To Bournemouth In Quest Of Beauty

Well as ever we managed to cram much into our annual September long weekend in Bournemouth.

This year we tried a different hotel - gee that was a mistake.Let's just say we won't be staying there again!


Having said that the location was good and the other side of Bournemouth to where we usually stay. We checked in and went for a mooch round town, ate chips on the beach (because that's what you have to do because it's the seaside law) then took a lovely long walk to Boscombe and back to clear the cobwebs.
We called in for a drink on the seafront at Boscombe and watched with interest whist a bunch of ladies did a boot camp circuit training thing right under our noses, I guess it's more fun to do on and around the beach than in a gym? I can't say circuit training has ever appealed, I'm fat, lazy and get bored easily for a start, drinking wine whilst someone else exercises is always going to win.

On Friday we decided to visit The Russell Cotes Museum because they had a Mucha exhibition 'In Quest Of Beauty' on and Himself is a big fan of Mucha.

 I'm somewhat ashamed that I have never visited this amazing museum before now, it is everything I love in a small museum and the extraordinary Mucha exhibition was just the icing on the cake.

The Museum was actually the Russell-Cotes family home before they donated it and it's contents to the people of Bournemouth. Finished in 1901 and crammed full of all the things that they collected on their extensive world travels, the museum somehow still manages to maintain the warm feeling of being in someone's home rather than an institution. 

I know it's not everyone's taste, and it was even a bit too full of stuff for me if I'm truly honest! but wow did this cliff top house with it's stunning sea views make me wish I could live there!! Look at the beautiful peacock mural, this went all around the whole room.
Below are just a few of the many pictures I took. More of fixtures and fittings than views of the rooms as you will see.

There was even an elephant stained glass window so how was I not going to love it?

 I was also taken with this beautiful side table.

Part of the ceiling came down at one point so it was repainted in the 1930's with this deliciously Art Deco version of Venus.

Look at the detail,on this door furniture. This is the door to the Lily Langtry toilet no less!

The swallow stained glass was repeated often through the whole house.

I loved this painting on the landing.

 

One room had peacocks the other had slightly more sinister crows!

The gorgeous stained glass dome above the stairs and all this before we even got to the Mucha exhibition.

We both thoroughly enjoyed the exhibition, though as a graphic designer (Himself) and an ex-art student (Me) we both would have liked to see many more of his preparatory sketches. The skill and detail of the few that were there was astonishing.

Mucha was also very interested in photography and there were some wonderful pictures he took himself to use as preliminary ideas for future works. 

   I do love to see originals of prints I have at home, we have the two pictures above as wall plaques. All in all very well worth the visit and somewhere I will most definitely go again.
There was even a fabulous 13th century statue of Ganesh borrowed from the British Museum on display

We didn't stay to sample the busy cafe though I gather it is very good, but did do a quick browse of the gift shop where I bought this print of an old railway poster.

As we still had the afternoon ahead of us and the weather had decided to behave we took a long walk along the seafront to Southbourne and back.

Quick cheeky cider and a sit down!


On Saturday I did my annual meet up with my friend Alison. This year she took me to visit Emporium in Christchurch. It's quite new and still not fully open but we had great fun browsing the mad mix of crafts, gifts and vintage. I ended up buying loads of bits and pieces and this was where I nearly bought the other red vintage handbag, but in the end the price tag was just a little too much given it's well loved condition.
Ironically I was just telling Alison how I never ever wear skirts anymore when I found an absolute beauty for £2! A full tartan swing style skirt in the right length for me, a bit too big but well it had to be done.

Now I just need to get over the skirt thing and actually wear it!

So what else did I buy?

A make your own brooch kit and cat print scarf for my Mum not pictured

Who could resist this cat egg cup?

A ceramic brooch.

and a pressed glass jug that went straight into service catching the water that was dripping through the ceiling when we got home! 



