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Trees have the remarkable ability to pass knowledge down to succeeding generations and to survive the ravages of climate change, if only we’d let them alone, according to the German forester Peter Wohlleben. In The Power of Trees (translated by Jane Billinghurst) he explains the significance of leaving ancient forests untouched, and is scathing about the failures in forestry management and the planting of non-native trees for profit. Jill Butler is an ancient tree specialist and a trustee of the Tree Register of the British Isle which records the nation’s ‘champion trees’ – the tallest and biggest trees of their species. But she’s also keen on getting the public involved in helping to find and care for some of the country’s oldest trees with the citizen science project, Ancient Tree Inventory, run by the Woodland Trust.The healing powers of ancient trees is celebrated in stories throughout history, including the great Icelandic sagas. In The Norse Myths That Shape the Way We Think Carolyne Larrington, Professor of medieval European Literature explores the renewal that comes from the roots of Yggdrasill, the World Tree.Producer: Katy Hickman

Why is it so difficult to find a place to call home? By the age of twenty five the journalist Kieran Yates had lived in twenty different houses, from council estates in London to a car showroom in rural Wales. In All The Houses I’ve Ever Lived In she reveals the reality of Britain’s housing crisis, the state’s neglect, and the toll it takes on those forced to move from place to place.In her memoir Undercurrent the writer and poet Natasha Carthew compares the picture-postcard view of her native Cornwall with the reality of growing up there. She explores the impact of rural poverty, political neglect, and the dominance of second-home owners, but also the sheer beauty of the landscape she calls home.Christine Whitehead OBE is a specialist in housing economics and evaluates government policies on home ownership and housing supply. She looks at the unintended consequences of implementing policies, like rent caps and controls on buying housing stock in rural areas, and the impact of Covid on the rental market. The architect Alice Brownfield, Director at Peter Barber Architects, advocates for high density, mixed-use residential schemes for local councils and housing associations. Her practice has been recognised for its work in developing social housing, often on small plots of land, that centres on fostering a sense of community.Producer: Katy HickmanImage: Kiln Place, by Peter Barber Architects just after completion. Image credit: Morley von Sternberg

The artist Ai Weiwei has always enjoyed ignoring the boundaries between disciplines, fusing art, architecture, design, collecting and social activism. He’s now taken over the Design Museum in London (from 7th April – 30th July 2023), filling it with his work and collections - from millions of handcrafted porcelain sunflower seeds to Lego pieces and broken teapot spouts dating back to the Song Dynasty. The exhibition, Making Sense, explores what we value - from what we perceive to be precious or worthless, to the tensions between the past and present, as well as work made by hand and machine. The engineer Roma Agrawal invites readers to marvel at the design of many of the small but perfectly formed inventions that have changed the world. In Nuts & Bolts she deconstructs complex feats of engineering to focus on the nail, spring, wheel, lens, magnet, string and pump.The economist Bent Flyvbjerg is also interested in deconstructing things, but he's focused on ambitious multi-million pound projects to find out why the vast majority are significantly over-budget and past their deadline. In How Big Things Get Done he extolls the virtue of 'thinking slow, acting fast', and how megaprojects that are designed with Lego-building in mind are more likely to succeed.Producer: Katy HickmanImage credit: close up of Monet's Water Lilies in Lego, constructed by Ai Wei Wei - photo copyright by Ela Bialkowska OKNO Studio