somerton Road.   The North Belfast synagogue is the third synagogue built in Belfast, the first one being built by Daniel Jaffe on Great Victoria Street and the second by his son Otto Jaffe on Annesley Street near Carlisle Circus.   While t...

Sir Otto Jaffe was one of the leading entrepreneurs responsible for the boom of the Linen Industry here in Belfast in the 1800s.   Through a lot of hard work and determination, the young German-born entrepreneur rose through the ranks of the family business and went on to become the Lord Mayor of Belfast. Twice.   Yet by the end of his life, Sir Otto was forced out of Northern Ireland. Forever.  ...

Mark Goldstone has worked for more than 25 years in the healthcare/life sciences industry.     He has a passion for technology, new “stuff” and all things creative.     Currently based in New York City, Mark spends his days working as the General Partner of Forepont Capital: a performance-focused venture capital firm that invests in early-stage life science companies.     Mark began his career as...

  Leonard Nugent is a businessman and author from Belfast with an incredible story to tell.     Despite experiencing homelessness at a young age and receiving no formal education, Leonard went on to start a one-man construction business that has now become a multi-million-pound company.     He’s also walked the Camino and is in the middle of a 2500km walk from Malin Head to Cork.     Both his adve...

Quick bonus episode with Rita Harkin from the Architectural Heritage Trust who we interviewed as part of our Danny Blanchflower documentary released last week.   I had such a good time with Rita and learned so much that we decided to share the full unedited version with you!   In today's episode we cover: The history of red bricks in Belfast How Rita 'got into' Heritage And why it's important we p...

Danny Blanchflower was a footballer from Belfast who’s most well-known for captaining the Tottenham Hotspurs team that won the double in 1961 and 1962.   (The first team to win the FA Cup twice in the 20th Century).   He also led the Northern Irish team to the World Cup twice as team captain in 1958 and in his role as manager in 1976.   Off the pitch, he was highly respected as one of the greatest...

Today marks the beginning of a very exciting new series we’re rolling out next week called The Streets Where They Lived : a six-part history documentary that will share the story of six incredible Belfast men and women from the pages of history — and the buildings they once called home.      We’ve been putting a tonne of work into this behind the scenes and have partnered up with some really great...

Joshua Burnside is a singer, songwriter and storyteller from Northern Ireland.   His award-winning, genre-defying music draws from the rich, complex history of home — and has found music-lovers from all over the world.   You can listen to his latest album here.   In this exclusive interview ( hosted by Mark Todd ), we talk to Josh about: His first memories Sources of inspiration for his music The...

Alice Wilkinson and Susan Rollins-McEwen are the dynamic duo behind Yoga Quarter and Refill Quarter in East Belfast.     They met while completing their yoga teacher training in 2016. One year later they launched Yoga Quarter in Ballyhackamore.     Being both community-driven and environmentally-conscious, the pair were also inspired by the zero-waste shops popping up in towns and cities across Eu...

David O’Reilly (Rigsy) is is a broadcaster, DJ and author from Belfast, Northern Ireland.       As an independent producer, he hosts two radio programmes for the BBC and has made a number of incredibly popular shows for the likes of Gary Lightbody and Hannah Peel.      David has also been writing all his adult life and has contributed to everyone from the NME to The Times .      His debut novel '...

Cormac Quinn is the founder of loyalBe: a bank-connected rewards app aimed at helping independent retailers to attract and retain customers.   The most impressive part is that before their recent investment, the Ormeau Baths based tech startup was built from the ground up by Cormac himself.    Before loyalBe he was a Software Engineer at Kainos, where he worked as part of a small team to build the...

Andi Jarvis is the Founder and Strategy Director of Eximo Marketing , a marketing strategy consultancy based in Bangor and Liverpool.   Originally from Bradford, Andi has worked with local and global brands to take the "guesswork" out of marketing and implement cost-effective campaigns that work.     He's also a guest lecturer at Liverpool John Moores University and is a regular speaking at confer...

Sinead O’Sullivan is an Aerospace Engineer from Northern Ireland who has worked with NASA to design human spaceflight missions to the planet Mars and asteroids.   Now a Research Fellow at MIT, Sinead is taking the methodologies she created at NASA and applying them to the social sciences to better understand global challenges, such as the interaction between democracy and technology.   In today's...

Mike is the Managing Director, of beIN ASIA PACIFIC: a global leader in the production and distribution of sports content like The Premier League, Rugby World Cup, FA Cup and much much more.   After moving to Singapore on a 6-month placement, Mike has ended up living and working in Asia for over 26-years.     He's also a keen golfer, lover of pastie baps and former professional rugby player for Ho...

Terry Kane is a senior executive at Facebook living in Dubai where he heads up the marketing strategy for the Middle East, Africa and Turkey regions for all Facebook's platforms and services.   As if his 20-years experience in tech wasn't enough, he's also an avid participant of various sports including Gaelic Games, Surfing, Snowboarding and has completed dozens of marathons, ultra-marathons and...

Bernadette Collins is a senior Formula One strategy engineer from Northern Ireland working with the Racing Point F1 Team.   Alongside being responsible for the race strategy for both drivers, she also travels to every event in the championship — often making decisions on a lap by lap basis to win as many points for her team as possible.   In today's episode we talk about: How she got interested in...

Philip Hamill is the Associate Provost, and currently the Interim provost, at Abu Dhabi University.   After watching a movie about Wall Street when he was a boy, Philip decided to move to Belfast from Portadown to study economics.   The rest, as they say, is history.   One Bachelor's, Masters, PhD and MBA later, Philip is now an accomplished academic with a successful track record of publishing in...

Sheridan Tongue is a BAFTA-nominated composer from Belfast known his global, award-winning work on drama series and documentaries alike.   From scoring the mind of Stephen Hawkings, soundtracking 12 seasons of Silent Witness, to releasing music under the pseudonym IN-IS; Sheridan's creative work has taken him all over the world and back home again — most recently with BBC NI's series Spotlight On...

Incredibly excited to announce a new mini-series we're launching in collaboration with Northern Irish Connections where we’ll be sharing the story of six extraordinary people from NI doing exceptional things overseas.   In this quick intro episode, we caught up with Invest NI's Anne Beggs to chat about:   How many Northern Irish people are living outside of NI? Why it's so important to connect the...

Brian John Spencer is an artist from Belfast, Northern Ireland.   After going down the grammar-school track of studying law, Brian decided to take the leap in a brand new direction at 25-years-old to pursue his dream of becoming an artist.   A dream that already is paying off.   From sketching thousands of caricatures, painting landscapes to designing wine labels for Michael Deane, Brian's work ha...

Joan Henderson is an Educational Mentor focusing on helping schools across Ireland tap into the developmental power of outdoor play in young children.   Being a former early-year teacher and school-inspector herself, Joan has spent a lifetime observing the impact being outside has on children — and the problems that can arise when they don't get out enough. In this fascinating, exclusive episode w...

BONUS EPISODE.   I was interviewed recently for another podcast and ended up talking about Northern Ireland the whole time.   Thought there was some interesting bits in here about WHY we do the podcast and how loving where you live really has the potential to change the way we live our lives.   Enjoy!

Red Bay Boats is a family business in Cushendall that has built over 1000 boats and 'shipped' to 30+ different countries around the world.   After reading a book on boat building Tom McLaughlin dropped out of school to restore an old rotten rowboat.   Since then, Red Bay have made boats used by the royal family, anti-pirate authorities, ferries, tour-guides and fishermen.   His son Conor — now a m...