[dramatic music] ♪ ♪ NARRATOR: We are an island nation.

♪ ♪ Scattered around our coastline are hundreds of them.

Most are tiny.

I always like the evening light.

NARRATOR: They are home to unique communities, a mix of wildlife and people.

[bell rings] Many are remote, majestic.

I mean, it's gorgeous.

Who wouldn't want to spend their summers here?

NARRATOR: With breathtaking landscapes.

WEZ SWAIN: It's just fantastic.

There's just so much to see just from this one viewpoint.

NARRATOR: Some are steeped in history and traditions, communities living very different lives from those most of us know.

GARETH ROBERTS: Look around you.

It's fresh, and it's clean.

You're in charge of your own destiny.

NARRATOR: This is the story of life on our tiny islands.

[light music] ♪ ♪ The UK's many tiny islands come in all shapes and sizes.

Some you can see from the mainland.

Others are so far away, they're not even specks on the horizon.

But there is one in particular that proudly claims to be the most remote inhabited island in the UK.

Fair Isle.

Fair Isle is about 80 miles from the UK mainland's northernmost tip, John O'Groats.

It's around 3 miles long and 1 and 1/2 miles wide, with a permanent population of about 60.

This remote location is also home to large colonies of seabirds like puffins and fulmars.

But despite its geography, the island has a vibrant, forward-looking community.

It's self-sufficient in green energy and has good transport links by boat and plane.

Although its airport is really different from those found on the mainland.

♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ There's only an hour until the morning flight.

And making sure it arrives safely is Dave.

He celebrated his 80th birthday this year, and he's the airport manager.

I'm just waiting for a phone call from the pilot, just checking to see what the weather is, and then I'll go through to the office and answer his call.

Because I've got a weather station in my backyard and I have access to all the weather data, the pilot phones me before he sets off for Fair Isle, just to check what the weather is like here.

NARRATOR: Fair Isle is managed by the Scottish National Trust, and Dave moved here with his wife, Jane, 51 years ago after they answered an advert to manage a croft.

That was one taken by the press in Edinburgh.

This was when we went to be interviewed by the National Trust for Scotland about coming to Fair Isle.

This is a picture of Catriona, my older daughter.

She was always interested in what I was doing with the weather and at the airport and aviation.

[phone chimes] Five passengers for us.

Many thanks.

OK.

Right you are.

Cheers.

He's early.

That's the plane on its way.

Marie.

[phone rings] Hello.

DAVE WHEELER (ON PHONE): Hello, there, Marie.

Yeah, that's the plane on the way down.

OK.

Perfect.

DAVE WHEELER (ON PHONE): Thanks.

OK.

Cheers.

Once I get the call from AirTask saying that the plane is on its way, then I alert the fire crew.

[lighthearted music] NARRATOR: Today's fire crew contains Fiona-- she runs the island's shop-- and Marie, a French knitwear designer who came to live on Fair Isle six years ago.

♪ ♪ While they get ready, Dave makes his half-mile commute to the airport by bike.

DAVE WHEELER: I think Fair Isle only really, really work because everybody does help each other out.

But the majority of people do the jobs they do because they enjoy doing them, and also appreciate the fact that they're putting something into the community.

I had my 80th birthday earlier this year.

I still keep working.

My two knee replacements over the last couple of years have made a huge difference.

Papa six, Fair Isle ground radio check.

[radio chatter] FIONA (ON RADIO): Read you loud and clear.

Many thanks, Fiona.

You loud and clear also.

[siren blares] So now we're just going to go around the airfield to make sure there's no birds or sheep on the way.

Like there's two Arctic skua just in the middle here.

And this is going to do the siren and chase them away.

Don't really want the plane to crash into birds when it lands.

And there's a few more sheep on the threshold over there because there's no fence at the end of the runway.

So we're just going to make sure that they're not there when the plane maneuver.

[siren blares] [plane buzzes] [radio chatter] PILOT (ON RADIO): Morning inbound.

Two minutes to run, five on board, positioning at 06.

DAVE WHEELER: Two minutes to run, five on board, and positioning for 06.

