Actor and mummy blogger Teresa Palmer on motherhood, her Adelaide Hills home and new show on Binge

Australian actor Teresa Palmer has some sound advice for other parents as she opens up about retreating from LA to the Adelaide Hills and her latest magical character screening on Binge.

Actor Teresa Palmer says motherhood will always come first. Picture: Sam Tabone/Wire Image

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If you want to give your baby a non-traditional name, keep it to yourself.

That’s the advice of Australian screen star Teresa Palmer — mum to six-year-old Bodhi, three-year-old Forest and one-year-old Poet — who warns other people may try to change your mind if you let slip too soon.

“Don’t share your name with too many people because you’ll get lots of unsolicited advice and judgment,” Palmer said.

“When we first named our daughter Poet, my stepmum was saying ‘but isn’t that a masculine name?’ but now they love it.”

The 34-year-old, who runs the Your Zen Mama blog in addition to her stellar acting career, is speaking from her rural base in “really chilly” South Australia, where she has been hunkering down with the kids and husband, actor-director Mark Webber.

Located in the Adelaide Hills, the 4ha property has been home since January when Palmer and her family made a hasty retreat from northern Italy.

Teresa Palmer with her family at sunset at Port Willunga Beach, SA. Picture: Carmen Yeates, @rosegrace_photography

Palmer was shooting her hit TV show A Discovery Of Witches in the small castle village of Monselice, a two-hour drive from Milan, as the COVID-19 pandemic started to take hold.

Now safely back in her hometown, Palmer and her children are loving being among nature despite the wintry gloom.

“I feel recharged when I’m out with nature,” said Palmer.

“It’s one of the reasons why I decided to move from the big city of LA to a piece of spacious land in the Adelaide Hills.

“It’s incredibly important to me to get back to nature. For me, it’s a big part of my life.”

Two seasons in, Witches is one of the gems in the catalogue of new streaming service Binge.

Palmer plays historian Diana Bishop, who discovers she comes from a long line of witches and gets drawn into a captivating world of magic.

Describing the character as colourful and a joy to play, Palmer added: “She’s riddled with vulnerability and doubt, yet she’s hyper-intellectual and dynamic and charismatic … I loved playing a strong female character.”

Palmer said that pre-coronavirus the plan was to start filming season three of the show in September, “but who knows with the current climate”.

Matthew Goode as Matthew Clairmont and Teresa Palmer as Diana Bishop in A Discovery of Witches. Picture: Binge/Sky

Given her string of impressive film credits, which most recently includes the award-winning Hacksaw Ridge (2016), and Michelle Payne biopic Ride Like A Girl (2019), you might think acting is her main focus.

But for Palmer, motherhood will always come first.

Along with her internationally successful blog which chronicles previous pregnancies and births, she released a parenting book, Zen Mamas, co-written with American actress Sarah Wright Olsen, in April.

Expanding on the themes in her blog, the book provides tips, advice and support for anyone raising a child, and offers some candid truths about how to stay “Zen” through the chaos.

“Being a mummy is simply my favourite thing on this earth,” Palmer said.

Last month, she also toasted the first birthday of her nutritional plant-based supplement, Lovewell, with “clean and lean” fitness advocate Christiane Duigan, formerly of the international Bodyism empire.

“We started @lovewell.earth with the desire to fold our passion for parenting, wellness and simplifying the complexities of family life, into an essential, plant-based, immune-boosting product that supports all busy households,” Palmer said.

“We sit and look at what has unfolded in the first year and we still feel overwhelmed by the way our little business has been embraced.”

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