Blandford Georgian Fayre

This May Bank Holiday we braved the rain and opened the shop for the Blandford Georgian Fayre. In order to not have someone random outside the shop we had also booked the pitch, so I found myself putting up a gazebo in a windy downpour at 8.30am on Monday morning!

Did I mention we had to dress up?!

Thankfully the rain did clear by lunchtime and the usual throng of crowds appeared. It's quite a mad day, with fairground rides, country events (ferret racing and the like!), stalls, traditional music battling with a battle of the bands, a beer festival, dancers, a town crier competition and very randomly, Stormtroopers...

The wonderful Rachel Dyke and her ceramics

As we were open I didn't really manage to escape this year but we did get a sneeky half at the beer festival after closing :)

All in all it was a really fun day, and I was helped loads by the wonderful Lou and Rachel who manned the stall and the shop all day, and Ben and Owen who helped with the heavy bits, and bought coffee and biscuits so a vitally important role!

More of Rachel's pieces. We sell her larger work all the time in the gallery

It's only on every 2 years so there's a little wait for the next one. And after a long day I was up at 6.30 the next morning to go to the Craft Council Hothouse Taster Day, more on that in my next post.

If you fancy sampling the Georgian delights of Blandford, the beautiful buildings are here all the time and the wonderful Fashion Museum with their Georgian Tea Rooms is well worth a visit.

The sun did eventually break through and the crowds showed up!