The surface wind Fair Isle, 110 degrees, 07 knots, and no known traffic.

PILOT (ON RADIO): Copy.

Two minutes.

Roger.

I've lost my glasses now in the brightness.

[chuckle] They're on my head.

Silly.

[clears throat] [stirring music] ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ NARRATOR: This truly is a tiny island airport with a tiny departure lounge.

Your turn for a day trip NARRATOR: And a departure gate, which is literally a gate.

And where's Tommy?

He's supposed to be on this plane, I think, isn't he?

Unless he's gone on the boat.

It's like arrival of a small bus.

Unload one load of passengers, and then when they cleared the airstrip, the outgoing passengers carry their baggage across to the plane and hand it over to be loaded and then directed what seats to sit in.

AirTask one Fair Isle radio surface wind is 120 degrees at 07 knots and no known traffic.

AIRTASK (ON RADIO): Roger, AirTask.

Yeah, It feels good to be part of this effort at the airstrip and seeing people in and out and just keeping an eye on that all's done safely and things like that.

Yeah, it's good.

[light music] ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ NARRATOR: At the far end of the UK, 690 miles southwest of Fair Isle is the island of Tresco.

Part of the Isles of Scilly, it's just 2 miles long and 1 mile wide, with a year-round population of around 150.

The island of Tresco has been leased by the Dorrien-Smith family since 1831.

And the world-famous Abbey Gardens are their pride and joy.

With its subtropical climate, there's 17 lush acres with around 20,000 plants from 80 different countries.

The gardens are also a favorite spot for Tresco's population of red squirrels, who not only enjoy an island free from predators but also a daily breakfast, laid on by Kate, who's also in charge of the vegetable gardens.

Come on then, lovely.

Come on.

Let's put some food out for you.

So we feed the squirrels at about 10 o'clock every day, and so they know they're going to be fed then, and they're normally waiting.

And this is just a token feed.

They find their food wherever they can.

There's plenty of food for them all over the island.

We introduced 28 squirrels originally in 2014, and we think that there are now upward of 300 in the island.

If you see squirrels with really orange faces, it's because they've been feeding off the Puya plants which we have in the garden.

Inside, there's all this really nice pollen, and the squirrels absolutely love it.

They put their faces right in and they come out and they have these bright orange faces of the pollen.

[gentle music] ♪ ♪ But I was sort of trying to find somewhere I really wanted to settle.

And then when I came here, I just discovered this was where I wanted to be.

I was also very lucky to find my husband here.

So I'm married to Andy, who's the head gardener.

I mean, Andy has worked here, man and boy, and this is his life.

And he's-- he's so proud of the garden and rightly so.

♪ ♪ ANDREW LAWSON: Bit of a scruffy plant at this time of year, but always reminds me of sherbet lemons this one.

This is the ruins of the Benedictine Priory where the garden was started.

So 12th century, the first consecrated ground in Scilly.

Behind it is the house that was built in the 1830s for Augustus Smith and then for successive generations of the Dorrien-Smith family.

[water splashing] Once he found he could grow tender plants, Augustus had 25 gardeners working.

By the mid 1850s, the garden had already expanded to the 17 acres that it covers now.

There's some wonderful plants, like the Xeronima there with the red flowers.

This is the Poor Knight's Lily from just below the Bear Islands of New Zealand.

Rare to see it flowering in the UK.

KATE LAWSON: So here we go.

We'll lift it up and just see what's underneath.

Woo-hoo!

Look at that.

NARRATOR: Today, Kate's doing one of her favorite jobs, harvesting potatoes.

I first started gardening really because in my 20s I was diagnosed with bipolar disorder.

I was really struggling to find my way in life.

And I went to a work rehabilitation center, and they basically had a garden center.

We were making a little community garden at the time.

It was just a wonderful discovery.

I just suddenly found I loved being outside.

And it wasn't plain sailing, but it really made a big difference to me.

It was good to find peace, and I really have.

And I'm really keen that the veg garden here can be a, sort of, refuge for people as well, and a place where people can come and find a bit of peace.

So it's not just a productive garden, it's also a bit of a sanctuary for people.

