Arthur Swallow Fairs

Ripley Castle’s website describes a history of persecution, plague, loyalty, social turbulence and recklessness.

Dealers will be heading to Nottinghamshire and Lincolnshire this month with three days of buying beckoning from the two ‘biggies’.

Although some restrictions are still in place for now, many fairs and markets organisers are gearing up for a busy summer to serve pent-up demand.

As live fairs and markets return in strength, Richard Burgoin, director of Arthur Swallow Fairs, is in the midst of his summer season of events.

Swallow Fairs’ first three-day Decorative Home and Salvage Shows this year is the biannual event running at the 14th century Ripley Castle, near Harrogate, from noon on Friday, May 7, to Sunday, May 9.

Roadmap means reopening time is getting closer at last but some hurdles remain.

The appetite people have for the return of fairs and markets is summed up by Alice Roberton from Arthur Swallow Fairs talking about the specially adapted, fully outdoor Covid-19 antiques and salvage market on Saturday, June 27.

Arthur Swallow’s busy vintage monthly fleamarket runs at the Lincoln Showground.

Pictured is award-winning photographer and interiors stylist Tamsyn Morgans who runs one of the workshops at Arthur Swallow Fairs’ Decorative Home & Salvage Shows.

“I’ve sold Jesus Christ… could I interest you in St Patrick?” So asked Martyn Watson of Penrith, Cumbria, stalling out in the Epic Centre and keen to shift his statue of Ireland’s patron saint.

Condensing a two-day event into one and moving to a new weekday slot are no mean feats – just ask Arthur Swallow Fairs, which has just launched a new streamlined format. ATG went along to the first edition to view the results.

Arthur Swallow Fairs’ Antiques & Home show may not have the moniker ‘international’ attached but the event attracts a strong overseas group of buyers who comb the fair, clutching sheets of shipping firm stickers to identify purchases for collection.

Belinda and Tom Kilduff (pictured below) are Lincolnshire locals and Antiques & Home Show loyalists. They noted how “busy, condensed and lively” the one-day format was.

Buyers are spoilt for choice during May and early June when three decorative and salvage fairs will be running in the UK, all in interesting outdoor settings. Here is a short focus on them.

Organiser launches Malvern fair to run alongside existing venues.

Arthur Swallow Fairs has announced a significant change in the format of its antiques and home fairs held at the Lincolnshire Showground.

Schedule change for Lincolnshire Showground marks a shift in strategy but other organisers are more cautious.

From dealers Charlie Bates and Matthew Nellist of Jeffrey and Day comes a story about Jean-Baptiste Godin, a 19th century French industrialist and enlightened innovator.

The first of Arthur Swallow Fairs’ Decorative Home and Salvage Shows this year kicks off on Friday, May 11, and runs to Sunday, May 13, at Ripley Castle near Harrogate.