   

Gladrags, Handbags & Elephants

The time has come the walrus said to talk of many things.
Mostly because I haven't got around to blogging for about a month and much has gone on in between!
It's not that I haven't meant to, I even had a post kind of semi ready to go but somehow I lacked the oomph.
I think even though I have been determined not to let all the upsets and dramas of the year dampen my usual positive outlook I will admit it has taken it out of me and I'm bloody tired right now. 
The clear indication being I'm ill and can hardly crawl out of bed in the morning at the moment

also our usual blissful jaunt to Bournemouth has not recharged the batteries as much as I had expected. 

Anyway this to shall pass and really I should pick up where I left off and share the damn magnificent parcel or joy that was waiting for me when I got home from the Nettlebed sale. 

To give it it's correct name it was actually a parcel of elephant joy.

I'm sure I burst the eardrums of every dog in the district with my squeal when I opened this amazing and spot on gift from Curtise 
I have been eyeing up the recycled elephant cement purses and bags on Ebay for a while now so I was beyond thrilled to find one inside.
Both brooches have already had an outing as well!

Whilst we are on the subject of elephants I celebrated World Elephant Day by buying this really rather lovely set of bedding on a day out with my Ma.

It's actually my 3rd set of elephant bedding and I honestly couldn't choose between them so don't even ask.

There has been much, MUCH clothes buying in the month just gone. I share with you here a mere fraction of all my purchases. I'm not sure why there was such a frenzy but I just went with it.

I will justify it by saying not a one was full price. 

Chazzas, the sales, vouchers and birthday money have combined, but yes it did get a bit manic, I might have to share it in dribs and drabs over the next few posts and that doesn't include the boring things like socks pants and jeans!

Two Hell Bunny dresses off the bay of E. Black one for work blue one might just be  for a wedding that I have coming up.....

Charity shop tea dress and a too much wine, egged on by twitter, impulse Ebay deer print buy.

   








Hedgehog print dress! Hedgehogs you say, and in the sale? Plus 2 money off coupons that are valid on sales goods? Don't mind if I do!
Ok so on me it is actually more of a top than a dress but still, hedgehogs...

An I'm on holiday blouse purchase when I was actually looking for some kind of cheap footwear I could happily not care about wearing on the beach.

I did find them too in the shape of navy blue canvas flats for £4 by the way. I also picked up another dress at the same time for a fiver but that's in the laundry basket.

So what else? We had some friends from Newcastle drop by unexpectedly which was lovely. We haven't seen them for about 5 years so it was great to catch up over dinner, though kind of frightening to see how much the kids had grown. Children have a way of reminding you just how quickly time passes.

I went out for afternoon tea twice.
Once at Soo's house with our friend Simon where we did our level best to create a Prosecco shortage in Oxfordshire whilst stuffing our faces and laughing like drains.
And once in a far more civilized fashion at Patisserie Valerie with an Amazon Local voucher.

I also did a summer taster menu dinner at Jamie's in Oxford with Soo and Melissa, again a cracking Amazon Local deal.
No wonder I have piled 'The Half Stone' back on again *le sigh*

The bank holiday weekend we went to stay with Mum and help her sort some stuff at the house as well as do our annual pilgrimage to the Stonor Park Craft Fair.

I bought the above necklace and glass pendant, which was made from a piece of a broken lilac patterned milk jug apparently.
I also bought a glass elephant for the Christmas tree, but he is safely wrapped up until he will be needed in December.

Finally I bought a couple of vintage bags.

The beaded one at the top was 0.01p plus postage!?! It's in immaculate condition so I still can't quite believe it was only a penny. I though there would be some terrible fault but nope it's perfect.

The red leather one is a Clarks bag, I'm thinking 1970's?

 I still trawl regularly for my holy grail green 1940s/50s handbag, I haven't found it yet, but I've turned up some other crackers on the way.

Finally we had a long weekend in Bournemouth, there will be a very picture heavy post to follow!

