AN UNLIKELY PAIRING FROM THE ST TROPEZ MARKET

On a recent trip to Grimaud I had a wonderful morning rummaging round the market in St. Tropez. It is one of my favorite pastimes as it is full of the most wonderful eccentric objects as well as bargain priced clothes, accessories and jewellery alongside delicious local produce.  It is always pot luck as you never know what you are going to find, although over time you get to know where the best stalls hang out and get an eye for some of the good stuff as opposed to the overpriced rubbish.  I find that there is more chance of picking up a bargain in the winter as opposed to the summer when there are more visitors around.  This certainly proved true this January as the markets were very quiet due to the weather in the South of France had been unusually rainy and dreary (the locals blamed “les anglais” for having brought this dire weather with them!). The bronze statue below certainly caught my husband’s eye and after much deliberation, and negotiating over the price it became ours. The delicate glass chandeliers glistened in the faint sunlight and beckoned me towards them and just before the stall packed up for the day a mutually acceptable deal was struck. The two styles are so diametrically opposed that I never dreamed that they would end up happily cohabiting together on the consul in our flat, but they did and I think the chandeliers look particularly appealing at night with their candles which throw a soft light onto “Brigitte”, how could we not call her that as she was created by a French artist in the 1950s.