Joanna's Blog

Living North’s Christmas Fair at Wynyard Hall 14/11/2009

Christmas is coming and the first place to head to in this holiday period is Wynyard Hall’s Christmas Fair!

This event runs from the Friday until the Sunday on the second weekend in November and is hosted by Living North. 

I pulled into the Wynyard Hall grounds which you can’t fail to be amazed at, and followed the directed path to park my car up. I was with my son, mum, nana, sister, and nephew.  Tickets are £5 each pre ordered online, buy 3 get one free, or £7 on the door.  There is not much luck getting in on the door because it is so popular, it was heaving at 10am when the doors open!

When we first entered the huge marquee it was brilliant! I say marquee, this was industrial size, huge - with red carpet and central heating throughout! There must have been 200 stalls, all different sizes and selling everything you could ever imagine.  There were tonnes of crafts and handmade jewellery stalls, handbags, and various beauty products, hand made cards, toys and wooden delights! 

I was straight for the foodie stuff, it was a foodies heaven!  I bought some delicious pesto, made in no other than Bedale!  Some of the best olive oil I have ever tasted made in italy but sold by a local guy who imports on a small scale! Appleby’s Cakes, Chutneys made in Newcastle, and toffee vodka made in Northumbria!  It was hectic, and I had Ramsay who was tired after walking around it all with me (despite me having the pushchair but boys will be boys!). The upside was that he ate samples from almost all these food stalls, he was in his element!  So we went into the main hall for a coffee and a sit down.  If you have never been inside Wynyard Hall before, you really are missing something, it is wow wow wow!  Like stepping back in time entering into the country’s finest stately home.  It really is magnificent and is especially nice because it still seems so untouched, so uncommercialised.  There was a jazz quartet playing christmas classics, the giant tree, and the festive cheer buzzing around in the air.  We had coffee and lunch, then chatted about all our buys, we had all got split up many times, so it was good to have a nosey.  It also gave us time to think too because we all went back to stalls to purchase items we had debated over buying earlier on in the day.  Each and everyone of us loved it, all bought lovely things, either for ourselves, or as a present for others, and agreed we would definetely be there next year!

Now if you do want to be there next year you will need to buy tickets in October by signing up to the email notifications on Living North website, or keep your eyes out for it on www.visitteesvalley.co.uk where you can find many more fantastic events and days out in the Tees Valley.