The weather was kind, sadly the hotel was not kind at all, safe to say we won't stay there again.
We did the amazing Russell Cotes Museum and I met my friend Alison who whisked me off to the Emporium in Christchurch where I dithered over another red vintage handbag but ultimately left without it, though I did buy some other wonderous bargains.(see next post!)

We arrived home to water coming though the back bedroom ceiling, I can only thank god we weren't away for 2 weeks!
So I now have the joys of a stained and smelly carpet to freshen up tomorrow as it's finally dried out.

Also home to the sad news that Mum's cat of 20 years Missy, (or Mishka the Russian spycat as she was known internationally) had taken a turn for the worse and sadly had to be put to sleep on Monday.
She had been steadily failing recently, so we were all expecting it, but after all that has gone on this year it really was a bit like the straw that broke the camel's back for my poor Mum.
I have spent a fair bit of my spare time doing things with her this week, including a day off today.

We had a gentle bimble around a fab garden centre that's near her house and is called World's End, I have to say I have always found that a hilarious name for a plant nursery.

I love that I can go into work on Monday and say I went to the world's end to buy winter flowering pansies on Friday!   
  

It's Charity Shop Shopping, but on a Mammoth Scale.

So I finally made it to the sheer madness that is the Sue Ryder Sale at Nettlebed. Of course I forgot my camera *sigh* so you'll have to make do with a couple of crappy shots from my phone - sorry!

Held in the grounds and out buildings of their gorgeous care home in Nettlebed (most lately used in The Imitation Game as the exterior of Bletchley Park, in case it looks familiar)

the Sue Ryder sale is absolutely legendary in the Oxfordshire area.
It happens every 3 weeks for just 2 hours and the rule is to get there early, in the case of the clothes sale, very, very early.
It starts at 10.30am so we got there at about 9.30am and there was already brisk trade going on at the garden bric n brac table, as well as in the book and picture areas.

That queue you can see starting to form in the back of the picture is for the furniture area.

This one is for the clothes room, and it already went on way behind me, snaking past the tea shop and right round the grounds!

This final queue was for the china and glass area. I think you get the picture. People come prepared with huge bags and lots of cash, the queue in an orderly fashion until they are let through in batches, then all hell breaks loose!

I kid you not I was in one of the extremely busy, but tiny rooms, full of chinaware and a very pompous woman tried to snatch something up and barge to the front of the queue, she nearly got lynched, seriously I've never seen anything like the women already waiting to pay when they turned on her, they were savage!

The weary lady serving sighed and said "Every time, she comes to every sale and every single time tries to barge to the front" she then nodded over to the door and said "We have to have security you know" and sure enough there was a brick outhouse of a man dressed from head to toe in black with a walkie talkie and an earpiece!?!, at a charity shop sale - mint!

I'm not entirely sure how much very valuable stuff there is to be had as I imagine they sort the quality stuff out at the donation stage for sale via auction, they are about making the most money they can for charity after all.
They certainly had experts in each area as we found when we asked about donation some stuff to the book and periodical team. I'm sure there are still treasures to be had and you got the impression a lot of the people who got there very early and only to hit a particular area were trade.

It was a gorgeous day so the place was absolutely packed with well over 1000 people, it was hard to get about and you did have to indulge in a certain amount of pushing to get to things you wanted to look at. I'm not sure what happens when it's wet, or in the winter, as the majority of the sale was outside. The furniture and toys were set out in the stable yard for example.
You have to buy a ticket for 50p and show it to get into each area and they were very strict on the opening and closing times and only letting so many people through at a time.

 We finally got to the clothes area at11.40 and STILL had to queue for a while before we got in, even at that late hour.

I have to say the clothes sale was a really poor location for being able to search through and see what you were looking at, it was a small barn of all places with hardly any lighting.
When they shut the doors at 12.15 you were pretty much groping round in the dark! There were rails all round the wall with things like long dresses, coats and trousers but the rest was just piled high, oh so very high, on trestle tables jumble sale stylie.

