Lynsey Smith | Non-Executive Trustee | Chair

Lynsey is a creative economy consultant with almost 20 years of experience. She has gathered expertise from working in high-profile roles for the British Council, Nesta, The Lighthouse and Creative Edinburgh. Lynsey has strong strategic and leadership skills and is bold in her thinking, building an international network and reputation for her pioneering work with creative hubs.

Lynsey has gained an invaluable international perspective on the global creative economy after leading on the development of more than 100 projects and programmes in more than 40 countries across Africa, Europe, South America and Southeast Asia, in order to advocate or support sustainable creative economies. She spearheaded the creation of the Creative Hubs & Communities portfolio, a brand-new global portfolio for the British Council, which she led and internationalised.

Previously, Lynsey was co-founder and Executive Director of Creative Edinburgh, one of Europe’s largest creative hubs for the creative, cultural and tech sectors of Edinburgh. Lynsey has been responsible for shaping numerous enterprise programme offers for organisations like Nesta, the Eden Project, the British Council, Creative & Cultural Skills and Creative Spark. Most recently, she co-designed a brand-new global leadership programme in partnership with Clore Leadership. Lynsey is an RSA Fellow and alumna of Future Leaders.

Jodie Barnacle-Best | Non-Executive Trustee | Vice Chair

Jodie is a dedicated creative projects facilitator working with arts and cultural organisations across Scotland. An MA graduate from Glasgow School of Art, since 2021 Jodie has gained valuable experience working across community arts settings in Dumfries and Galloway, Edinburgh and Renfrewshire.  

Jodie is deeply committed to facilitating greater connections amongst individuals using creative methods within local communities. She has strong networking, partnership and organisational development skills and is passionate about fostering inclusive cultural spaces. Her work to date has seen her engage with over 300 artists and cultural practitioners and programme, organise and deliver cultural activity for attendees aged 4 to 65+. She is experienced at coordinating cultural activity in settings where opportunity to engage creatively is limited, such as care homes, hospitals and prisons.  

Jodie’s first connection with The Stove came in 2021 where she was a Creative Associate in the Creative Spaces programme. She developed and delivered professional community arts workshops, talks, and other creative activity aimed at engaging young people in Dumfries and Galloway alongside a team of 3 other exciting and inspiring emerging young creatives. It was this experience which lit a fire to further explore opportunities to engage with communities and enabled her to see how she could utilise her skillset in the most personally fulfilling and meaningful way. 

Since then, Jodie has worked on freelance programmes and projects for Creative Renfrewshire, Rig Arts, and Refractive Collective alongside her role as Communities Programme Assistant for the Edinburgh International Book Festival. She sat on the Craft Scotland advisory board between 2021-2024 and has been delighted to sit on The Stove board since May 2022.

Erica Judge | Non-Executive Trustee | Treasurer

Erica is a Director of Funds at Inspiring Scotland, which provides financial and practical support to more than 700 of Scotland’s third-sector organisations. She was instrumental in launching Creative Communities and Rural Communities Ideas into Action, two community-led development programmes. She brings with her over 20 years of experience in change management, financial strategy, and commercial delivery roles.

A US native from New York City, Erica holds an MBA from the Wharton Business School and began her career as a diplomat with the US Foreign Service. She has subsequently worked with a variety of FTSE 50 companies, most recently in the banking and retail sectors. Passionate about community-led change, equity, and improving access to opportunity for all, Erica is motivated by a desire to make the world better by helping people and organisations achieve their objectives.

Erica has lived in the UK for over two decades, with half that time in Scotland. She was previously a trustee of the Curiosity Collective, a charity working to give children the freedom to explore the world of learning beyond the classroom. She enjoys reading and exploring the outdoors with her two sons and adopted greyhound.

Linny Oliphant | Non-Executive Trustee

An authority in luxury brand development, PR, and marketing, Linny’s 25-year career spans tourism and hospitality, fashion and textiles, luxury automotive, and premium spirits.

Linny, the former fashion editor of The Sunday Herald Magazine, is a contributor to several lifestyle titles and is regularly quoted in the press. Having served as a director at University of the Arts London, Linny is an ambassador for linking industry and education and remains a university external assessor.

During her eight-year tenure as brand manager at Johnstons of Elgin, she was credited with revitalising the historic cashmere and fine woollens manufacturer, bringing it to the forefront of the luxury market and founding the renowned collaboration with Scottish fashion designer Christopher Kane.

Returning to her home region of Dumfries and Galloway in 2014, Linny spearheaded the Annandale Distillery project, including developing the state-of-the-art visitor centre and arranging the official opening of the site by HRH The Princess Royal.

Particularly passionate about tourism and creativity, Linny is the product and destination development manager of the SSDA (South of Scotland Destination Alliance) and is proud to be on The Stove’s board of directors. With a love of classic cars, Linny is the founder and owner of The Love Bug D&G, South West Scotland’s classic VW company based in Lockerbie, which offers chauffeur-driven wedding cars, corporate promotions, mobile bars, and bespoke tours with door-to-door service. Popular food and drink itineraries include the VW Chocolate Tour and the VW Distillery Trail.

Tessa Gordziejko | Non-Executive Trustee

Tessa is a theatre-maker—creative producer, director, writer, performer—and a consultant specialising in organisational and creative development with arts companies.

She was a Fellow of the Clore Leadership Programme 2005–07 and has over 20 years’ experience in leadership roles in the cultural sector. These include Creative Programmer for London 2012 and Director of imove, a £3.2 million 2012 Cultural Olympiad programme comprising 32 projects across Yorkshire; Executive Director of Unlimited Theatre; and Chair of Red Ladder Theatre. In 2013, she established imove Arts as an independent production company that created socially engaged arts projects which connected groups of citizens and communities with a deep set of ideas or themes, framed through collaboration with artists.

Tessa has a passion for, and a wide experience of, making site-specific performances in unusual, mostly outdoor settings, and is engaged in networks of artists making work about climate and ecological breakdown. She is also a performing poet. Having lived and worked in the north of England for 30 years, she moved to Dumfries & Galloway in 2021, and since then she has worked as a producer for several Scottish companies. She is a founding member of The Forest Ridge Project, an arts-led, off-grid cooperative which embraces rewilding, growing food, and creative connections with land, nature, and communities.