Vintage & Artisan Dolls House Fair - What A Brilliant Day!

It is hard to believe that it was a week ago today that our Vintage & Artisan Dolls House Fair took place in Thame Barns Centre....and what a day it was!

https://www.c-r-y.org.uk/

The main aim of running this fair was to help raise awareness and funds for the wonderful charity CRY (Cardiac Risk in the Young), and at the same time bring high quality artisans and antique/vintage dolls house sellers all together under one roof. From the start, 50% of everyone's admission fee was donated to the charity to help raise funds, as CRY is the brilliant charity that helped my daughter Kate after she randomly had a cardiac arrest.  

Well we succeeded in doing all of the above and more, and I am delighted to announce that the total money raised for CRY was an amazing...
 £801.46! 

So thank you everyone for your generosity, this amount far exceeded all expectations. The raffle alone raised £246, and we ended up with 19 beautiful prizes on the day, all donated by UK miniaturist artisans and traders. Needless to say there were some very happy prize winners! 

The Large Barn

Huge thanks to absolutely everyone who made this all possible. That includes family and all my lovely friends who helped out in so many ways, from beginning to end. Plus all the wonderful stand holders who came, and of course all the visitors too! Many of the stand holders rank amongst the finest in the UK and would not normally come to a small event such as this, so I am extremely humbled that they came and helped to make this event even more special. 

The Small Barn

The weather was wet all day and truly awful, but those that braved the elements seemed to enjoy themselves, there were smiles all round.

The Thame Barns Centre is such a pretty and atmospheric setting, which helped to give the feeling that this fair was just that little bit special and different from the norm. 

My old mate Robin (now long retired from Coombe Crafts) did a fantastic job helping me on my KT Miniatures stand, and business was brisk.

Charlotte of Oxfordshire caterer Time For Tea and her assistant Sonn, did a fantastic job turning two of the smaller rooms into stunning Vintage Tea Rooms, complete with bunting, vintage china and of course, delicious food. The cakes in particular were to die for and proved rather popular with visitors! Charlotte kindly donated 10% of her profits made on the day to CRY.

This is just one of the many lovely raffle prizes which attracted much attention on the day, donated by stand holder Stokesay Ware. 

*Highlights of the day was to meet Alison and hubby, who came all the way from Australia. They had always wanted to come to a British dolls house fair and literally built their entire UK trip around coming to this fair!! 

Here is another gorgeous raffle prize that was donated by stand holder Victoria Fasken. 

*Then there was Norma who had lugged a big plastic carrier bag of small change she had been collecting for a long time, all the way from the east of England to give to CRY. There was well over £30 in that bag!

*And how about John of Onetwelfthscale, who after spending quite some time explaining to a customer how he had created the back panel of his Macintosh washstand, whipped out a separate panel that he called a "second" (although neither I or the visitor could see what was wrong with it) and insisted on giving it to the visitor free of charge, he simply refused to take any money for it. So the lady in question whipped out a £20 note and thrust it in my hand to give to CRY instead. 

This just about summed up the wonderful spirit of the day, it really was rather special. 

Although spare a thought for poor Trevor Cain of Dolls House Restoration, whose car had a blow out on the M25 en route...and by all accounts it was very scary indeed. Thankfully he was ok but sadly neither he or his car managed to reach us on the day. 

Phew...so now it is all over and I had said from the beginning that this was to be a one off fair....but since last Saturday, I have had lovely messages and emails from stand holders and customers alike, to ask if I could do this all over again next year. All I can say at this moment of time is that I am considering it...so we shall see:)
Celia