Arundel Eccentrics in Liberty London

July 02, 2016

Arundel Eccentrics in Liberty London

Arundel Eccentrics
in
Liberty London

& how it all began

We've had an exciting year so far

January 2016

Absolutely thrilled beyond words to be asked to take the space on

the 4th floor at

Liberty in London

I had always adored the shop and been going there for many years.

yep thats me......big specs.....my son there grinning ..is now 38!
39 on Monday July 4th
(What a day to have a birthday when you live in the US)

Looking gorgeous in the Liberty Cabinet... decoupage pots and a tole tray that my aunt painted in chinoiserie

They called us in December 2015......

In January we moved in

the room is beautiful.. like a baronial hall.

English Victorian Bamboo

one of our specialities.

These were made circa 1880.

Many in factories around London.

About Victorian Bamboo

We restore and decorate them using 19th century images.

A 19th century chest of drawers that Ive hand painted.
OMG it takes a lot of patience
and cussing
and Pinot afterwards...but its worth it

Most weeks we take more decorative pieces up to Liberty.
Here's a 19th century chest that we have painted and decorated in botanical images...just about to go on the van and head north to London

Do go and have a look if you are in London

and if you don't already know us...

We are a husband and wife team

that live and work in the beautiful town of Arundel

on England's south coast.

The first time I painted and distressed furniture,
was over twenty years ago.

It was a Habitat coffee table,
with no age to it, probably 1970's.

It was scruffy and past its peak.

I heard there were ways to
paint and distress furniture
to give a

more interesting aged look to it,
but didn't know where to start looking.

No pc's or Internet.

No Google to ask.

The phrase " shabby chic" not even thought about.

I rang an artist friend, ( we still just phoned each other in those days.)

She talked me through sanding the wood
back and painting it with emulsion.

(Wow, we only ever used that on walls and
ceilings, so that in itself was a revelation)

and then waxing it.

"What with?"

"Where do I go to get all this stuff?"

" Bren, don't worry if you can't find the furniture wax,
you can just use brown boot polish"

That's what I did and so,
my first aged and distressed piece was complete.

I met Allie 20 years ago.

At the Body Shop headquarters in Littlehampton,

We worked the evening shift at
The Trading Post
the lovely wooden shop that was on the HQ site.

We laughed a lot those evenings.

About similar creative paths.

Macramé and candle making,
crochet and cards,
bags and patchwork

and a hundred other things

besides.

"Lets make some extra cash
and sell on market stalls."

We found an old warehouse,

a 19th century brewery building,

hidden away in a little side

street in Arundel where I lived.

It was in a mess.

Filthy, damp
and filled to bursting with kitchen units.

Stacked floor to the ceiling.

Left behind by a company who had gone into liquidation

Together with another Body Shop friend, Zoe we moved in.

With an army of friends
from Body Shop HQ,

we cleared, painted and opened our

warehouse in less than a week.

"Ambiance" was born.

The name was something we brainstormed for just days.

Well...we only had days.

Early one Sunday morning we went
to London to buy stock.

Afterwards, with the car groaning under the weight,
we stopped for breakfast

at one of
the new restaurants

that were springing
up all over town.

Cafe Rouge.

It was a new concept then.

Beautifully decorated with a French.....
"Ambiance"
we all shouted together.

At the opening,

we barely had anything
in the massive warehouse.

But.....

It was filled with friends
wishing us well,

and supporting our new venture.

That was good enough for us.

Even Gordon Roddick,
head of the Body Shop,

turned up.

We suspected our

business would never be
quite as successful as his. LOL

We barely had any stock.

Well, we hardly had any money.

I had been signing on and Allie was bringing up

two small children.

Somehow, we managed.

We found junk items to restore and decorate and built up

a warehouse of interesting pieces
........and a loyal following of fans.

We taught ourselves
to paint furniture, decoupage, craquelure and gild.

Scouring books, magazines ,
anything we could lay our hands on.

We sourced new products and experimented.

I had never owned a microwave,
didn't have a clue how they worked.

I nearly blew up
Allie's kitchen,
warming different coloured waxes.

We had seen an article in an old book

and painted a 1930's cupboard, grey.

Afterwards we used different coloured waxes
to cover, and merged them all in together.

The piece we were experimenting on came out beautifully......

...........but the microwave was never the same .

The warehouse, though a great space,
was off the main street,
down a dark alley,
(or twitten, as we say,
down south)
It was really hard to

draw people round to.

We would go into town leaflet dropping.
Handing them to day trippers or pushing
them through local doors.

Allie still sighs, to this day,
at the very thought of it.

It worked though.
We would go back to the warehouse.
Put the kettle on.

By the time tea was made people were coming to look.

The landlord allowed us to use
the front of the building, (now the right side of

William Hill,) for the summer months.

One of the first pop up shops.

We went in overnight.

Zoe was doing a lot of work for Anita Roddick and was great with artwork.
She made all our signs, cutting the large ones out of ply and painting them.

The A boards were old discarded Body Shop ones......

as was our counter.....

Location, location, location.

It's true what they say....

We took more in the first week
than we had in six months around the back.

But more than that, though, we had a window on the world.

