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Lincoln Castle |
372
years ago Edward Montagu, the Earl of Manchester, arrived in Lincoln and
gathered his army on Canwick Hill. From
there he sallied forth to besiege Lincoln Castle, and it was all over red rover
within half an hour. He took the castle,
smote his enemies and jumped up and down on the ruins.
Fast
forward to 2016.
Dougie and I arrived in
Lincoln and booked into our hotel on Canwick Hill. From there we sallied forth to besiege the
Lincolnshire Antiques & Home Show, the second largest antiques fair in
Europe.
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The pitiful amount I left behind. |
Within
half an hour I had spent over £1000 and smote all my enemies rivals who also
wanted lots of fabulous European enamelware.
Take that, you laggards! You’ve
got to get up early to beat me to the best enamelware.
Oh
yes, I’m feeling triumphant.
As
soon as the gates opened I marched briskly to see Zoltan (the Magnificent), who
always offers the best selection of enamelware, and always ends up giving me a
secret discount. It’s only a few pounds
off per item, but when you’re buying over 50 pieces it adds up to a
mighty fine discount. And a great deal for me =
a great deal for you.
But
despite my bolt for Zoltan’s stand, there were still a couple of dealers there
ahead of me, already buying. Damn you,
faster dealers!
I
had to take Zoltan aside so we could conduct our secret negotiations. He doesn’t usually give a discount and doesn’t
like anyone else to know he gives me one.
But meanwhile, those other dealers were already making their selections.
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French window shutters coming home |
So
I did a quick scan of the scene. All of that, I said to Doug, pointing to
a very large group of beautifully coloured enamelled storage vats, bowls,
ewers, buckets, etc. So Doug got to work
gathering it into an enormous stack over which he stood guard, while I strode
off to deal with Zoltan. Thirty seconds
of fierce whispering later, I had cajoled, harassed and nagged poor Zoltan into
compliance. I’m a well-practiced nagger,
so I’ve been rudely informed. Meanwhile,
Doug had amassed an impressive pile of enamelware. Teamwork!
But
it turned out I had little to worry about from the other early-bird dealers. Rank amateurs. Slow as a wet week. They bought, what – 10 pieces between
them? Ha! I bought 50, baby! Just in that first selection.
But
there was more than one pile of enamelware to rifle through, so while Doug
guarded our trove I made more selections.
Pretty soon our pile of All The Best Stuff was looking dang impressive,
and was attracting the buyers who were slow to arrive. By slow to arrive, I mean they were 15
minutes behind us.
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Nice things coming home with me |
Ear, ‘av you bought all that?
one woman said to me. Yep, I said. Wot?
But you’ve tooken all the best stuff, she said. Yep,
I said.
What
can I say? I’m here to shop. I’ve come a long way to get what I want, and
I’m jolly well going to get it. These
pieces were a nice addition to the fabulous shopping we did in the Porte de
Vanves market in Paris.
I
haven’t had a chance to talk about Paris other than the play day activities,
but let me tell you now it was fantastic.
It started off slowly, because for once not many of the sellers had done
much early unpacking. But after a few
cigarettes, strong coffees, arm-waving arguments, cigarettes, double-cheek
kissing to resolve the arguments, and cigarettes, they got their acts together
and presented some beautiful things. And
I bought them all. At any rate, I bought lots.
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Lovely cloisonne, coming home |
Doug
and I staggered back to our van loaded with the most beautiful enamelware
utensils we’ve ever had, lovely antique copper pots and pans, enormous wooden
cheese and chopping boards, really pretty glass, striking cloisonné, more wire
baskets, nicely shaped galvanized tubs, wine bottle carriers, ginormous carboys
(giant, huge, bulbous green wine bottles), and so much more.
All
in all, the buying in Paris was a triumph.
But not as triumphant as the buying in Lincoln. There’s always a lot more competition at the
big antiques fairs in England than there is in Paris, because many buyers
attend only those fairs to stock up.
Doug and I skip everywhere, buying nice things wherever we alight. But for a serious quantity of good stock, we
need to put on our game faces for the Lincoln and Newark fairs.
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Lovely Art Nouveau, but too expensive. |
I’ve
done so well shopping the freight forwarding company tells us we
should take a container this time. We
haven’t done that for years, but once you reach a certain amount of cubic
meterage it’s cheaper to take your own container.
So
the gloves are off and some really serious shopping is about to begin. There’s
an awful lot I can fit into a 20’ container.
Running out of money is now the issue, but somehow I’ll make it
work.
The biggest antiques fair in
Europe starts in Newark tomorrow. Today we headed up to Derbyshire and Yorkshire to some good centres, and came away with some interesting bits and bobs. But tomorrow is my last chance for some big-time shopping. We'll see what happens.
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French enameled lunch boxes all coming home + more |
More
from the Ever-Victorious Besieging Army of Two soon.
PS. Don’t you love the word ‘tooken’? I’ve only
ever heard it in England, but I might have to start using it.