When I was a little girl, my dad was the minister of a little church in our little town. We didn’t have much money to throw around, so every now and then mum would take me down to the local op shop, where we would fossick – elbows deep – for sensible clothes and dress-ups. It was one of my favourite things to do. I’ve rifled my way through countless thrift stores, trash & treasure tables and garage sales with aplomb in the years since, but never a dedicated vintage market. Until Sunday.
The Clerkenwell Vintage Fashion Fair – housed monthly in the ornate Old Finsbury Town Hall – is a glorious clutter of tweeds, Butterick sewing patterns, pussy bow blouses, hourglass gowns, late 50s Mad Men glasses, cravats, records, belts and costume jewellery, from the 1800s right through to the 1980s. The stuff is spread across three different rooms, each of which is set to its own soundtrack of ragtime jazz, soul and 60s rock n roll standards.
When I popped in on Sunday there was a lady in the foyer, sketching birds from a vintage nature photography book. Another lady – with bright red lips and victory curls in her hair – was strumming her ukulele and singing in the tearoom while tired shoppers ate cupcakes. It’s easy to lose your head in a place like this – where every third item is a real find – so I worked the racks in a sort of clockwise fashion, imagining how each piece might work with my wardrobe at home. Eventually I settled on a paisley print silk scarf for £10 and a pair of 80s Roland Cartier red leather boots in pristine nick for £40. If I’d had money to throw around, I’d have snapped up a white ermine fur shrug and a silver half hunter pocket watch too, but what can you do?
The next CVFF was on October 17 from 11am until 6.30pm. Tickets are £4, but you can apply for a complimentary ticket on the website here.
The Old Finsbury Town Hall
Rosebery Avenue
London, EC1
Nearest tube: Angel, Farringdon
Gretel Hunnerup is convinced that in a past life she was a carrier pigeon, such is her love of taking fanciful flights and posting little stories about her discoveries to her independent online pigeon hole: www.thecarrierpigeonpost.com.
The Australian sticky beak now writes about the little-known delights that make London hum…stuff that wouldn’t make the papers, like quirky establishments, not-for-tourists pursuits, and ordinary folks doing surprising things.
A trained journalist with six years travel and lifestyle writing for print and web, Gretel has taken a new post heading up internal communications for STA Travel’s Northern Europe and Africa Division, geared for maximum on-the-road reportage. Oh and she’s a sucker for documentaries, dress-up parties and dolmades.