Anything left at the end is chucked into black sacks which they ask the customers still in the room at 12.30 to help fill and sent off to Africa. It was £3 a coat £1.50 - £2.00 for a dress/suit/trousers and 50p everything else.
Frankly we were a bit overwhelmed by this point and only did a bit of halfhearted rummaging, it was fascinating to see the people on a mission working their way with steady determination through the piles from one side to the other.

We left the room before 12.30 because we had to go and pick up some glasses and a mirror Soo had on reserve. She had bought a box of crystal and cut glass champagne flutes for the princely sum of £2. On later inspection it turned out to be a matching set of 4 glasses, 2 sets of 2 glasses and one odd one so she was very pleased. I did a last minute purchase of a wicker picnic hamper full of crockery for £6 including the hamper. 

Now my Mum had lured me to the sale in the first place with the promise of a "Room full of handbags" I tell you was dreaming of that room full of handbags and panicking 2 hours would not be enough time to go through them all.
Sadly it was all a lie, I was badly mislead and I'm not letting her forget this one either hehe.
I was very disapointed to find just one long table of bags,and all modern and naff ones at that. Bah.

Anyway we retreated a bit battered, very thirsty and piled with treasures. After loading the car we headed to a lovely pub for a much needed drink and well earned lunch. What an experience, it was sheer madness but great fun.

Without further ado some of my treasures included;

An Art Deco-ish jug and sugar bowl for £1

The £6 china tea set minus it's hamper.

A huge bunny cotton wool holder £1 plus a quirky little plate for 50p (not pictured)

and various brooches. The stone one at the top left cost me £6 the rest were £10 in total, there was another cat but it sadly got decapitated in transit!

I also bought a book on Pilates for £1 and couple of huge pyjama tops with a quirky dog print for cutting up and making into something else.
A sage green checked shirt, a red 60's sleeveless top and a long brocade 60's dress, but didn't get round to taking pictures of them before they hit the washing basket and or the ironing mountain.

Not a bad haul for less than £30. We will definitely go again at some point, just not every 3 weeks! 



  

   

Fashion on the Ration and a Baby Rhino Called Ian

Last week we had to have a huge planning meeting at work that started at 9am and instead of ending at 4pm as advertised overran by an hour and a half. We were all losing the will to live by lunch time so by the time I was finaly released to get the train home I was practically speaking in tongues.

This was swiftly followed by a Team Building Day!

As luck would have it this took place at The Cotswold Wildlife Park because that was what won all the votes.

It was great fun and some of us who hadn't been there for many many years got a bit excitable to say the least.(yes that would be me.)

 The weather was gorgeous, there were amazing animals to see, with a few babies including the star of the day, a baby rhino who went the magnificent name of Ian. 

I can only imagine they did a competition to name the rhino and someone picked a name from the hat to *big drum roll*“ AND THE NAME IS………Ian!!”

Yaaaay! wait what? did you say Ian? The rhino is going to be called Ian?? Oh!

Anyway personally I think Ian is a great name for a rhino and he was just the cutest thing, especially when he decided to wake up and gallop about a bit.

All in all a far more successful day than the one before. Even if I did manage to mistake a pigeon for a penguin. Unsurprisingly I didn't have my glasses on at the time.

This excitement was followed by another day off work to head to London with Soo to visit the Imperial War Museum’s exhibition Fashion on the Ration.

The exhibition has timed tickets and we were booked onto the 12.30 entry.

We got there a little early and whilst walking through the peace garden at the side we spotted an ice cream van. 

Well that didn’t take much deciding, we were quick to justify it by the fact it would stave off the hunger pangs whilst we browsed the exhibition, very sound reasoning as I'm sure you will agree.