It's certainly a sanctuary for me.

[lighthearted music] ♪ ♪ NARRATOR: Some of the tiny islands that surround the UK are truly majestic.

Others you might dismiss as little more than rocks, but that would be a mistake.

In Northern Ireland, 14 miles east of Belfast, lies the small coastal village of Groomsport, and sitting snugly in its harbor is Cockle Island, less than 50 square meters at high tide.

It may be truly tiny, but it's also vital for the Arctic, common, and Sandwich terns that come here from as far away as Africa to nest.

This is Hugh.

He works for the National Trust monitoring and protecting this important seabird colony.

Today, he's here to count nests and ring chicks helped by Jim, a volunteer.

Well, we're about to set off to Cockle Island.

It's not a big journey.

[chuckle] Just from Groomsport Harbor.

And our plan today is to do a nest count for Arctic and common terns that breed on the island.

But we are also out here to, hopefully, coloring the Sandwich tern chicks.

And there should be a reasonable number now.

[birds calling] Cockle Island, if you look at it from the shoreline, particularly at high tide, there doesn't seem to be very much to it.

Although it's extremely small, it's actually extremely important for breeding seabirds.

The species that breed on it, most of them are long-distance migrants.

They're wintering in the Southern Hemisphere, a lot of them, and they're breeding in the Northern Hemisphere.

So we'll basically go through the tern colony, marking and counting nests.

We actually use macaroni to mark the nest.

So essentially, to avoid double counting.

There's always a slight concern, might the bird try and feed a chick with the pasta?

But what we generally find is that the birds, when they come back to their nest and there's a little bit of pasta in it, they flick it away.

They just toss it away.

So we'll go down the right-hand side, Jim.

Yeah, first.

So I'll take that line.

HUGH THURGATE: Yeah, take the wrap line because some common tern might be on that.

[stirring music] ♪ ♪ You've got a huge number of seabirds in less than 50 meters by 30 meters.

So you have to watch every single step as you go through the colony.

It's very, very easy, if you're not careful, to tread on a nest.

♪ ♪ JIM MCNAIR: Just seen one of the biggest Sandwich tern chicks that have hatched this year.

It's just hunkered down in this bit of kelp so we'll get it and ring it on the next pass.

HUGH THURGATE: It's a privilege to be able to go out and access islands and be amongst breeding seabirds.

The whole impact of being in a bird colony, the cacophony of sound, the movement of birds.

It's something that a lot of people will never experience in their lives.

154 as a total between Arctic and common in the main colony on the 30th of May.

And today on the 7th of June, 165.

So just a very small increase.

JIM MCNAIR: Yup.

HUGH THURGATE: And then in the east colony, last time we got 29, this time we got 26.

Slightly down, but they may have lost a clutch or two with a high tide.

More vulnerable there.

They're more vulnerable there.

HUGH THURGATE: Now we want the birds to come back onto their nests to resume incubation, keep the eggs warm.

So we'll let them settle for maybe 10 minutes or so, 15.

And then we'll go back in and just ring a few of the Sandwich tern chicks.

[birds squawking] Yeah, so we're making sure that the ring is butted up properly so there's no crack where the-- the two sides of the ring join.

They need to be flush.

I want to make sure that ring doesn't slide over the joint, over the foot, and it doesn't.

We're also potentially going to get information from ringing recoveries.

We know from ringing studies where they overwinter, but there's lots of subtleties we don't know about.

And the color ringing, basically, we're doing that now to get better quality information on individual birds.

So in the first year, we ringed over a hundred birds and we got about 30 recoveries, 30 bits of information about individuals.

And some birds were seen three to four times on their migration.

In one-- in one season, we got four or five different bits of information about an individual bird.

[frenetic music] ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ Obviously, you want this colony to be successful for as long as it possibly can be, but it's extremely vulnerable now.

Sea level rise, obviously, is having an impact on breeding seabirds.

As the years go by, we'll find that spring tides are going to start regularly covering the island.

Eventually, it will become unsuitable for terns.

♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ NARRATOR: Just 70 miles north of Cockle Island, near the bottom of a string of islands on the West Coast of Scotland known as the Hebrides, is Gigha.

