Cushion and Caking in Paris

Je suis a Paris! It was quite unplanned so have found myself enjoying a week in the beautiful city of Paris.
I'm here with Stuart for a music festival, Rock en Seine. It is the second time we've been to this festival. We booked it again at the last minute because the line up was too good to miss.

So having taken a break from Glasgow based cushion and cake-ing, I'm enjoying some French sunshine and culture. Aside from the festival, we've had plenty of time to take in lots of lovely things. I'm really familiar with Paris so we're not doing anything touristy really. 
Yesterday we had a great afternoon wandering round the French flea markets, Marche aux Puces in the north or the city.

The delights on offer here were superb. I can't say I saw many bargains however, in fact the antiques here were rather expensive, so I had to make do with a little wooden letter 'P' from a typographer's set. 

The patch where i got my 'P' was pretty cool and had little boxes of the most random things from coloured glass beads to metal name badges for bicycles. 

The furniture on sale at the Marche aux Puces was great and I found myself particularly attracted to metal garden furniture. Some of these you could see had been painted numerous times and had layers of paint flaking off. 

I quite like this look but I don't think I'd be able to resist stripping off the paint and giving it a nice new paint job. The furniture was a bit more 'shabby' than I'm personally comfortable with.

Resisting the tourist attractions of Paris leaves more time to discover real Paris, the Paris where people actually go about their daily lives.

However, away from the crowds, there's still lots of loveliness to see, beautiful colours everywhere.

OK so I said earlier we're not doing the touristy thing, but I wanted to go on a trip to Versailles and visit the Chateau. I have been to Versailles before but I was a teenager so it doesn't count ;-) I'm going back for a proper look at real decadence and to enjoy a bit of decadence of my own, I'm going to eat nice things and drink tea in the Laduree Tea Room and take pictures of how pretty it is. But for now, I'm off to the festival.

Long time no read... Catching up...

Well I have been bad. I haven't posted anything for perhaps longer than two weeks. I can only apologise however, I was on holiday for a big part of that time. I spent a week and a half staying in a proper counrty cottege in North Lopham, Norfolk. I had a great time. It was very relaxing and I managed to get some lovely finds while I was out and about and do some tea room research.

This is were we were staying. It had the lovliest big garden with apple, pear and plum trees, laden with fruit.

I kept up my search for china for the tearoom while I was away. I picked up this cute Greendawn Johnson Bros china and Meakin's Rosa coffee pot. I'm keeping the greendawn for myself however.

On a visit to the seaside town, Sheringham, we came across this second hand bookshop. Floor to ceiling stacked shelves with vintage books. I was impressed however to discover that the books were alphabetised into sections. Now I used to work n a book shop a few years ago and it was at times tricky keeping ontop of sections and keeping them in order. Real Kudos to the man who manages this lot.

Secondhand Bookshop Sheringham

A London trip was planned while we were staying in Norfolk. Stuart and I went through to spend the day, then stayed overnight with two of my friends. We did a bit of an anti-tourist London trip really and stayed away from the main sights, however a quick trip to the Camden Markets meant we could discover a great tearoom, Yummcha. Above you can see all the different varieties of tea they sell in little milk jugs for you to have a sniff and choose your tea.

Yumchaa Camden

The decor was pretty cool. A bit more 'shabby' than I'd have in my own place put it gave me some ideas. I love exposed brickwork. Here they've pretty much left it as it is. I think I'd have mine painted white. The furniture was an eclectic mix which I liked and I guess it was pretty minimalist. Again, I think I'd like a bit more stuff on display, nice china, pictures and the like.

I've got some viewings this week too of potential cushion and cake tearooms so I'll tell you more about that tomorrow. I'm also heading off to Paris with Stuart for a last minute music fetival trip for Stuart's birthday. Very much looking forward to it ;-)