Alfriston — An Elegant Sufficiency

We arrived in Alfriston in the late afternoon and by the time we got our act together, it was time for an aperitif…

So Alfriston made its initial siren call through the window of the bar of The Star Inn. I sat, G&T in hand, peering across the main street into the windows of The Apiary, looking forward to an hour or two to potter about on Saturday morning before we headed off to Eastbourne for the party.

On Saturday morning, however, the village was part of the route for the Beachy Head Marathon and we stepped out of the hotel door to find the front runners coming through. This gentleman may well have been the leader at this point and we were glad to stand for a while and cheer him - and his followers - on!

So most of our explorations were made on Sunday morning, when the village was waking up to a little sunshine. We feared that, as a small community, Sunday would not be a day for trading and that most of the shops and small businesses would be closed. Thankfully, that was not the case! Alfriston is a popular haunt for tourists and as a result, by ten o’clock, lights were being switched on, doors opening and all of those tempting shops were open for business.

It’s a quaint old main street with a collection of interesting businesses which hint at the affluent clientele they serve.

We peered in the window of Diana Kelly’s Interior Design and admired the lovely glassware and chic table settings inside. Maybe just as well that on this morning at least, the door was still firmly closed!

Across the Rope Walk we found the Village Store, an historic but thriving general store with a quirky interior, complete with a galleried floor upstairs. Though the deli was tempting, since we had plans for Sunday lunch I made do with chocolate - a selection of Rowdy & Fancy’s interesting flavours might just have found their way into my shopping bag for later!

Alfriston is a great place to potter. Just the right size to spend a morning. Small enough to feel that we could linger in any of these corners without feeling that we were missing out on other things.

The wooden clapboard buildings, the flint walls and terracotta bricks and tiles are so characteristic of the area and so different from home, too.

A little further along, we came across Much Ado Books but calamity! It was closed! We returned a little later, understanding that frequently, small businesses are somewhat more flexible in their opening times and this one was most certainly somewhere too good to miss.

We smiled at the height “ruler” just inside the blue gates, noting Roald Dahl up there at the top of the scale and Bilbo Baggins down at the bottom!

For the next hour or so, we explored. Out in the garden was the book bower, filled with mostly paperback, used books that looked remarkably similar to our own shelves at home!

And the Shepherd’s Hut, where every book was priced at £2 and each one was a treasure. How could I resist?

Well, quite easily, actually, for I was already carrying a bag filled with a few of the full price titles I’d spotted in the main shop, which was even more glorious…

Because this is one of those small, independent bookstores which stocks books that other bookshops don’t. Where people stand and chat about the books they are reading and those of us who eavesdrop become curious about the titles they are talking about, can’t resist asking for details and then succumb to a purchase. A shop where the number of titles on the shelves is not overwhelming, where they are not piled high in great quantity but where a careful selection is shown to best advantage, tempting people like me to browse and yes, of course, to buy. With my purchases came a piece of home made lavender shortbread…how lovely was that?

By now, it was nearing the time we’d arranged to meet our friends for Sunday lunch at The Star. So, no time to browse in A Swallow's Wings (love a shop name with an apostrophe!) or in The Dressing Room and only time for the briefest of stops in The Apiary (no website)