boot sale sunday

I spent the weekend by the coast in Broadstairs and made it to two boot sales on Sunday, out of town boot sales are the best. I tried to be discerning in my purchases but for prices as little as 10p I came away with quite a haul. Classic English utility homewares - Denby pottery, New Hall stainless steel and Falcon enamel ware, folksy Vileroy and Boch platter, studio pottery vase, glass pear and marble candlesticks.

Meanwhile, I am turning part of my garage into a prop store for location shoots. A big garage clear out first, then ultra cheap shelving from Ikea and I can empty my cupboards and sort into categories, I cant wait. And of course a great excuse to keep spending my 10p's.

All this and more random pictures on if you follow on instagram

weekend in pictures

We spent the weekend in Broadstairs looking after Otis, pictured here with his sad look. The illustrations are from one of my sister's vintage books, a lovely but battered edition of A Child's Garden of Verses by Robert Lewis Stevenson, with appropriate illustrations by Alice and Martin Provensen. So lovely that I found one on Abebooks and ordered it for myself (at a bargain price, the other editions on the site must be in tip top condition as they are hugely expensive). I visited a rain-lashed boot fair on Sunday. Not much to be found apart from this Briglin daisy pattern pottery bowl and a set of six whale shaped teak placemats (the sort of slightly mad thing only ever found at a boot fair) which I was going to buy but forgot. I wish I had snapped them up as I am pretty sure that whales are set to be the new owls, everybody loves a whale.

bootsale finds

This studio pottery coffee set was my weekend find at the bootsale. It is made by Briglin potteries, probably in the sixties. Briglin was set up in the 1940's in the smart west end of London by two ladies called Brigette and Eileen, hence the name. Their aim was to produce pots for the home that were well designed, attractive and affordable and I think they succeeded. I have a couple of other pieces, the teazel jug and the kitty money bank. The excellent Pottery Studio website tells me this is now worth an amazing £75.00, however as with most of my stuff it is rather well loved and battered so probably not worth a bean but has a very nice smile!
Lots more pictures and infromation about Briglin is to be found on this ultra informative website www.briglin.com

odd finds

I found this abandoned dolls pram beside the road in Penge yesterday, in one of the posher parts of Penge I have to say. It has a rather sad feel about it and goes with these other odd boot sale finds, a bracelet of engraved silver four-penny bits, and a little piece of victorian embroidery, is it a sleeve? is it a sampler? is it a place to keep shiny buttons? I'm not really sure.

sea blue

I had to limit myself at the boot sale on Sunday, my house is full to bursting with my 'finds' so I restrained myself and spent my £5.00 on a few curiosities and tiny items all linked by the theme of blue. A water colour painting of the sea, a tiny ship in a cabinet, lovely blue Whitefriars vase and some delicate white china bowls. I bumped into Kate at the boot sale, she is a stylist and writes one of my favourite blogs the fabric of my life. She has an amazing eye for the beautiful and charming and her blog is aways inspiring.

spring colours

I love the spring colours of these 60s plastic egg cups and I keep finding them (we'll never eat this many eggs!) Six more came from the bootsale yesterday along with some pretty 50s enameled metal daisy brooches. 

mystery bottle

I braved the wind and rain and went to the Boot Sale last Sunday. I found this rather battered ceramic bottle lurking underneath someone's table and fell in love with it. It's a very busy bottle, covered with charming European scenes of buildings and people including a skier, a windmill, a 2CV, and a man shooting a deer. I can't work out where its from, does anyone know?