Tuesday 31 August 2010

SHOPStock: Review!

Well well, SHOP held it's second festival over this bank holiday weekend and rather than camp in SHOP like last time, this time, we actually left the shop - on bicycles - and camped in a field! Although, it should be pointed out at this point, that not everyone cycled as was the original plan due to - in no particular order - bad backs, lack of bicyles, lack of cycling proficiency and car boot sales.
From Bristol, we cycled to Walnut Tree Farm, 9 miles outside of the centre, as the crow flies. The route we took on the way out saw us through some lovely North Somerset countryside, with a rest stop at Chew Valley Lake. On arrival at the farm, we pitched up and then played some ball games before having a massive BBQ. To walk off said BBQ, we took an evening trip down country lanes to a 'local' pub about a mile or so away. There we endured terrifying stories of foot-eating rats and rampaging cows and even more horrifying than that - tall tales from Chasers Nightclub in Kingswood.
Back at camp it was time for a camp fire and more stories - of the 'who can embarass themselves the most' kind, rather than the Jackanory kind.
Come morning, a camp breakfast in the sunshine was on the menu, before it was time to get back in the saddle for a mostly downhill cycle home via a different national cycle route. All that was left to do was have a last pint before finally admitting SHOPStock was over. For this year...

Setting off on Sunday, with the open road, the odd hill and a just one fall ahead of us

The cycle path along the river and out of BristolA brief stop to coordinate the four wheeled contingency in Chew Magna

Onboard camera!

Arrival at camp, puncture repairs and sitting on chairs

Cat mithering and a barn

The campsite, all to ourselves. Nice innit?

We found a key under a rock and 'barn' becomes 'partaay barn'

Blue skies, lush fields, a night under canvas, what more could one possibly want? A cake. A big beautiful cake.

Get ooorf my inhaler

A real-life camp fire

Breakkie

The secret seven*

Ashton Court and it's old deers on the way home


*SHOP orginally intended SHOPStock to be available to the whole of Shop Club, til the lovely campsite we found informed us they would prefer we kept the numbers down to 12. By this point we had already exceeded the 12 by 3 bods, so we had to start turning people away. Then, circumstances conspired so that some people had to drop out, bringing us down to the perfect 12, til the morning of departure, when 3 people had logistical problems and 2 were at the other end of the country, leaving us 5 short of said 12! Safe to say we have learnt a lot about organisational matters this weekend! But, nevertheless many thanks to everyone who came and many apologies to the people we had to turn away.


Paolo, all ready set for cycle camping, only to be thwarted by bad organisation (sorry, Paolo!)

Monday 23 August 2010

Guerilla Gardening

This Saturday (just gone) saw SHOP busy at work in the new arts space creating - of all - things seed bombs (as well as some questionable clay sculptures)! The aim of the exercise was to claim back the Christmas Steps Arts Quarter Community Garden - that residents and traders have had access cut to since the late 90's when security gates belonging to a nearby office block were erected - by throwing said bombs at said garden.

The rain put a stop to the actual bombing and there's plenty of seed bomb ingredients still at SHOP, so if you have a place in the city you would like to 'hit' pop in and we'll give you some surreptitious advice.


(rumours that we were given the code to the security gate by a neighbour are neither true nor false).


Here's some educational pictures:









It is just clay and soil, honest.


Many hands make many seed bombs, and ginger giraffe-deers.


Many hands make, oh ... made that joke already



The ginger giraffee-deer fiercely guarded the seed bombs



A bomb! A bomb! A bomb!!

Here's some bombs we made earlier...

Friday 20 August 2010

Reclaim Nature: Planting Picnic in the New Christmas Steps Community Garden

Oh well, it rained but so what - we still managed to get all the weeds out of our area in the community garden and fill it with compost. The plan to plant something was somewhat thwarted as we couldn't actually decide what to plant. There is a nice covered area for picnic-ing, but already wet and cold, we decamped for an indoor stuffing of our faces back in SHOP!

Any ideas what we should grow?

I'm the king of the (plant) world!


Well soiled.


Shameful product placement.




Many hands make light work and many feet make for a strange keyring for the garden key.
You're havin a giraffe!

Wednesday 18 August 2010

Lets Do Nice Things Life Drawing returns...

Last night saw the welcome return of Life Drawing courtesy of our new friends at Let's Do Nice Things.

With the promise of a professional naked person and after the word had got round about the success of the last time (during the takeover) the attendance swelled, so much in fact that we will have to move to the main SHOP next time and there's even the promise of switching from monthly to fortnightly!

Sarah who runs the Life Drawing has been receiving a lot of praise for the way the class is run and how welcome everyone feels regardless of ability.




Tuesday 17 August 2010

WorkSHOP: Fix it Don't Chuck it

Our expert for the Fix it Don't Chuck it WorkSHOP was SO skilled and SO sought after that he got pinched for an emergency job halfway through the session, something about some organisation called NASA or something?

Aaanyway, he did manage to get a few fixes in, including, the cotter pin on a bicycle pedal and a no disc error on a DVD player, see how varied his skills are?

Here's a picture of the bike:


And a library a picture of a DVD player:



Friday 13 August 2010

New stock now in SHOP!

NEW STOCK! NEW STOCK! NEW STOCK!
Men's shirts, polo's and caps!
Women's dresses, skirts, jackets, tops and brooches!
Homeware!
Exclamation marks!