It's 7 miles long and 1 and 1/2 miles wide, with a population of about 110.

Its clear waters and shallow bays are perfect for growing oysters.

It's one reason Tony moved here from Edinburgh with his wife Catriona, bringing their son Archie, who was then just a baby.

He's now 12.

This is East Tarbert Bay on Gigha, and this is where we farm our oysters.

NARRATOR: Tony harvests 120,000 oysters a year, which have ended up in restaurants all over the world.

So when the oysters first come in, we buy them in this tiny spat about the size of your fingernail, and they have to go into a very fine mesh bag.

These have taken about four years, but sometimes they're ready in three years.

Well, the Hebrides all around, you can see the beautiful crystal-clear water.

It can be a bit cold so it means that they take a bit longer to grow.

But I think that-- that adds to the special flavor and the taste of oysters.

Growing oysters is such a sustainable way of producing food.

It could even be carbon positive, you know, but it's certainly a tiny carbon footprint.

The oyster shells themselves sequester carbon, and they filter the ocean, keep it clean.

We don't have to feed them.

There's no inputs.

So other than a little tiny bit of diesel to come down here in the tractor, that's really it.

Oysters and mussels also are very sustainable protein, something people can eat with a clean conscience.

There we go.

Good lad.

Always bring Archie in when he's-- when he's not at school.

He's a good help now, and he's a strong lad.

And he likes being out in the fresh air and helping his dad.

Do you think this look nice, Archie?

Aye, they look quite nice.

Yeah.

ARCHIE WALKER: I like being by the sea with the oysters.

And it's quite interesting seeing all the sea creatures that live in the bags with the oysters.

INTERVIEWER: Is your dad a good boss?

Yeah.

[chuckle] I'm not too strict, am I, Archie?

ARCHIE WALKER: No.

Like to be an oyster farmer when I grow up.

Seems like quite a good thing to do.

I would continue doing it here if I be an oyster farmer, which I probably will.

[chuckle] Strong lad.

I was actually training to be a primary school teacher, and I was in my final placement right up in the north of Scotland.

I decided it wasn't for me.

But I saw in the window of an estate agent up there an oyster farm for sale, and it, kind of, rang a little bell inside me.

I thought, that's interesting.

CATRIONA WALKER: I thought it was a great idea.

We found out more about it.

We spent a summer going up and down the west coast of Scotland looking for sites, and we thought, yeah, let's try Gigha.

Let's give it a go.

TONY WALKER: So yes, and we had to put our idea to the community.

Of course, Gigha is community owned.

I remember having to stand up in the village hall and do a presentation on our proposed oyster farm.

And then we had to leave the room, and everybody voted whether or not we could come and farm oysters.

And-- and thankfully, they voted that we could come and give it a go.

[lighthearted music] I didn't really always get on with bosses particularly well, you know.

I do have a new boss, which is the tide.

The tide that goes in and out every day dictates when I can work.

[mellow music] ♪ ♪ [gentle music] ♪ ♪ NARRATOR: Fair Isle is the most remote island community in the UK.

Situated northwest of the Scottish mainland, between the larger neighbors of Orkney and Shetland, its isolated location, climate, and lack of development make it a world-famous haven for seabirds.

But it's also been home to a proud community of people for thousands of years.

It's Tuesday, and the Good Shepherd is here with post and supplies for the island shop.

If weather permits-- and there's no guarantee of that-- the boat comes three times a week in the summer, just once a week in the winter.

I'll sing you a bit of a Fair Isle song.

NARRATOR: Eileen and her sons, Luca and Ander, are on their way down to the port to help unload.

♪ ♪ ♪ Far away, across the water ♪ ♪ Lies the dear land of our birth ♪ I was born and raised here.

Not actually born in Fair Isle because obviously you have to go to Shetland to be born in a hospital.

I suppose I moved here when I was three days old then.

♪ So far and wide or all the Earth ♪ We've got our family tree going back to the 1600s here in Fair Isle on my grandmother's side.

That's the amazing tie is so many people live in a place where you're not particularly connected to the place and we're completely the opposite.