Exciting opportunities evolved
when an Arundel antique dealer,

who was, still is, one of the most
prestigious in the country,
saw what we were doing and

was looking for someone to decorate
his Victorian Bamboo

furniture.....with decoupage.

A friend, Julie, from Body Shop days

was working at his shop

and she
introduced us.

The previous bamboo person
was going to teach us

but he left without warning,

That was that then.

We put the phone down
devastated,

on hearing the news.

We really needed this break and without
someone to show us
the whole idea seemed doomed from the start.

We thought about it.........
for
thirty seconds and

no, that wasn't that.

We called back.

"What about if you talk us through the recipe

and we do a couple of samples?

If they are good, then we are on,

but if they are not up

to your standard,

then we shall

understand."

Bear in mind, we were small fry,

and, as far as we were concerned,

this was an internationally

known antique god

we were

talking to.

We were quaking in our boots when we made that call.

We were given a bamboo cabinet to work on.

It was to be painted a saffron yellow,
crackle glazed

and the same gorgeous yellow,
used

as a top coat.

Then antique waxed was to be applied
to sit in the cracks,
giving a fantastic aged look.

Only problem was,
we hadn't even attempted crackle glaze.

Out came the books, and we studied all we could find on crackle.

We found most information

through Jocasta Innes,

and, as luck would have it,

there was one of her Paint Magic shops

in Arundel High Street.

How to put it on?

Her books suggested in a haphazard way.

I forget who did the first brush stroke,

we both hovered over the piece
with loaded brushes

"You go first"

"No, you first"

Well, we finished it over a couple of days,

working on it in the back of the shop.

The last wax was on and we were proudly buffing it up,

late at night, when Julie passed by

and saw the lights on.

We swept her in to the shop and with a

flourish proudly showed her the cabinet.

To our horror, and massive disappointment,

Julie shook her head and said,

"Oh dear, he won't like that"

We had done large haphazard cracks,

and what were required were

small, neat,

cracks.

We decided there was nothing else for it, if we were to get this job,

we had to do the whole thing over again.

We re-did the piece and got the contract.

We learnt a massive amount

about painting and ageing on

some glorious items of furniture,

that with our humble income,

we would never have had

access to.

As luck would have it, the company were
looking for an extra man on their team.

Nass went on a days trial.

He stayed 14 years.

Sixteen years ago

I opened a shop by myself

in Nineveh House in Tarrant Street.

I kept the Ambiance name,

but late changed it to

Arundel Eccentrics.

At the same time I found a
workshop to use
as a studio/showroom
on a farm in Binsted,
a little village just outside Arundel.

By then, I had taken over the
Victorian Bamboo myself
and had several US trade customers who came
to visit me regularly.

They loved
driving down country lanes and tramping
through mud to get to my hidden away studio.

It proved more successful, than sitting in the shop.

From then I just operated from the studio,
working on 19th century
chests of drawers and bamboo
& selling direct to the US antique trade.

The first chest of drawers I decorated like this, went to a shop in NYC.
Two years later, in turned up in the prestigious US interiors magazine
Architectural Digest. Exciting stuff

Occasionally, I would pop up in one of the
many antique centres around the town,
and stay for a year or two.

I needed to have my pieces seen.

Sadly most of these centres have now gone.
Restaurants most of them.

The first gilt chest I sold was in an antique
centre that was on the corner of Tarrant Street and the High Street
Now La Campanula

A mother and grown up daughter came in.

"Oh do look Mummy, isnt that gorgeous?"
"Darling," Mummy replied in a haughty voice, " I think its absolutely ghastly."

Never ignored though.......

on of our cabinets.......

.
I stalled out at
Newark and Ardingly antique fairs,
sleeping in the van overnight.

Bribed friends to come and help.

Brrrrrr cold sometimes.

and wet...........

Building up a business is hard hey?

Sometimes, you need some bread and butter while you are doing it.

So, I took a night job.

Full time nights at a residential home for

"Adolescents with Challenging Behaviour".

It was wild.

I could tell you stories that would make straight hair curl.

Exhausting trying to juggle the two,

On more than one occasion I worked on furniture all day,

drove to Crawley, worked a wild night shift,

drove back to Arundel to see clients,

finish a piece of furniture off,

throw a dinner in the slow cooker,

and finally sink into bed.

Phew............

Seven years I juggled both.

I aged I can tell you.

Chasing absconders over

the south of England, or collecting them

from London police stations in dead of night.
It was manic sometimes.

I did the job to the

very best of my ability,

and staff and most

of the kids seemed to like me.

I hoped in some small way, I changed a young life along the way.

Although I wouldn't

want to be in that front line any more,

I would not have missed the experience for anything.

Some of these kids had experienced dreadful times and
used to view staff as enemy.
Well, most actually.

They could scream abuse at me with words I'd never even heard of. Ha ha .

But.....

Years later....one by one some of them contacted me.

One said how we/I had changed her life and she
was now working with adolescents who had been through the same.

Makes it all worthwhile hey?

Seven years ago
my husband Nass and two friends
set up an antiques warehouse.

Guess where?

Yes, the very same place I had started all those years ago.

Full circle.

20 years later.

The only difference being more antique traders are there.
The Old Brewery Antiques Warehouses
now also houses
French Loft and Harmony Antiques.