On Tuesday 21st February, Chris Yeo from the Antiques Roadshow gave us an amusing and information talk about his life in antiques, as well as giving valuations to some objects brought in by our members. Chris was curator of the Ken Stradling Collection in Bristol, an eclectic array of British and European design from the 20th century, and is currently a valuer at Clevedon Salerooms. His specialism is 20th Century art and design and he has appeared regularly on The Antiques Roadshow since 2015. He told us about how fashions change and can affect the price of antiques so you should always buy what you love, rather than what you think might make you money (as it very often won’t!)
On 17th January we held a swishing event, at St Andrews Bowls Club, to swap clothes old and new. It was a well attended event with lots being brought and re-homed, doing our bit to help reduce waste, save money and the planet! Left over items were not binned but taken to other clothes swap events and one smart, new coat was donated to the Bristol Central Library’s Coat Rail, which has coats available throughout the winter for anyone who needs one. While this was only a small contribution to charity we are considering doing a public swishing event next year to raise funds for local charities. Please email us, using the contact page, if you are interested in helping or supporting this event.
On 6 December, we had our annual Christmas Party. Fizz and raffle tickets were sold to raise money for our charity The Square Food Foundation. Everyone brought a dish to share, some from the late, great 2013 Gloucester Road Cook Book! Hannah Lowry won the skittles (again!) and Jo Furney won first prize in the raffle, which was an epic hamper! We also announced our new programme, which can be viewed on our programme page.
In November, we held ad a Personal Styling session with Elise Heptinstall-Holmes of Redefined Styling.
We discussed how to build a capsule wardrobe, what colours to choose, how to use accessories and more!
In October, we held our Annual General meeting to review our annual report and finance report for the year.
Our finances are healthy and we agreed we had had a good mix of different types of event at our monthly meetings. We discussed ideas for next year’s programme.
We discussed how to bring back our Wild Women group who held adventurous and sporty meet ups to try different things like paddle boarding and wall climbing.
We did some pumpkin carving to celebrate Hallowe’en, and some members carvings were very impressive!
In September, we celebrated the apple in all its forms!
We tasted apples, apple juice and of course, cider! Members brought their spare apples and we had an apple pressing, and had competitions for apples, apple based foods and apple crafts, an apple quiz and a cider tasting!
Unfortunately it poured down and our Summer Social in St Andrew’s Park was rained off! Instead we went to the Bristol Flyer and had an indoor social instead.
We learned about Graffiti with Graffiti Artist Jody and had a go at some spray paint art.
We discussed Craftivism at June’s meeting and members shared what Craftivism meant to them. We also took part in some simple sewing and knitting craft activities with our Knit and Stitch Group members.
Gloucester Road WI 
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