The Cottage Orné Quilt

The Cottage Orné Quilt
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Wednesday 1 June 2011

Hay and Heroes

On Bank Holiday Monday, at what seemed like the crack of dawn, I set off for the little town of Hay-in-Wye which straddles the border with England.


I was going to the Hay Festival to hear Matthew Rice and Emma Bridgewater talk about their pottery in Stoke and about Matthew's book "The Lost City of Stoke on Trent".  I mentioned this book here a while ago and can't praise it enough.

The Hay Festival is world famous, though I had never been before and it attracts some very prestigious names.  In the past Bill Clinton and Arthur Miller have appeared there and I believe that Rob Lowe and the Duchess of Cornwall are due there this week. Well I hope they have a better time that I did weatherwise.      It should look like this -


with everyone lounging around having a good time discussing books and enjoying the sunshine.  However on Monday it was raining cats and dogs and everything looked extremely dismal. We tried to make the best of it but oh dear, after our chosen event we beat a hasty retreat from the Festival field and retired to our favourite pub in the centre of the town.  You can't beat a cosy old pub as a refuge from the rain!

Despite the weather, I enjoyed the experience.  I am not sure if I will go again but meeting Emma and Matthew, afterwards in the bookshop was certainly worthwhile.  They are very nice people and care very much about Stoke and Matthew's book is both a tribute to Stoke's past and a plea for its future.

Matthew and Emma both signed my book - just look at Matthew's wonderful printing -

 
and of course I had to buy the EB special mug as a momento!


3 comments:

Shirley said...

I love my book Mary and you have such a treasure now that it has been signed. Emma and Matthew are doing wonders for Stoke. Long may it last. I heard that the Duchess of Cornwall loves to read to the children and is a regular visitor to the festival. Pity about the rain. I know we need it but somehow it always manages to come at the wrong moment.

Quilt Station said...

HI Mary, I had been to Hay in Wye back in 2006, not during Festival week but later in the summer. A year or so earlier I had a cut an article out of Country Living mag about a shop there which sold handmade leathergoods/woven fabrics/wools etc, designed by the owner. So on the drive back from Wales I detoured that-a-way and spent a lovely afternoon browsing the streets and shops of that very picturesque town. The Leathergoods shop was still there and the shop owner was amazed I had carried a (by then) tatty magazine article all the way from Aus.Thanks for the little trip down memory lane :-)

Vivienne at Vivebooks said...

Another EB mug Mary! I look forward to seeing it . . . V x