I'm so connected to this place, and it's wonderful.

♪ But no heart can ever get her ♪ ♪ Our one beloved island home ♪ It was a lady who wrote it maybe four or five generations ago.

Because so many people from Fair Isle did leave, I think it, kind of, mirrors for me when I left Fair Isle to go and live in Edinburgh for a while and Glasgow.

Then this is always home.

You got anything, bits for us?

None for you!

Aw, come on.

I'll always come and help out at the boat when it comes back on a Tuesday.

There's usually quite a lot of mail and parcels and things like that.

So if you're collecting your own things, but you come up and help out as well.

It's fine to-- to give everyone a hand.

If a house becomes available here, the National Trust have quite a strict selection process.

Because by design, people who often want to live in a remote island, it's because they want solitude.

And actually, it's the last thing we need here.

If you want to live in a small island, you have to be really open.

You have to be really sociable and-- and enjoy the teamwork of it.

A few of the wrong people living in a place like this could really upset the balance, and we wouldn't have enough working bodies to do the essential jobs that we need to keep the island running.

[gentle music] ♪ ♪ I don't want the sea to come up and get us.

OK?

Or get our lovely castle.

ANDER: Neat.

That's all done.

EILEEN THOMSON: My summer holidays were spent here at the beach as well.

And I really like being able to take our kids so they get to do the same thing.

I mean, it's gorgeous.

Who wouldn't want to spend their summers here?

All right.

Give that a good pat.

How are you doing, Luca?

He's definitely a fisherman in the making, that boy.

You think, when we left, we lived in Edinburgh until he was two and he was mad about buses and trains.

And I remember thinking, we live near the railway.

I remember thinking, why am I taking this poor child who loves buses and trains to Fair Isle, where there's no buses and trains?

There are things you miss, but actually-- ANDER: Mum, here comes a big wave!

It's a big wave!

What they get here instead is irreplaceable.

[dramatic music] ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ Can you see the theme with our family?

The Argentina theme.

Where does daddy come from, boys?

BOTH: Argentina.

And did we go to Argentina recently?

BOTH: Yes.

NARRATOR: One of Eileen's paid jobs on the island is to finish off the famous Fair Isle jumpers made by other commercial knitters.

So you pick up the stitches for the shoulders, which would be here.

And then you pick up the matching ones on the back.

And what you need to do is you need to graft them together.

This is luxury.

I have a lot of jobs here in Fair Isle.

But this is my favorite job because it's very peaceful.

As probably a lot of my forebears going before me, you would sit outside in the sunshine because you get the best light to do the knitting.

So we have a pretty busy life here.

So it's nice having a job where you're forced to sit and be still.

[gentle music] ♪ ♪ My grandmother was from Fair Isle, and she was probably the last generation, along with her sisters of the people who would really have to knit from childhood.

So from four or five-year-old, they would start knitting.

And those things would be sold and would really add to the family income.

So she always knitted, and nanny was in her 90s and would still knit every day.

A lot of life has changed here.

We have modern homes and modern jobs and all the comforts you'd want living now.

But actually, I'm sure 200 or 300 years ago, there would have been women sitting outside when they had half an hour of peace in between cooking and feeding animals and doing the land work, and they would have been picking up their wires and knitting something or grafting it together.

And it's lovely to be able to continue in that, really.

Something I hope that my kids might choose to do.

They can both knit, so we're getting there.

[lighthearted music] ♪ ♪ NARRATOR: Over on the island of Gigha, which lies just off Scotland's west coast in the Inner Hebrides, Tony is busy in his oyster shed.

His latest harvest needs sorting and grading.

While dad is busy with oysters, in the garden, Archie and Catriona are looking through their moth trap.

We've got a bucket with an upside-down light shade and a light bulb.

The light bulb attracts the moths, and they get funneled into the bucket by it and rest on egg boxes inside the bucket.

This is a brown silver-line.

They're quite common, and they like living in bracken, and there's lots of bracken growing here.

There is, yeah.

There's someone on the other side as well.

Oh, that's a drinker.

CATRIONA WALKER: That's the first one of them we've had this year.

