Briswool and Shopping

I'm just back from another jaunt to Ireland for family visiting and Hen Party Shenanigans. I went from Thursday to Sunday but had the added pleasure of a Bank Holiday Monday the following day and as I hadn't seen him for a few days the hubby was "happy to do whatever I wanted" on our bonus day off- YAY!
Top of my list was head over to Bedminster in Bristol to see "Briswool", this is an incredible (and ongoing) effort by a group of Bristol folk to recreate the whole of the city out of wool, mainly knitted or crocheted with a little nod to needle felting. To say the least it's impressive, when you first lay eyes on it you think it looks pretty neat but it's when you start to spot all the little details you really start to appreciate how wonderful it is.
I think anyone can appreciate the amount of work involved and enjoy the overall look but if you know Bristol at all you realise how amazing all the little details are.

You may recognise this street from The Antiques Roadshow

It's located in a lovely little craft shop, The Paper Village- http://www.radisol.co.uk/paper-village/, at the moment so can't be displayed in it's full glory until they find somewhere to exhibit it properly and like any real city it's still growing and transforming. We chose the perfect day to visit as it was quiet, I think a lot of people may have thought it would be closed for the Bank Holiday. The very friendly owner, Vicky, was super enthusiastic and told us they had had a couple of days where there were queues stretching down the street and she couldn't actually sell anything due to the volume of people in the shop. Thankfully I was able to purchase a few items, well it seemed only right to support the shop after it made such an effort (any excuse huh?)
We then went for a wander and stumbled across another lovely shop selling lots of handmade items created by local artists- Dadswell Glass, full of lovely stuff and I was delighted to pick up a couple of treats for up-coming birthdays http://www.dadswellglass.co.uk/category/shop/
We then headed to the city centre to one of my favourite shops in Bristol, Made in Bristol. http://madeinbristol.blogspot.co.uk/ 
As soon as I step in I'm always in awe, I walk around and everything I see makes me think "I want, I want, I want"! When we saw Alice Shields' ceramics we couldn't resist, I treated the hubby to an slightly early anniversary present and he did the same for me. We're both suckers for bumblebees...

Always good to support local makers. Craft in earnest, Craftin' Ernest x