Stamford

Hello again,

I recently went to Stamford, one of my favourite little towns in England. It has a very old British feel to it, with plenty of cosy pubs and cafés, along with A LOT of lovely little shops. I try to go every school holiday, especially after Christmas (sales!). Most of the shops on the high street are ones like The White Company, Crew Clothing Co., Joules, White Stuff…expensive shops, basically! But I definitely do recommend going after Christmas, as there are very good sales sometimes. On the high street, you’ll also find book shops, a couple of cafés, Holland & Barrett, a lovely little art shop right at the end (which is quite dangerous for me to go inside…), and many more!

I can never resist going into Walkers Bookshop. It’s a very old building, with beautiful exposed timber. Downstairs, it has Thornton’s, cards, bath bombs (which make the whole lower floor smell delicious) and every magazine you could ever want. Up some uneven, red velvet coloured stairs, with book wallpaper running the length up it, you’ll find the books. They have mainly adult books, quite a large children’s section, and a little bookshelf for teenagers. They often have signed (!) copies, and stock recently-published books very early on. The only problem is, is that it never does deals like Waterstones with the ‘buy one get one half price’, which is a shame, but I just love to look anyway.

Ooo what next? Well, I can never go to Stamford without visiting the dress agency down St. Mary’s Passage. Downstairs, it sells homeware gifts, and upstairs is the agency. If you don’t know what a dress agency is, it’s basically a posh charity shop, but without the money going to charity. You can bring some clothes if you want to sell them, and they will inspect them and see if they’re good enough, i.e. clean, good quality, and usually a good brand. They’ll sell them for an extremely discounted price, and give you half of that money. Typically in this agency, you’ll find brands like White Stuff, The White Company, Joules, Reiss, Kurt Geiger, Hobbs, Ted Baker, Armani, and occasionally Topshop/Dorothy Perkins/Next etc., all for discounted prices. I have found many items of clothing here! They sell shoes, bags, hats and scarves too, although I never find shoes in my size (7/8). It’s usually sizes 5/6.

The set-up of the agency is very much like being in your own bedroom. There’s never many people there – it’s almost always just been me by myself. There’s a comfy armchair (which the owner said is mainly used for weary husbands, haha), a full-length mirror, carpet, and a curtain to draw across a little alcove. This picture doesn’t show nearly the amount of clothes that there are! I thoroughly recommend popping over and taking a look.

Almost every time I visit Stamford, I go to the London Inn for lunch. It has that British, cosy pub feel to it, with all the typical dishes! It also has a children’s, vegetarian, vegan, and gluten-free menu.It also serves many different types of burgers, gorgeous puddings, and breakfast, too. If you are planning to go (and at about prime lunch hour – 1 ish), then book a table, as it’s not that big, and can get very busy very quickly.

This time though, I went to The Cosy Club. There are many Cosy Clubs in England, and I have never been before. Again, very cosy (as the name suggests), lively, with such interesting decor! They too had a children’s, vegetarian, vegan, and gluten-free menu. I would also book a table here in advance. The prices are not as high as the London Inn, which is good!

For my mid-morning coffee (because I need caffeine in order to function), I decided to go to The George. The George has been around for a long time, and is just beautiful. You can stay the night, and it is very expensive! I had a mocha which was £5.00, and it was tiny! But it was nice just to go once. My mum said that I had to go to the toilet whilst I was there, as apparently the bathrooms are amazing. I must say, I was not expecting what I opened the door onto! It was such a cold day, and it was lovely to walk into the drawing room, sit by an open, crackling, and roaring fire, and sip a delicious mocha. The sofa’s are dangerously comfortable…I have a lot of photos for The George, oops, haha.

Isn’t the bathroom beautiful?! I made the pictures slightly bigger so you could see it better, tehe. The walls are all hand-painted.

You don’t need too long in Stamford. It is quite quick to cover the high street, and there aren’t any big shops there. It’s most definitely the perfect place to buy a present (along with the perfect place to spend a lot of money…), as it has so many gift shops, that have all sorts of things that you want, but don’t really need (which, let’s be honest, you kind of do).

I know that this post was mainly pictures, but Stamford is simply too beautiful. I hope that you love it as much as I do.

Lucie x