The Red House

Well, this post is a little late. Okay, more than a little - I went to the Red House last August Bank Holiday, so a whole year ago, in fact.  Located a short walk away from Bexleyheath train station, it was built and lived in by William Morris and his family, and was a gathering place for a host of Pre-Raphaelite artists. It is currently managed by the National Trust, and features a wealth of paintings, furniture and artworks created by Morris and his contemporaries, especially Edward Burne-Jones. 

We chose to explore the house without a guide, and so could spend as long as we wanted admiring the various nooks and crannies of the place. The house is surrounded by a rather large garden, which, despite being nearly the end of summer, was still in bloom, full of lazy dahlias and fragrant herbs. We packed a small lunch, and spent some time on a bench in front of the main house, just taking it all in. Anyway, less talk, more photos... 

   

Red House

Red House Lane, Bexleyheath

DA6 8JF

Pele-Mele

What's a holiday without a visit to at least one ramshackle second-hand bookshop, eh? Pele-Mele is a small-ish Belgian chain (there are two other branches in Brussels) that buys and sells books, magazines, records, and some toys. It's also a brilliant way to escape from a grey, rainy Brussels day. 

For the hardcore tram aficionado

The majority of books and records are Belgian or French, although there's a small selection of English-language books toward the back of the store. (See this photo above? It's here, as well as on the wall in front of it.) You might have to do some pretty thorough excavations to find an interesting book (be prepared to wade through lots of airport-books/Paulo Coelho/non-Harry-Potter J.K Rowling/perhaps even a Dan Brown or two!, you get my drift), as most of the tomes on offer seem to have been offloaded by backpackers passing through the capital. Still, isn't that part of the fun of second-hand shopping? The thrill of looking for treasure, the possibility of finding something special! 

Or you could simply pick up a few copies of Tram 2000 for the special tram-spotter in your life.

Beautiful wallpaper - I need this

Pele-Mele

Boulevard Maurice Lemonnier 55

1000 Brussels

Belgium

One Night In Paris (Part Deux)

Sorry to inundate you with more Paris photos, but well...maybe I'm not really sorry! It is impossible to go to Paris and not want to take a gazillion photos. And yes, of course gazillion is a proper number. The photo above was taken on the steps just outside the Sacre Coeur - there's a platform where you can see almost all of Paris. 

We also had escargots - it probably isn't to everyone's taste, but Shad and I loved it so we were looking forward to it all day. These ones were pretty good, served with lots of herby garlic butter and not overcooked. They came with some fancy forks and special escargot tongs, and we had to concentrate on handling the tongs to avoid a repeat of that scene in Pretty Woman. You know the one...she's in a fancy restaurant and has to use the tongs to pick up her snails and her dinner ends up flying off into a waiter's face. We were both too hungry to remember the name of the restaurant, but there are plenty of places around Montmartre serving them up if you want to have a go.

Shad and I also paid a visit to Shakespeare and Company - it's a haven for bibliophiles, and has been visited by writers including William S. Burroughs, Allen Ginsberg and Henry Miller. There is an antiquarian section, as well as a lending library and some boxes outside containing a selection of curiosities you never knew you needed. 

One night is Paris simply isn't enough...

Voltaire and Rousseau

It's no secret that I love a good messy bookshop. In fact, I try to seek out at least one whenever I'm on holiday. I found out about Voltaire and Rousseau just before my trip to Glasgow last December, and made it a point to visit it while I was in the city.

Behind that rather unassuming exterior on Otago Lane lies a treasure trove - piles upon upon upon shelves upon boxes of boxes. It's a minimalist's worst nightmare. It was my idea of heaven. 

 

 

 

It may not seem immediately obvious, but the shop is actually divided into several sections. The front room is the £1 section - every single book there costs £1. It's just a matter of finding something that takes your fancy. I found too many, and ended up spending more time culling my selection than I spent selecting them in the first place. 

The inner room is roughly split into sections such as Drama, Music, Cook Books, Military History and others that I can't recall. Those are very vague delineations though - the actual sorting system seemed to be: find a pile which doesn't look too precarious, place book on top, make sure it doesn't slip off, walk away. Repeat. The old men who ran the place practised this system very conscientiously while I was there. It's the exact same sorting system I use at home.

There's also supposed to be a shop cat somewhere in there, but I couldn't find him. Him? I felt the cat was a him, after all, everyone else working there was a 'him' too. We ended up leaving with only about 30 books. Only 30? Well, I could easily have bought more - trust me, there were some beautiful books in there - but my purse and Manbacon's arms could only stretch so far.