CHArts at The Briggait, Glasgow

I was at the Argyll Festival in Glasgow at the weekend.  Organised by CHArts Argyll & the Isles (Culture Heritage &  Arts) who are charting all the culture, heritage & arts activities in the Argyll area.  Argyll Fest was about the best that Argyll has to offer by way of food, drink and artisan crafts.  I was delighted to have been accepted and been part of the event.  

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We had arrived in Glasgow the night before as I hadn't wanted to travel across country in the early hours & it meant we could go to the cinema and see something loud and nonsensical the evening before.  Glasgow was fully booked up, my favorite hotel had run out of beds.  So we took the first one we could find with a vacancy.  Not the nicest but we went to see Mission Impossible which was loud very nonsensical and just what the Dr ordered!

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After a late night, as I was up until all hours sending emails for Artmap weekend, we left the hotel to get to the venue, slightly antsy as I was tired and feeling stressed by the day to come.  Arriving early, when we realised that we had driven past the venue twice before eventually finding it, I had written it off as a waste of a weekend.  If we couldn't find it what chance did was there of any customers coming in?  Then I discovered that there wasn't any electricity as had been requested and promised.  I was stomping around by this point.  We hadn't been able to park terriby near by so I had a lot of to-ing & fro-ing to do before I could start to set up.   However an electrician arrived and power points produced, I stopped being hot and bothered & fakely smiley, was provided with a cup of tea and gradually I calmed down and properly smiled at people!  I discovered later flags and bunting etc got hung out and so people did come in to see what it was all about, LOTS of people!

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The Briggait is an interesting space/venue.  Now full of workshops for over 100 artisits and creatives with a huge central space, fantastically light and bright.  (I was actually quite pleased it was a bit of a grey rainy day so that my lit lamps and shades did show up.) 
It is situated in the medieaval part of Glasgow,  Merchant City, a category A listed building originally built to house Glasgow's fish market, it was completed in 1873 and used for the market until the late 1970's.  

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I didn't take this picture but have nicked it via Google from discoverglasgow.org.  I probably should have googled it before we went so that we knew what to look for when we arrived!  There's also a, now restored, steeple/clock tower, which can't be seen in this picture, that dates back to 1665, an interesting building.

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I was very rubbish at taking photographs that day and was too busy chatting to customers and fellow stall holders to remember.  Periodically Mr B brought across a sample of one of the gins or whiskys or ales that were on offer and food.  It turned out to be a really nice day and we decided to stay an extra night and managed to book into our favorite quirky urban chic hotel 'The Z'.  Also an interesting old building, formally a printworks.
A very mixed weekend!
Kx