ARCHIE WALKER: Yeah.

I record them all.

And then I submit my results to our local county recorder, and they go into a big national database.

So this is a cinnabar moth.

They're a day-flying moth and they like ragwort.

ARCHIE WALKER: There's about 2,500 species of moth in Britain, and we've seen about 270.

Oh, here's one.

Who's that?

That is a map-winged swift.

Yep.

Better write it down.

ARCHIE WALKER: Mm-hm.

OK.

So the boathouse restaurant and local restaurant, they've just rang, and they want 50 oysters.

So these oysters have been in the purification tank for a minimum of 42 hours.

Sunshine seems to sell oysters.

Oysters and ice cream are what sells in the sunshine.

These are lovely looking oysters.

Maybe have a few for my dinner.

Yeah, I'm sure Archie will enjoy a few as well.

[gentle music] ♪ ♪ ARCHIE WALKER: I think it's a bit windy for butterflies.

♪ ♪ Our oysters used to go to a large oyster company, and then they went onwards to all around the world.

We know some went to Hong Kong, some went to Austria.

But in recent years, I've tried to develop so that they all stay fairly local, they stay in Britain.

Most of them are sold in Scotland.

But it's also really nice to do the local markets.

Nice people can come to Gigha and try a Gigha oyster in a little Gigha restaurant by the sea.

I've also got-- Wow!

We had some really big ones.

Gee whiz.

Oh, man.

TONY WALKER: Got some of these big-- CHEF: Those are fantastic.

They'd be fantastic as a special.

ARCHIE WALKER: I like being outside and seeing all the nature that lives here, all the moths and butterflies.

I like that it's quite remote.

It's not as remote as other islands in the Hebrides, but there's not so many people around.

You get more peace and quiet.

TONY WALKER: The name Gigha, I believe, means God's island.

I'm not a hugely religious person, but it certainly seems touched by something a bit magic.

[lighthearted music] NARRATOR: The island of Tresco is home to the Abbey Gardens.

Part of the Isles of Scilly, it sits off the western tip of Cornwall.

And its subtropical climate has helped to create a world-famous collection of plants that attracts 35,000 visitors a year.

Come on, girlies.

NARRATOR: It may be an oasis of calm just now, but Kate's got a hectic day ahead.

KATE LAWSON: Come on.

We've got a busy day today with cruise ships coming in.

So it's just a lovely, relaxing start to the morning, really.

And they're always pleased to see you, so it's nice.

There's Little Dorrit, which is this little black one up here.

She's very, very highly strung.

Other than that, they don't have names.

ANDREW LAWSON: Morning, guys.

Thanks for coming in early.

We've got today three ships in one day, about 350 people in all.

So we're going to have to be on the ball a little bit.

We just need to do the meet and greet at the entrance and organize transport.

So nice and easy.

KATE LAWSON: Cruise ship days are very different from our normal day in that we don't do any gardening.

I have certain jobs which I have to do regardless of whether there's a cruise ship in, like the chickens always need feeding.

And at the moment, I've got these eggs that I'm incubating and I need to turn those.

And watering, obviously, for everyone needs to be done.

So we have a sort of busy start to the day doing the crucial maintenance stuff, and then we're just very much involved in showing people around and hopefully making their experience of the garden as good as possible.

ANDREW LAWSON: Afternoon, everybody.

While you're still here altogether, coming back here for 5 o'clock.

The boat will be here a little bit earlier if you want to.

There will be gardeners up there to answer any questions and to give you a map of the gardens as well.

NARRATOR: Tresco is car free, and visitors are ferried about the island in electric carts.

ANDREW LAWSON: OK.

They're on the way to you.

The first boat you've got English, Australian, German, American.

Toilets to your left, garden cafe here, and main entrance there.

It's really wonderful to introduce people who wouldn't otherwise necessarily get to see the garden and be able to take them around and show them.

And generally speaking, people are amazed and delighted.

And it's-- it's a real honor to take people around, actually, because-- because they're really enjoying the experience.

[gentle music] Hello.

TOURIST: Hello.

Do you want a map of the garden?

Oh, thank you very much.

