Visiting the "Antient Towne" of Rye

Towns are like people. Old ones often have character, the new ones are interchangeable. --Wallace Stegner

After spending a few days floating along the Rhine, we flew back to England, hopped on a couple of trains, and found our way to the cobbled streets of Rye in Sussex, England.

I can't quite remember how we decided to visit Rye. I think I might have glimpsed a reel about it on Instagram when I was trying to think of other things to do during our visits to the UK. I'm a big fan of getting on a train over getting on an airplane, and when I discovered that Rye was only an hour out of London by train, I figured it would be a good option.

Rye really is an "Antient Towne." The Doomsday Book shows it with recorded households since 1086. Dat's an old place, if you ask me. It has all of the features of the ye old towne all over the place, from cobbled streets to slightly crooked houses:

Does it have a castle keep? Not quite, but one of the landgates is still there. It used to have a portcullis and a drawbridge:

Does it have a castle? Sure does, complete with a courtyard and a winding staircase built counterclockwise and with crooked steps to trip up anyone running after you with a sword:

Old cathedral? Check. The cathedral has been standing since the 1200s, with elements being continuously added onto it over the centuries.

I loved these embroidered kneeling cushions in the pews. I wonder how you get to get one of these for your family?

We didn't have anything on the agenda, apart from exploring and relaxing. Each morning, we had breakfast at The Apothecary, which is a cafe in the old chemist's shop. The little drawers on the walls are the original ones with old labels like "wormwood" and "lavendar" and the like:

We mostly wandered, enjoying the sites and taking in the history:

Most of the buildings are listed, which means that they have to be kept up to a certain standard: you can't just knock them down and build new stuff in its place. Our hotel was a 16th century coaching inn. It had crooked floors and I wouldn't recommend skipping down the hallway if you were over 6 feet tall, but everywhere you turned, there were places to sit and enjoy the charm of the place:

I spent a couple of afternoons sitting in one of the sitting rooms working on an embroidery project I'd brought along. It's the first time I brought an embroidery project while traveling, and while I didn't keep the needles in my hand luggage, I quite liked the compact nature of it for this trip:

I did have a bit of a mishap on the way here: one of the outer pockets of my luggage was caught somewhere in the machinery of the airports it travelled through and the zipper slider popped off. I did a quick search for a craft store or haberdashery where I could get a replacement, and I was happy to come upon Merchant & Mills:

Sadly, they did not carry zipper sliders (few places do), but I was very happy to wander around to see what else they carry:

They strive to provide products that are sustainable and environmentally friendly, and they also work with suppliers around the world to source deadstock fabric, keeping it out of landfills and bringing it in for people to fawn over and make things from:

I really had no business buying anymore fabric, but I did collect up a selection of buttons and notions and needles for my little hoard:

And as I was waiting for the clerk to ring it up well... this remnant made it into my basket. I mean, come on, like I could have resisted:

I really loved how so many of the buildings were being used for shops and galleries and cafes and the like. We came across Rye Pottery, which has ONLY been there since 1793 (so young!) but the fellow there told me that before it was a pottery, the building was a machine shop for the boats that went into the tidal marshes nearby into the sea:

I would have loved to take home boxes and boxes of these tiles:

We also came across this gallery, but I can't figure out what the building is or why there is a chimney above the space that the gallery is in. I'd appreciate any suggestions:

We came across an antique store which was closing down and got a great deal on this Edwardian inkwell. Do I need an Edwardian inkwell? Well, how else am I going to reenact my Downton Abbey scenes at home?

And, despite my best efforts to avoid going in, I walked into a stationery shop where there was the most charming lady who told me how she sourced all the product from artisans in India. The cards are made from recycled cotton rags and wool:

And the hubby talked me into getting this book (well, he actually bought it for me), also made from recycled cotton and from the leather off cuts from shoe shops. He said, "You can put all your potions and spells in it."

We ate dinner in a pub where I could hear the cook singing Puccini, and then came back another night when open mic night was on. I met this dog named Louie, and ate lovely food:

And then... we took a train to London and stayed one more night at an airport hotel (where the floor seemed impossibly even after teetering around Rye) before we got on a plane to come back to Canada.

It was a good change of scenery and I did get some rest and relaxation out of it. I also came home with a finished project: King Leo, the embroidered lion:

I got so much practice on my embroidery that I actually finished a second one recently, which you can just see in the bottom right corner of this photo. King Leo has a brother... shall we call him King Mufasa? Not sure yet: 

Writing this post almost three weeks after returning feels a little strange, but I just knew I couldn't leave out the last third of our trip. I loved the olde worlde charm... but I'm also very glad to be home in my own worlde... and my own bed.

Next post will be all about my craft and art updates!

Have a great week!