The guy was very apologetic and said he had only just filled the machine so it might be a bit soft and then proceeded to make the most mammoth 99 by way of the apology (to those not in the ice cream know, a 99 is a soft whip ice cream cone with a chocolate flake stuck in it)     

You really can’t beat sitting outside on a sunny day eating an ice cream.

I will never get too old to eat ice cream.

From there we ambled into the museum and as we still had about 40 minutes we thought we would take a look at the Holocaust exhibition. It’s on the 4^th floor so we took the stairs to work off a few of those ice cream calories, which also really reminded me we had done a lot of leg exercises at pilates the night before.......owwww.

As far as the Holocaust exhibition goes and on the whole for what I saw of it, it looked an excellent exhibition. We didn’t really have enough time to look round it all though.

The thing I had a problem with was the audio. I absolutely hated the propaganda broadcasts and film reels of nazi speeches. 

They were just too loud, like really invasively so, and as they were on constant loop you couldn't get away from it, I found I couldn’t concentrate on what I was trying to read due to Joseph Goebbels ranting about the master race over and over and over again.

I ended up scooting through to slightly quieter part of the exhibition, frankly I couldn’t get away fast enough.

Before we got all the way round it was 12.30 so we took the quick exit and headed down to level 3.

As we walked towards the entrance I was busy rooting in my bag for the e-ticket when the man on the door greeted me with

“Ms Collins, you can go straight in but no photography”

Me taken completely by surprise “Er yes, what?, right, umm, how did you know who I am?”

Man on the door completely deadpan and without missing a beat

“ You have the air of a Collins about you”

That did make me laugh but I was honestly so completely wrong footed I went straight in without asking how he actually DID know who I was! 

Himself said I should have turned and looked at the people around us pointed at myself and gone “See I’m important me” then waltzed in.

We surmised we much have either been the only 12.30 booking, or we were the last 12.30 booking to arrive. Or maybe it's just that I really AM that important ;-)
 

What a total joy Fashion on the Ration is. No photos allowed inside (Boo) so I have none to share with you but I cannot talk more highly of this exhibition, it’s just fantastic.

You find yourself completely immersed in the life that was uniforms, rationing, Make Do and Mend and CC41 utility clothing.  

I only have one little niggle, and that is that there were many fascinating hand written letters included in the exhibition, but often the handwriting was very difficult to read. It would have been nice to have a typed transcription of the letter next to the original. Other than that I would have to say this was one of the best exhibitions I have been to in a while. It’s well curated and wonderfully engaging.

I have always been interested in the social history of war so this exhibition really ticked all the boxes for me. It was fascinating to see the letters from one lady who was almost delighted when rationing first began because she had 'masses of clothes that could be made over' and would be good for new things to wear for years to come. Right through to her weary letters from the late 40's wondering if rationing would ever end because her outfits had been made over so many times they were literally disintegrating and falling off her in rags, and that at this rate 'we will all be walking round naked'

Or the beautiful wedding dress made from fabric meant for petticoats that was knocked up in a few days for a speedy wedding then loaned to another 14 girls for their special day too.
 

I know it’s not on for much longer but I highly recommend a visit if you can fit it in before the end of the month.

Oh and whilst I bought a tiny wee lemur at the wildlife park (called Mahjong after the Eltham Palace lemur!) I didn't buy ANYTHING in London. 

This is getting a tad worrying people. 

What Would Audrey Do?

Well not get told off by her Mother for mismatching her outfit I'm sure! (more of that later)

I had the whole of last week off work, what bliss. and for once I had lots of fun plans rather than just slothing round the house.
On Wednesday I went to The National Portrait Gallery with my friend Charlotte to see their exhibition on Audrey Hepburn.

First we went for a wander around Covent Garden, I haven't been there for ages so it was fun to poke about. I was very tempted by some of the jewellery on the craft stalls but in the end I only bought myself this picture as an early birthday present.

 I was very taken with this smiley octopus so I decided to buy him, Himself however is not at all keen, oh well.