ANDREW LAWSON: I want them to be impressed with what we're doing, but also to understand the way that we garden.

Not try and force plants into liking an area, it's more about finding the area that the plants would like.

KATE LAWSON: We had two this morning, which was full.

And then, yeah, this afternoon, I think we've got about 145 so quite busy.

It does mean that we're very, very focused on the cruise ship itself and not on the gardening.

So it's nice at the end of the day to-- we have a once they've all gone, we have a bit of a clear up, and the garden sort of comes back to us again, and we can get on with our ordinary day-to-day jobs.

[gentle music] ♪ ♪ ANDREW LAWSON: I love having the garden to myself.

♪ ♪ Cruise ships have gone.

A bit of time to catch up.

So going through the beehives is something we do every six days, and it's to stop them swarming.

It's a lovely way to finish the day as long as you don't get stung.

♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ KATE LAWSON: It's really peaceful in this part of the garden.

Once the cruise ships have gone, it's lovely to come back here and have the peace and quiet of this area.

And it really is a real sanctuary here.

♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ [lighthearted music] NARRATOR: 690 miles northeast of Tresco is Fair Isle.

Just south of Shetland, it has also always had a close relationship with Norway.

The seas around Fair Isle were once a popular shipping route from Northern Europe.

And the island traded knitwear with passing ships.

Yes, this is where Fair Isle jumpers come from.

Firewoman Marie is also a knitwear designer.

A few years ago, she took over a croft.

No, I do have a sheepdog.

[chuckle] I'm Marie.

I'm French.

I moved here six years ago as I just fell in love with the island and the lifestyle, and I couldn't see myself settling anywhere else.

NARRATOR: Marie keeps a herd of around 50 sheep here.

And today, they're being gathered for shearing.

Oh, look at the rabbit.

NARRATOR: Marin and Alison, nieces of her neighbor, have been enlisted to help.

If one stay in the first third, I will go to the second-- oh, to the third, to the very top.

And if Alison, you go in, and then we walk all together towards the fence.

One escape, then they all escape.

That's fine.

I really love the scenery.

Like, just being surrounded by the sea and the big space.

It's so beautiful and then the sea always in the background.

I just really love the feeling of being on a tiny island.

OK.

I think they're going, but they can still turn back.

So yeah-- no, the door is open.

[lively music] ♪ ♪ Cool.

[goat bleats] Good, good, good!

NARRATOR: Like many Islanders, Marie prefers to shear by hand.

MARIE BRUHAT: So you can see where the new rule is coming.

And when the old wool wolves separate like on this one.

I could probably like, just push it all by hand.

You keep the shears kind of like parallel to their skin so you don't cut them.

But it is a bit faster to just clip just below where the wool separates.

The sheep we have on Fair Isle mainly are pure Shetland.

The wool is very suitable for Fair Isle knitting because it, kind of, felt together once it's washed.

It's really sustainable, and I love that the mill that I buy the wool from is just on the next island.

The wool I clip from my sheep is then sold to that factory, and then I buy wool from them to make my garments.

If you look at Fair Isle knitting, they all use different motifs.

So there's different stripes of motif, but all the motifs are different.

And this is one of the criteria for a traditional Fair Isle.

The reason Fair Isle knitting became so famous is because of the localization of the island.

It was in the highway of the time where all the maritime traffic was passing by the island, and people on the island were really good at making use of that and trading with the passing ship.

And that's why they got lots of dyes and were able to get very bright color before everyone else and-- in this region.

[gentle music] ♪ ♪ So when I start a new design, I kind of think what pattern I want to use, and I select them from archive books, where I've got all the charts of traditional patterns that were used on the island.

It's not a process that can happen without someone behind the machine.

It's very much a craft, and it's not like printing jumper in a factory.

This is my favorite view, the view I've got out here with the hill is called Malcolm's Head, and the sea is just my favorite place.

The big window makes the most of the view.

So if 10 years ago, you would have told me that I could make a living out of knitting and being a designer, and also have sheep and live by the sea, I wouldn't have believed you.

So one sleeve knitted, one more to go.

[frenetic music] ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