Britain has, as the Daily Mash so marvellously put it, been ‘hit by entirely typical weather’ for this autumnal time of year. This has brought the unseasonably warm spell we were enjoying a week or so ago conclusively to an end, and an email from my old buddy Nick Cobbing pops into my inbox.

Nick is a multi-award winning photo journalist who for the last few years has undertaken major missions to Greenland and the Arctic Circle with Greenpeace to creatively capture the shifting situation at the top of our world. You’ve probably seen Nick’s compelling images before, as they have graced many a publication and media outlet (see Nick’s lovely website here).

Nick’s images are as always powerful, visceral and challenging. One of this year’s story emerging story themes is ‘Where the ice goes to die’, a series of amazing pictures whose scale is impossible to determine, microscopic ice crystals or vast crumbling frozen seascapes? They are also ethereally and aesthetically beautiful, the strange, fractured geometry of fragmenting ice sheets and floes, the weird granular textures set against the icy blackness of the forbiddingly cold waters below. These are the photographic canary in the coalmine of our changing world and grip me every time I see them.

A lot of Nick’s work is dedicated to documenting the endeavours of the pioneering polar scientists who are studying the impacts of climate change so it’s also lovely to see the playful curiosity of a polar bear cub toying merrily with a piece of monitoring equipment. Mother in the background however is an altogether more powerfully menacing prospect…

A couple of Nick’s pictures grace Futerra’s home here at Number Four. They are a daily reminder of one of the key reasons why we do what we do. So thanks Mr Cobbing for your ongoing inspiration and the good news is after several months in the Arctic you’re back to London just in time for winter!

: )