Stomachs started growling so we decided to give Five Guys a go and how glad am I that we did. This was everything Mucky D's and BK's wishes they were and more.
I went for a cheese dog and fries, and thinking of the portion sizes in other burger places I asked for regular fries. The girl serving helpfully pointed out this was actually meant for 2 people, recommending I go for a small. Turns out that even the small was a mammoth portion.

As anyone who knows me well will confirm I am not a woman to ever leave a chip uneaten, but even I had to admit defeat on these deliciously gorgeous fries.
No 'reformed from mashed potato' here, only freshly cut, skin on, double fried in peanut oil, real potato! MmmmMmm.

We waddled out of Five Guys and headed through Leicester Square. There was a big crowd gathered so we went to see what the fuss was about.

 turns out it was all for a Frank Sinatra dancing skeleton in a natty silver bow tie and green sneakers.

 Ok so he was puppet, but goodness me that puppeteer was good!
 He had clearly watched Frank Sinatra do his Vegas shows many times, that puppet was not just word perfect but move perfect too.
Admittedly that was probably lost on most of the teenage tourists in the crowd but as someone who HAS watched those shows, every gesture and every movement was captured to a tee. Very clever and unusual street entertainment for sure.

We reached the National Portrait Gallery a bit early (the exhibition tickets are timed) so we mooched round the exhibition of the 'Portrait Artist of the Year' finalists. No photography sadly but wow, just wow.
All I can say is they were all well worthy of their place in the final.

And so to Audrey.

Again no photography so we both had to satisfy ourselves with buying postcards afterwards.

It is was a small but perfectly formed exhibition mostly made up of unseen pictures owned by her family. You were struck over and over again by just how photogenic she was, and for me, not just the overall luminous quality she had but by her stunning eyes, truly windows to a beautiful soul.
One critic was quoted as being distracted and captivated by the amazing eyes of one of the impish girls in the chorus, so much so it took his attention away from the main players, she was an unknown in an early background stage role at the time, there was no doubt she would go on to be a star.

Personally I find something very calming and joyously uplifting about gazing raptly upon great beauty, be it male, female or in nature, and this exhibition was just a joy to behold.

 Friday was my birthday and the day began earlier than I had hoped because our front door lock had broken the night before, I had visions of my Mother (who was due over) having to feed me cake through the letterbox!
Anyway this meant getting up to call the rental agency as soon as they opened for the day. As it turned out the man who could fix it was just around the corner and would come straight over, which in turn meant abandoning my cup of tea to belt upstairs and fling some clothes on just in time before he arrived. Thankfully it was just the barrel and not the whole mortis lock that had broken so once he got a new one it was a matter of moment s and all was fixed.

I had another cup of tea before going upstairs to wash and dress properly for the day ahead, well I say dress properly, clearly even though I'm now the great age I am my Mother still thinks I'm not capable of putting an outfit together!
She arrived and looked me up and down, tutted and said "the worst bit is your necklace it doesn't go with anything else you are wearing"
Me " that's the whole point"
Her with narrowed eyes "Hmmm". We went to leave and I put on my silver brogues,
 Mum "Good lord no you are not planning on going out in those shoes? No, no, no they do not go at all"
Me "Fine I'll take them off"
Mum "What do you have instead?"
Me "Green converse? I have green in my outfit"
Her horrified "No! even worse!" 
*Sigh*
I ended up in sensible black just to keep the peace. Outift sorted to a passable level we went into town to buy some goodies for lunch which we took round to the nursing home and ate with Dad. From there we went to my brother's house to get our hair done and finally home to prosecco and presents.

The necklace was a massive unsubtle hint from me to Himself heh heh it worked.

Saturday I was up and off to Oxford with my friend Simon to see Noel Coward's Blithe Spirit.
It was held in a wee tent in University Parks and was great fun. Performed by a small repertory company from London what the young cast lacked in polish they made up for with enthusiasm in spades.

So all in all a fun week.