Visiting Spring Fair 2012 at the NEC
Two of us went to visit Spring Fair 2012 today at the NEC in search of shabby chic home accessories and vintage gifts to expand our range with. We met up with our current suppliers and also met a few more – some that were casually pre-booked and others that we ‘came across’ while navigating up and down the hundreds of aisles of products.
We spent quite a while perusing the home and gift halls and then went onto the jewellery and accessories area where we found a couple of lovely, new suppliers which is rather exciting and fits in with our plan to expand and diversify into ‘fairytale jewellery’. In particular we found three suppliers that we’re keen to place orders with in the jewellery department.
The first is the UK distributors of Classic Hardware an american brand of Gothic fairytale jewellery which involves some amazing artists such as Kukula, Camilla D’errico and Caia Koopman. I’ve been a massive fan of Kukula for ages since discovering her softly sweet gorgeous doll-like paintings which all have a slightly sinister, provocative or sad twist. I’ve actually had an iPhone skin of one of her pieces of art for a couple of years now which I love. Very excited about introducing this Victorian-era pop culture brand.
Secondly, we found a niche vintage accessories supplier that stocks dainty, delicate, fine chains with sparrows and scissors on for an ultra girly, feminine feel. And lastly a wicked, brand new steam punk jewellery collection with a wash of coppery keys, trinkets and air balloons adorning chains or suede necklaces with pocket watches on. Steam punk, if you’re unaware of it, is a fabulous movement based on a literature subculture involving a Victorian era feel mixed with industrial (steam engines, air balloons, clockwork and cogs) to make a lovely tinkering collection of parts, often linked together on necklaces and bracelets. We were so impressed we placed a pre-order as they’d arrived with the wholesaler literally two days ago.
We look forward to introducing new pieces and jewellery to our collection over the coming weeks!
Oh, and as most Spring Fair wholesalers prohibited us taking pictures of their stock 
we haven’t got many good shots of the inside to share - though we have some snowy and foggy pics of our walk from the car park up to the exhibition halls showing the iced over pond on our long march to the entrance!
