Introducing… Helen Green

In the latest edition of our R&I bulletin we introduce Helen Green, Senior Associate in our London office. Helen tells us where in the world they would live for a year, the fashion trends which should be making a comeback and what superpower they would choose.

You have your own late night talk show; who do you invite as your first guest?

After their recent performances, Sam Smith. They are doing so much to strip away the traditional concepts of what it means to present gender and body positivity in a patriarchal structural society in the face of so much backlash and hate. I would be interested in discussing how living through decades of shifting attitudes of society, and in personal spaces, towards the understanding and expression of sexuality and gender has impacted their life and shaped it. I think we would have a lot of common stories.

If you could live anywhere in the world for a year, where would it be and why?

Most likely South Korea; I would love to travel there later this year. I am (very slowly) learning Korean and as everyone around me knows am pretty obsessed with K-pop and the hallyu wave. It also has a lot of wonderfully diverse galleries and culture centres, not to mention the amazing food. If HCR want to send me off to be a Foreign Legal Consultant, I will say yes in a heartbeat!

If you could choose any two famous people to have dinner with, who would they be?

Baroness Hale is an absolute icon. The first female -judge in the Supreme Court and its first woman president; she is a vocal feminist, constantly advocating for women’s rights and greater judicial diversity. She has also presided over some fascinating cases that have impacted on the lives of everyone in the UK.

Kim Nam-Joon, whilst obviously most famous for being the leader of BTS (also breaking records with his recent solo release), he also holds the title special presidential envoy for future generations and culture and as such has spoken at the UN and is vocal in preserving and protecting his own (and global) cultural and art. He is someone who has also had to live with his words affecting the lives of others and has seen national laws changed as a result of their impact.

What is the best thing you have bought so far this year?

My gym membership, I am currently regretting it because it’s been too long, but I have just signed up for boxing classes and I’m really excited about that.

If you could bring back any fashion trend, what would it be?

I love fashion and I love historical clothing. Currently my sewing obsessions are Edwardian tea gowns. As we are all freezing and as much better alternative to the Oodie (love my leopard print one but it’s not exactly outside stylish), tea gowns are a heavy over gown designed to be worn to keep warm when lounging in the house, but fancy enough for taking tea with guests or dining in the home. It always has a train, for swishing about, and the under dress was made of linen or cotton and often allowed for much looser corsetry.

What simple food will you never eat?

As a coeliac, bread.  But , donuts are the one bread-a-like that I always think of as amazing, in my mind they are fluffy clouds of hot, soft, sugary joy. I am informed this is not the case.

What is the most obscure superpower you would want and why?

I’m currently reading ‘before the coffee gets cold’ by Toshikazu Kawaguchi (on my commute), the premise of which is a café that has the power to send you back in time but with very limited scope; it can send you back to that café, you can’t move from your seat, the future will not change no matter what you do, you can only stay as long as it takes to drink a coffee, and you must drink the coffee before it goes cold.  The book explores the idea that whilst this appears to be very limited, it is actually very powerful allowing the patrons to get closure, to look at their memory of an event in a new way and take away a new lesson from the one they have been left with before. I think that idea of being able to look again at something with fresh eyes and to help people heal is a massively underrated superpower.