Wrexham County Borough 92- The Tailors Quilt /the bar - mats clothing/Alexander McQueen collection /Football is back on again /a lambourgini Hurican

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It has been a short break this year between the end of the football season and the start of the new one . Scotland start early due to their bad winters . Because of the World Cup our season is starting a month earlier than normal . The Charity Shield as I will forever know it was held at the King Power Stadium in Leicester . Liverpool hammered Manchester City . It has been a season of summer sport from Wimbledon to the 20/20 Cricket , from the Womens Euros to the Commonwealth Games . If you are into your sport then the summer of 2022 has been a good one with something for everyone . As we drove into town clutching our tickets for the last pre-season friendly we found ourselves chatting about the match . It is exactly a year since we had free tickets for the Curzon Ashton match . This year we had to pay £5 with all the proceeds going to Macclesfield Town. A team with a connection to the town . One of its own Robbie Savage had bought into Macclesfield . Some had likened him to Judas Iscariot because he betrayed the town of his birth buying into Macclesfield rather than Wrexham . Others remembered him fondly for being the first to contribute 10k to the fighting fund to keep Wrexham alive in its dark days .

The conversation flitted between football - the new players we had signed this week , the new freehold being bought back for the club by our Hollywood owners , the purchase of Morag the Dragon. She would become a fitting addition to the new Kop which was closer than ever to being built . Plans to demolish the old Kop had been agreed . Fencing was going up and in the next few weeks the demolition would begin . The plans for all black ultra modern Kop were with the council for planning permission to be granted and we had a new scoreboard . There was also the small matter of the Disney + documentary - Welcome to Wrexham featuring Rob McAlleney and Ryan Reynolds, the supporters, the players and the misfortunes of the town .

Back and to it went . Football /Holidays . Our plans for Turkey were now aborted . A phone call had been made to our insurance who had assured us way back in March that although at that time they did not cover a green card for Turkey they hoped to have it sorted by the Summer . The reality was that they were still no nearer arranging the underwriters to honour travel to Turkey . Or Albania and Montenegro and many others . We had tried Saga who wanted to quote us before they tried the underwriters with no guarentee if we paid the insurance we could get cover . As the new price with Saga a company who advertise as competitive was extremely high .In fact double what we were currently paying . In addition to the extra we would lose around £100 cancellation fees and have to pay somewhere in excess of £80 for two weeks green cover so Turkey was no longer on our country to visit in September . Plans had reverted to spending the entire holiday in Greece . Would we have enough to see ? That was the worry and the thoughts for the next week .

It was good to park up on an almost empty car park at Glyndwr University . Still £3 to park and because it was a friendly there was plenty of room to park . Next week would be different for the first league match of the season . But that is something to think about next week .

Our plan to waste some time before the game was to walk up town , call in to do a few chores that needed looking at and then going for a coffee, a bacon sandwich and a sausage roll at our go to cafe Gerrards . We spurned Cafe Nero or Costa Coffee in favour of an old fashioned family run very friendly cafe that served good plain old fashioned food and a good cup of coffee.

After our coffee we headed for Ty Pawb and the Wrexham Tailors Quilt exhibition . The quilt was made by Wrexham tailor James Williams and it took him ten years to make. Made from scraps he had collected from his work as a military tailor it was purely an exhibition piece showcasing his talent. We had never heard of it before it was brought to Wrexham from St Fagans Museum to be exhibited in the town . Mr Williams created the quilt in its subdued colours in his spare time sitting in the evenings sewing together squares , diamond shapes , cutting out the animals and recreating the Bible stories and showcasing local history . It was a masterpiece made in 1852. The quilt was behind glass which did make it difficult to photograph . But we were mesmerised as we listened to the historian working on the exhibition who explained its background to us . She pointed out the naive animals . A giraffe, a lion with a bigger smile than the Cheshire Cat . An elephant . Bible stories - Jonah and the Whale , The garden of Eden , .Local history Telfords bridge over the Menai Straits and the Pontcysyllte Aqueduct . All picked out in the kharki, the greens and the browns of the military uniforms materials . The odd splash of colour of red picked out along the corners and up the geometrical side patterns . The stitching was delicate and all done by hand . We were looking at one of most well-known patchworks produced in Wales. 4,525 separate pieces of cloth all cut into the various components needed to produce the quilt . Having taken ten years to make it was displayed at the Art Treasures Exhibition in Wrexham in 1876, the Palace of Arts in Wembley London in 1925 and finally at the Wrexham National Eisteddfod in Wrexham in 1933 . Rabindranath Tagore said " In Art , a man reveals himself and not his objects " Looking at the Quilt it indeed told us about his skill , the meticulous way he worked , how tidy he must have been, how he knew his Bible stories and how to tell those stories to an illiterate population . He knew the animals he brought into the design and he had the knack of thinking ahead , of planning something that would require patience and fortitude . Something he probably received no reward in monetary terms . The quilt told us so much about the man who designed and made it when you read between the lines of the stitching .

We were then shown the photographs of the Alexander McQueen exhibition where he designed a collection of clothing including bags based on the designs . The Lion smiled back at me from his coat and from the bag . They graced the Paris catwalk . A small town tailor with a big skill influencing a major 21st century clothes designer . Who would have thought it ?

The rest of the exhibition held exhibits of shawls and quilts of many materials and colours . Geometric shapes in black and white . A real splash of colour in other fabrics used . A waistcoat made from Wrexham Lager beer mats that once graced the local pubs . A massive quilt filled with everything Wrexham . From beer mats to goalkeepers gloves . From advertising slogans to football memorabilia . At one time we probably would not have visited such an exhibition in town but with time on our hands it filled the void between parking up and the gates opening at the ground . It was fascinating to walk from exhibit to exhibit and see so much of our hometown in the quilts .

On the walk back we encountered music on the streets . A mexican band playing trumpets very loudly . The music made you want to dance . We walked in front of a very expensive Lambourgini Hurican with blacked out windows . We guessed who drove that car . It was a savage looking black monster . We would see it again at the football ground . Yes it was owned by Robbie Savage a local lad done good . And yes we beat his team . 4 - 0 . An auspicious start to the 2022/2023 season .

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Comments

[Home and Away]

Sorry to hear about cancellation of your Turkey trip...
Perhaps you might fly there instead as there is so much to see and do. You have pretty much done Greece and every country between Wales and there. What happened to your idea of visiting Scandinavia? I know it is expensive, but with an RV you could take food and hopefully save some money.

[JenGog]

the trip
Hello Bob - We are a bit stuck with Greece as we have already booked the ferry from Italy to Greece and paid for a camping on board for the van . So we thought rather than lose the money just to see if we could make a holiday out of Greece . We have plenty of places to see that we have missed before . So it should be Ok . We might fly to Istanbul perhaps next Spring . Scandanavia went pearshaped with Covid and we did not want to risk trying it in the Spring as Glenn was not sure if he wanted to drive long distances . The last holiday to France was a try out to see if we could get to Turkey . Disappointed with the insurance but it is what it is . We could not even get Albania nor Montenegro as our insurance companies wont cover us . Perhaps next year will be different . Might get to Scandanavia in the Spring . Will see how things go . Are you still on for Scotland ?