A 'New' Bicycle, Fantastic Finds & The Vintage Jumble

Preparing For The Vintage Jumble

It has been nearly two months since my last post and I have a lot of catching up to do! In between the fairs we have been on the hunt for 'vintage' and visited Newark and numerous car boot sales around Northampton and have found some quite a few things. The cycle is a 1940s Dutch Batavus which we found on Ebay and collected from Corby a couple of Sundays ago.

THE DOORS WILL BE OPENED AT 11AM SHARP!

The poster is for the Northampton Vintage Jumble which will be taking place at St Matthew's on Saturday 5th July. The doors open at 11am and there are bound to be lots of bargains (as well as lovely homemade cakes). The stalls will be inside the hall and if the weather is kind there will be lots more stalls outside on the lawn. As it is a 'Jumble' there will be lots of vintage bargains.

Finds From Newark

During early June we visited Newark for the Antiques & Collectables Fair and brought back a colourful collection of finds. Although Newark and similar fairs do not specialise in 'vintage' there are some fabulous traders who regularly have stalls and there are literally hundreds of pitches outside to wander around. If you go be prepared to stay for several hours and walk quite a few miles.

My Favourite Find

I really like this old wooden table which I purchased from gentleman who had brought it over from Ireland. It was painted a bright turquoise at some point and has since weathered gracefully and would make a fine potager table for the 'vintage gardner'.

The Same Table As It Was At Newark

The next Newark Fair will be taking place in August.

Found For A Pound

On a much more thrifty note we found this lovely silk scarf from the 1950s in one of the charity shops in the Kingsley area of Northampton. The ground is a delicate pale blue onto which the beautiful birds have been printed, the colours are vibrant and intense and the detail is precise, they were originally painted by Rowland Ward who was a noted taxidermist.

More Vintage Birds 

This lovely table cloth decorated with budgerigars was embroidered during the early 1950s (I think) and was also a find from one of the charity shops in Northampton (again for a very small amount). The style of embroidery is different when compared to the more common pieces from the 1930s. Hand sewn embroidery virtually disappeared as a pastime shortly after this cloth was completed and so in it's own little way it is an important thing, helping to mark the rapid changes in taste and lifestyle which took hold as the 50s became the 60s.

A Lovely (To Be Ironed) Table Cloth

I found this large cloth of pink flowers embroidered onto heavy-weight unbleached linen at a small car boot sale of about ten stalls which takes place in the garden of a nursing home close to where we live. Usually we arrive too late to find anything of interest however our visit last Saturday was great and we returned home with some cute retro bits and pieces along with the table cloth.

Colour From Stenia

We had a super time at the Northampton Fair in May and there were some very nice stalls  including Stenia's who brought along a lovely kitchen cupboard and first aid cabinet (along with lots of other things).

'H' At The Northampton Fair (St Matthew's May 2014)

Wendy from Random Makes brought  'H' to the Northampton fair (after his brief appearance on television as the Woman's Cycle Tour dashed pass through the rain). Sitting on the lawn he made quite an impression and helped to make it the busiest ever fair at St Matthew's.

Northamptonshire Home Guard On Patrol At The Olney Vintage Fair

The hardships of a very rainy day were lightened by the gentlemen of  The Northamptonshire Home Guard who patrolled the streets of Olney on the look out for customers for the fair and Fifth Columnists (there must be some, even in rural Beds and Bucks).

The Stamford Fair

There were some fantastic displays on show at the Stamford Vintage Fair at the end of May including an on-trend retro inspired handmade collection, original vintage fashion and accessories from the 40s, 50s and 60s, costume jewellery and lots of original decorative and utilitarian wares for the 'vintage home'.

Vintage For The Extremities

The fashions and in particular a long rail of original dresses attracted a lot of attention at the Stamford Fair. We also had some visitors who arrived in wonderfully authentic clothing (Land Army I believe), it is always nice when this happens and the effort made to dress in period clothes is much admired.

Lovely Original Dresses

The pleasant June weather has made visiting car boot sales a pleasure and they have been a surprisingly rich source of interesting items including some very retro pieces.

Vintage Wedding Cake Decorations

These wedding cake decorations were found wrapped in tissue paper in an old shoe box and date from the 1950s/60s. I really like the stalk carrying a baby in a Moses Basket whose presence I would suggest is percipient although not of an imminent new arrival (it was an another era after all, Billy Liar, Room at the Top, Don't Look Back... etc).

The Social Arrangements Of The Early 60s

These Lilian Rowles nursery prints were very nearly the first thing I saw when I arrived at a sale last Sunday, it was a beautifully sunny morning and I could not believe that someone else had not spotted them.

Nursery Prints From The 1930s

I spent twenty minutes walking around with them tucked under my arm until a gent with a van offered to look after them along with a clothes airer and small cabinet I had just bought from him. The thought of lugging them all around was not welcome so I gladly accepted (and kept my fingers crossed that I would not do what I had done the previous week - I bought two Crown Devon storage canisters, very 1970s, and left them on the stall only to completely loose track of where I had left them, finally returning home without them).

A Beautiful 1950s Dinner Service

The roses decorating this dinner service, in pink, yellow and blue are very Cath Kidston in appearance, so it was especially nice to find a box full of original pieces which are now over sixty years old, including plates for six in three sizes.

Retro Styling

This Philishave in its original leather case along with a little cleaning brush caught my eye at a little car boot sale of no more than ten cars that takes place in the garden of a nearby care home.

A Murano Menagerie 

At the same sale we also found a small collection of Murano glass figures from the 1970s, I particularly liked the peacock, the little hound and the creature with the large eyes.

A Bit Of Up Cycling

I spent a couple of hours in the garden transforming a couple of folding stalls and a folding chair. The wood was painted white using chalk paint, then sanded and waxed and the seats were recovered in pieces cut from a new Cath Kidston tablecloth.

Flowers From My Garden

The roses picked from my garden are for the people who arrived only to find that Market Harborough Fair had been cancelled. We are really sorry and hope that we never have to cancel a fair again. They are Rosa Benjamin Britten, Rosa Handle and Rosa LD Braithwaite.

Best wishes until the next time and hope to see you at the Jumble next Saturday.