ADRIAN-FLETCHER.COM
Photo: Vicki Dawson
This is one of the Paradoxplace group of websites and website names created by Adrian Fletcher, aka "Dom Paradox" and "Adriano".
Paradoxplace is a fascinating site which uses hundreds of the best photos you will find on the web to bring to life people, art, palaces, cathedrals, abbeys and travels in medieval Italy, France, Spain, Portugal and Britain, accompanied by some of the best food you can eat whilst discovering these.
The websites Paradoxplace, Ciao Adriano, Bellatrovata, and Domparadox are the main web creations of Adrian Fletcher - traveller, foodie, photographer, medieval historian and sometime banker, university don and physicist.
Adrian was born of British (army) parents in Cairo during the Second World War, then lived and was schooled in Hythe and Sandwich in Kent, in the south east of England. He started his working life with English Electric in the UK midlands, after obtaining degrees in Physics and Management from Imperial College, London (where he was also Student Union President). He came to Australia in 1972 via South Africa, where he had spent three years building up a computer bureau for Rand Mines. During the early seventies he directed the MBA business and public policy courses at the Graduate Business School at NSW University, and then moved to head up planning and finance for a large packaging manufacturer in Sydney.
He married in 1974 (the marriage was dissolved in 1994) and has three children, now all in their twenties and thirties.
In 1980 Adrian became the youngest general manager of Australia's largest private sector bank (the Bank of New South Wales), then later Westpac Banking Corporation's Chief Financial Officer, putting together systems and teams to operate in the newly deregulated banking environment in areas as diverse as finance and accounting, capital management, strategy and its implementation, mergers and acquisitions, economics, government relations, management systems and organizational development. He spent the years 1987 - 90 based in the City of London as Head of Westpac’s Global Investment Banking Group, was a member of the bank's Executive Committee, and senior board member of several subsidiaries including stockbroker Ord Minnett.
During the 1990s Adrian was Chairman of several Australian public companies in the Petsec Energy Group, and also undertook a range of advisory and management consulting assignments. In parallel with this and the pursuit of wide ranging reading and music interests, he also set out to learn more about alternative approaches to understanding people in the context of organizations. This was driven by the clear need to do something about the observably large number of unengaged (alienated) people in most large (private and public) organizations, and the number of unsustainable strategies being followed by these organizations.
In 1999 he spent time as a coach to the top management team of The Smith Family (a major Australian not for profit organization), with a particular interest in laying the foundations for a significant expansion in their Learning for Life program. This program gives monetary and advisory help to Australian children who do not have the resources to, for example, pay for textbooks, clothing, school outings or a number of other things that are not part of the "free" education system. Reliable statistics show that an unbelievable 700,000 plus Australian children (or around a quarter of the school age population) are exposed to various forms of social exclusion as a result of parental poverty.
Widely travelled in Europe, North America and Asia, Adrian decided to spend the year 2000 on sabbatical in Central Tuscany in Italy (amongst other things working with Australian Greg Page's well known real estate company - Alfaimmobiliare di Gregory Page - in Castellina in Chianti). During this time he became known as Adriano, produced (after intensive research) a guide to Restaurants, Food and Festivals in Chianti, Siena, Florence and Umbria, got into digital photography, and started work on "The World of the Middle Ages, Italian Renaissance and Central Tuscany" easy to read histories / chronologies (especially useful to visitors to Florence, Siena, etc) which are now part of the Paradoxplace website. All of which morphed eventually into a website called paradoxplace.
Now dividing his time between Australia and Europe, much of this is spent on developing Paradoxplace and its associated websites and activities. Paradoxplace itself continues to grow in content and coverage and visitor numbers (3000 - 4000 a day in early 2008), and to kindle the author's curiosity (which is learning for fun!) ... and of course there is an obligatory requirement for regular visits to Italy and Europe for research purposes, the latter also being food for Ciaoadriano, Bellatrovata and Domparadox.
A fortunate life, full of interesting and rich friendships and experiences and the opportunity to continue and use these to facilitate worthwhile projects, learning, interest and involvement.
All material © Adrian Fletcher 2000-08 - The contents may not be hotlinked or reproduced without permission.
Feedback and comments to afletch at paradoxplace dot com