One of my top charity shop areas is my late Granny's neck of the woods, the Cregagh Road in East Belfast. It's has all your classics, Oxfam, Cancer Research, but also your lesser known Quaker Care and East Belfast Mission. These establishments are the kitsch jackpot. Oxfam etc. went under a bit of a makeover in the Cool Britannia 90's. As Kate Moss wannabes suddenly opened up their clothing scavenger hunts to the before shunned charity stores, the shops followed suit with more professional window dressing and merchandising. The 'chain' charity shops didn't stock crap any more, just good quality, in style second hand clothing and bits & bobs.

Old Maude & Edna no longer had a say in which donated products went in the window, and which in the skip. This meant a lot of the junk I'd be after got thrown away. Plastic pineapples & grotesque ornaments which never sold just got thrown away. I weep at the thought of all the J H Lynch & Tretchikoff prints some sassy, middle-aged assistant manager may have chucked, deeming them bad taste.

So when I come across a one-off charity shop like 'U Fight Cancer', it's like other women being let loose in a magical 80% off Topshop.
These places still stock shelves of old aunties' ornaments, 1970's Tupperware, faded prints of exotic women & shell decorated barometers.

I've gone on a tangent, and the items I bought today aren't even in that genre of find! But I do love the Cregagh Road shops, I think that was my point.

In their Cancer Research shop I spotted these mugs & bowls. Originally from Urban Outfitters at £8 each for the bowls and £6 for the mugs, I bought them for £1.50 and 95p. They are brand new too, the Urban Outfitters stickers with their prices were still stuck on the bottom!

Hope you all have a nice night tonight, and here's to finding lots more bargains next year.

http://folksy.com/shops/KitschenSink

Also adore these tape measure bracelets, a must have for my seamstress pals.