I just had a trip to Cape Town with some friends and found something I've never come across before - ShweShwe. Here's the history. It's discharge printed from etched copper rollers onto cotton and comes in a heavy smelly wax to preserve it. On a great tour of Khayelitsha township I asked to find a fabric shop and managed to buy some.

The traditional way to use it is in a panelled skirt, some of the fabric was ready marked in the panels for easy sewing. Below are a few examples of ladies wearing their superior creations. After washing the wax disappears and the fabric softens up.

fencing from Donald Christie on Vimeo.

On arriving in Berlin for the first time, Aggie and I went straight to the flea-market at Mauerpark. It was a beautiful but very chilly day. We found this photo album which may have inspired our next trip. I can't quite decide if they flew all the way to Nessebar on the Black Sea, or whether they drove, but either way, the photos show such an interest in modern architecture as well as a gorgeous couple on their Eastern block hols. Why was the album got rid of? It's made me so interested in these people that just turned up.

This one is a bit of a mystery, I can't find an airfield called Stoppelfeld - it seems to mean Stubblefield.

Some lovely pics from the Gentle Author's blog.  Richard & Cosmo Wise’s pop up shop is at 68a Cheshire St where all the clothes are between seventy and one hundred and thirty years old. until Nov 20th. Better get down there.

What were they thinking? Are these the new hero products?

Here are some pics of how it looked before Rupert re-made it, as well as another little idea that he whipped up the other night. This is all at the Kings Hall in Hackney.

I knew that I wanted to have our new shop on Golborne road from about a year ago - it's such a great mix of people and shops and feels so busy all the time. We opened a week ago and all the neighbours have been in to introduce themselves and give their opinions as to whether we're needed there or not. Mostly it's been super friendly and we're looking forward to making some great friends.

Yesterday I took a walk with Leila to look at the food on offer - she was in charge, and purposefully marched into each place and pointed out the stuff she loved and the things I might have missed. Here are a few of the things we saw, all displayed in such a way as to get us properly excited. I bought these for Hamish, hope they fix his throat.

A couple of weekends ago, prompted by a story about the Archbishop of Canterbury, Rowan Williams, in the Observer, my mum and daughter decided to dress my dad up. There is an uncanny similarity, but since he's a pretty committed atheist we had to make do with his super cool (in the 70s) neck chain in place of a cross.