Guest Post: Renegade Craft Fair Review

Today's post is from Laura Harris of LauraFallulah, a weaving graduate who, after a lightbulb moment, knew she had to swap her life in retail for setting up her own business making the most of her creativity. Her love of vintage design combined with an eye for bold colours and stylised motifs help her create fun individual accessories for the young at heart.

This weekend bought the first ever Renegade Craft Fair to the Truman Brewery in Brick Lane, London. As soon as the well established American craft event team Renegade Handmade announced they were coming over the excitement started. Much like the Bust event, a buzz was instantly created so I knew it would be similarly hectic.

I have to say that I am not a big fan of the Truman Brewery, I had my degree show there in 2004, I find it like a big white multistorey car park so was looking forward to seeing what the Renegade team would do to fill it. Needless to say I still didn't like the room itself but the layout of stalls worked really well and was curated perfectly. There really was something for everyone. I thought I would share with you a few of my favourites.

First Kate Sutton with her beautiful and fun illustrations, I have a small print of hers but I was really enamoured by these cuckoo clocks, definitely one for my Christmas list.

A Alicia has been a firm favourite of mine for a while now but I was yet to see her latest range in the flesh. I really love the way she incorporates a traditional technique such as french knitting into her contemporary jewellery designs.

I thought these button badges by Magic Industrie made with the spines of vintage books where such a novel idea (get it!?, sorry about that). Being a book lover myself and knowing a fair few other geeky people I purchased some of these as Christmas presents, they also sold wallets made from the covers which provided more easy gift buying for me.

Lastly and probably my favourite are these posters by The Bungaloo, we had a great chat with the illustrator John Vogl about London, Denver (his home town) and music. He has a gallery show on at The Flood Gallery in Greenwich starting tomorrow until the 18th, so if you are about I recommend checking it out.

That is what I really love about craft fairs, the ability to connect with the artist/designer who has the ideas, makes the product and puts all their love into doing so. You just don't get that in most high street shops in this country which is a real shame.

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You can read about Laura's comings and goings on her blog, and check out her handmade wares on her website.