Renegade Craft fairs have jumped across the pond from the US for the past 3 years to East London and this year we just had to pay a visit - and what a great day we had too. Renegade have made a huge stamp in the US and have fairs in Brooklyn, Chicago, San Francisco, Austin and Los Angeles - just a few then! As their website says 'The Renegade Craft Fair is a curated indie-craft marketplace showcasing the brightest talents in contemporary craft and design.'
This year in London was bigger than before with over 100 designer/makers and so the popularity is definitely growing over here in the UK. These crafts are not for the feint-hearted though as there are no country crafts in sight. You are more likely to find rude cross-stitches and jewellery that will definitely make you stand out from the crowd.
Well, firstly, where to start! We are likely to miss some people out, but we thought we would go for some of our favourites rather than trying to get everyone in. The full list of who was there can be found on Renegade's website.
The Fox in the Attic had the sweetest collection of hand embroidered plushies.
Sammy had a tough time choosing between all the beautiful jewellery from Eclectic Eccentricity but settled for a blue crystal pendant.
Cute envelope brooches by Amy Panda.
Quirky badges by Kayleigh O'Mara.
Sammy picked up one of these beautiful calendars from Cotton Post.
We love a bit of printing and Passa Pa had some lovely hand printed bags on offer and one of our favourites Zeena had some of her lovely screen printed goodies on display.
DYFALNONC had a fab display of their wooden pendants, we loved the ones using vintage stamps.
The prize for the most unique stall had to go to the girls from The Compartment Store, whose stall was a vintage suit carrier fitted out to hold all their gorgeous stationary wares. Described as 'a department store in a suitcase' it was packed full of goodies!
There was also yesterday's Who's who and H's all round fun jewellery favourite, I am Acrylic. They were pretty much the first people we saw as we walked in the door and they didn't disappoint, H may well have bought a few goodies! Thanks guys for the treats!
We loved Anna Wiscombe's wooden birds and necklaces.
Some Jewellery that neither of us had seen before was by Coatt. They use the Morse code for the word of your choice to give you a bracelet or necklace. They had come all the way from Hollywood too!
H fell in love with these bears from Pygmy Cloud, they are so cute. One day she is going to have a house and will be surrounded by little animals!
We love the very unique style of Ella Masters who Sammy featured back in July for her Love it ... Illustration feature.
Made by Loulabelle had some great Vintage inspired bags that utilised different pieces of fabric to make some really different clutches and bags. Can you guess which one H liked?
Some more cute acrylic jewellery came in the shape of Bonnie Bling whose fun phrase necklaces were a hit.
We were there on day two of Renegade and by this time Debbie Greenaway had lost her voice, thankfully she had a trusty helper to do some talking for her on the Sunday.
Whilst walking around aswell we spotted Make Thrift London doing a lino printing workshop. Daisy was so sweet, even after H admitted to seeing her on Instagram - which kind of made her feel like a stalker!
One of the great things about Lucie Ellen's stall was that you could put together your own favourite colours of her bunting shapes to make your own necklace. We did both love her dipped wooden diamonds too.
We saw our friend Mr Peebles had a stall and couldn't help but have a look what was new. We both have prints from previous visits and now have a Christmas card each to boot, thanks!
One of our Craft Coop friends, Isamo Crochet was there and so we couldn't resist a look.
Now can you guess what Designosaur do? Well, apart from dinosaur jewellery, there is also animals and flowers all lasercut, just for you.
More acrylic came from Hand over you fairy cakes and it was stars aplenty, which kept Sammy very happy.
So, as you can see there was plenty to see and spend our money on! I feel We were very restrained given all the goodies we could have bought! Although, now I feel plenty of these will be on our Christmas lists.
The venue was great and as we went quite early on Sunday morning it was a nice relaxed atmosphere. As we were leaving though it was definitely filling up and made it more difficult to take photos let alone get to the stalls. No bad thing for the designer/makers I am sure! So we swiftly hot footed it down to Giraffe for some late lunch, well needed after all the pretty!
Thanks Renegade for a great day and we will definitely see you next year!
H & Sammy
