Our regular monthly meetings are held on the second Wednesday of each month at 7.30pm at Quedgeley Village Hall, Bristol Road, Quedgeley, Gloucester.
After our monthly meetings we submit a report for publication in the next issue of Quedgeley News. One of our members, Christine Bentley, is our News Reporter. To give you a flavour of our meetings we have included copies of some of this year's reports.
Our July meeting was on a warm summer evening when we welcomed Angela Rendell and Kate Peake with their delightful talk “Dressing the Georgian Lady,” a time of excess and extravagance, Marie Antionette and the landed gentry. The gorgeous Georgian dress worn by Kate and information about the period made it a fun evening! The dresses, and others shown to us in photographs, are all made by her talented mother Angela who also does the photography. This was their second visit to our WI previously they talked on a different fashion period of history, the Victorians. We were again not disappointed, and our ladies thoroughly enjoyed the evening which also included a competition to find the oldest item in our wardrobes. This was well supported; we had a range of fantastic things displayed from a 2nd World War uniform to christening gowns to wedding outfits. It proved very difficult to choose a winner when everyone had made such an effort!
As usual we had no August meeting, but some of our ladies enjoyed our summer trip to the SS Great Britain in Bristol.
We will be back in Quedgeley Village Hall on the second Wednesday in September at 7.30pm when Dominic Hamilton from the Rococco Gardens in Painswick will be talking to us about these delightful local gardens.
We warmly welcome new members and visitors. For more information, please visit our website, www.quedgeleywi.co.uk, our Facebook page, or ring our President, Pat Watts on 01452 502252
It was another warm and sunny evening for our June meeting and most members were dressed in red white and blue to commemorate the Queen’s Platinum Jubilee. After the singing of Jerusalem we went through the usual business. The book stall at the recent St James’ Church Fete had been profitable, having raised nearly £35. Future dates to look forward to are the visit to the Incinerator in July, the August outing to SS Great Britain in Bristol, a skittles evening in September and the Robinswood Group party in October which has a cowboy theme. At our July meeting we will have another visit from Kate Peake and Angela Rendell with their talk and demonstration on Dressing the Georgian Lady which is sure to be just as enjoyable as their previous one, Dressing the Victorian Lady. There is a competition for “the oldest item in your wardrobe” and members may or may not be asked to model them!
This month’s speaker was Pam Slatter from the Cotswold Perfumery in Bourton-on-the-Water. She brought several testers for members to try after her talk but first we heard about the history of the Perfumery, which was started in the mid-1960s, where the perfumes were made in the kitchen before moving into bigger premises. You won’t find their perfumes in big stores except Harrods or direct from the Perfumery, although they do also manufacture fragrances for several celebrities. We were told that if you want a particular fragrance then look on the Harrods website, if they haven’t got it listed you can’t get it.
As well as their usual range of fragrances, the Cotswold Perfumery also make “smells” to represent the plague etc. for several historic visitor attractions and anywhere else that may want other authentic “atmospheres”.
The retail price of perfume depends on the cost of over 800 ingredients that come from plants and trees from all over the world. Jasmine is very expensive as it is carefully hand-picked at night when the flowers are at their most fragrant and being pollinated by flying insects. Some flowers only grow in certain countries due to the right climate, while others are only available for one month of the year which also adds to their rarity and expense. Many inexpensive perfumes from well-known companies are purely chemical concoctions and have not been created with the same expensive natural ingredients used by the Perfumery. We were shown a chart which can be found online called The H & R Genealogy which lists hundreds of perfumes and their classification. Some are Sweet while others can be much stronger and one particular perfume, Poison, has been banned in some offices as it was giving people headaches!
We were given several tips on buying and storing perfumes, one of which was to not just go by the name but to actually try a sample and wait at least two minutes for the fragrance to work and also that the same perfume can smell totally different on someone else. Ask for some samples from the store so you can try a few different ones at home. The worst place to keep your expensive perfume is in a glass bottle on your dressing table. It should be kept out of the light, either in your dressing table drawer or even in the bottom of your fridge where it is cool and dark and will keep for much longer. The usual shelf-life of perfumes is around three years, although Chanel No 5 should be used within two years. One other useful tip was to avoid using perfume when you are wearing pearls as it spoils them. After this very informative talk and perfume sampling we raised a toast to Her Majesty the Queen, accompanied by delicious cakes and scones.
