Five places that changed my life: Karen McCartney, design and architecture writer

GREECE

I grew up in Belfast where drizzle was the dominant weather pattern and family holidays involved a car trip to Donegal on the west coast of Ireland or striking across the Irish Sea to drive to St Ives in Cornwall. We had a white plastic potty in the back of the car for emergency vomits. I can picture it to this day. So as a university student to go to the Greek island of Mykonos for six weeks – to drink retsina, eat Greek salads and octopus and lounge around on a beach called Super Paradise was the height of sophistication. We were even cast as extras in a Darryl Hannah movie – one I suspect she would like to forget – and were paid with a small amount of cash and a large amount of food.

VIETNAM

When my husband and I were first married we made a three-month backpacking trip around Thailand, Indonesia, Malaysia and Vietnam. I had never experienced the heat, humidity and cockroaches and initially found the experience quite challenging. Vietnam was full of highs and lows as we travelled from Ho Chin Min City to Dalat and then on to historic Hoi An and Hanoi. While we had amazing food, and met some fascinating people, one rookie error was to hire a motorbike and ride north of Halong Bay into an open cut coal mining area. I was catatonic with rage when we returned to the hotel eight hours later.

JAPAN

We took our two children to Japan – which they described not so much a holiday as an adventure. We had a great time in Tokyo with friends who knew it well and then we travelled to Gifu to see the making of Noguchi lights and on to Kyoto to see the Katsura Imperial Villa and the Ryoanji Temple.

FRANCE

My parents bought a converted French barn in the Lot et Garonne area of France in the 1980s and I have been visiting there ever since. We stay in Paris for three nights and then get the train south to the sunflower fields and quintessentially French stone farmhouses of the area. The children amazed us when they pulled large, and I have to say grotesque, garlic fried snails from their shells and wolfed them down.

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