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"Girls Getaways to London and the Cotswolds"
By: Paull Tickner

The Royal Ceremonial Dress Collection; Zandra Rhodes Museum of Fashion and Textiles; the Fashion, Jewellery and Accessories Collection at the Victoria and Albert Museum; the markets at Portobello, Bermondsey and Petticoat Lane, Harrods…Welcome to some of the tasty morsels on the menu for a Girls Getaway to London.

Looking further down the very long list of a la carte items that can be blended together for a six or seven night programme you will find:

*  a floral feast at a manor house that includes hands-on making opportunities, lunch with edible flowers in the salads and puddings and, after a stroll in the garden, afternoon tea with lavender flavoured scones, jelly, drizzle cake and rose petal jam.

*  A train ride to the Viking city of York and a special tour of the recently opened National Museum of Quilting whose first exhibition came from your own National Museum in Lincoln Nebraska. 

The Thermae Bath Spa

Another day out heads west to the Roman city of Bath for a Jane Austen walking tour, a visit to No 1 Royal Crescent which gives an opulent illustration of grand Georgian life and a two hour self indulgent splurge at the Thermae Bath Spa.

Enjoying a Water Jet at Thermae Bath Spa

*  a short chocolate making course given by a Master Chocolatiere, a pub lunch and a classic afternoon tea where they make the famous Tiptree jam.

*  the 2009 Living Crafts, Art , Design and Innovation Show at Jacobean Hatfield House 7-10 May, the largest of its kind in Europe, and the Art, Design and Taste of  Summer Show at Blenheim Palace, birthplace of Sir Winston Churchill 23-25 May.  Both events attract master craftsmen and women who show and demonstrate their skills to the assembled masses.  The second of these shows will work well with a day at the Chelsea Flower Show (send an email immediately if you are planning a garden tour to this great event).

*  Althorp, the ancestral home of the Spencer family where the day includes a tour of the treasure-filled house, the exhibition that celebrates the life of Diana Princess of Wales and the Island of the Round Oval where she is laid to rest.

If you are looking for something more gently paced, head away from the hustle and bustle of London and make for the Cotswolds where there are some real treats in store for you.

Putting the T in the word Cotswolds is a theme that might appeal because it enables you to sip your way round one of the loveliest corners of England, sampling some of our finest brews in cathedrals, stately homes, great gardens, award winning tea rooms and privately owned properties that open for charity and only when they are at their best. In one of the prettiest of the Gloucestershire villages, you can take half-day course on how to prepare and correctly serve a classic English Afternoon Tea.   From your Cotswold base, you can enjoy a day in Tetbury the region’s antiques capital,  finding bargains at Beckford Silk Mills, and take in a matinee with the Royal Shakespeare Theatre in Stratford upon Avon with a country pub supper on the way back to the hotel.  If the Bard is an important aspect of the tour, you can take a closer look at the period gardens at the Shakespeare Houses and enjoy a private tour of moated, Elizabethan  Broughton Castle, which was used as a location for the filming of Shakespeare in Love.

For those interested in the culinary arts, there’s also a special London and Cotswolds tour that will be led by its creator, the former personal chef to HRH The Prince of Wales.

A quilt from the Quilters' Guild Collection and it is called
 'The Tree of Life'. It is a broderie perse construction  made of block printed
cotton and linen and dates from the late 18th century to early 19th century

If you have clients who head off to Paducah, Quilt city USA and other US based Quilting Fairs, invite them to come to the UK.  Around a day in York at the new Quilt Museum and Gallery the future national HQ for the Quilters Guild of the British Isles, you can build a tour that features Quilts UK at Great Malvern (just west of the Cotswolds) which runs 14-17 May 2009.

A Welsh 'home' quilt: red and white tapestry woven blanket
appliqued with machine embroidered panels of Welsh wild flowers

With a bit of juggling, you can also include a day at the 2009 Chelsea Flower Show! The National Patchwork Championships take place 19-21 June near London and The Festival of Quilts is at the National Exhibition Centre, Birmingham between 20-23 August.

American Welsh chapel machine embroidered textile collage

It probably comes as something of a surprise to learn that Liverpool is THE place to go for a UK embroidery and needlework tour.  There are Mortlake tapestries at Speke Hall, remarkable stump work at the Lady Lever Art Gallery, amazing ecclesiastical vestments in the Anglican Cathedral, and a fascinating Needlework Studio in the Crypt under the Metropolitan Cathedral of Christ the King. With a visit to the Voirrey School of Embroidery and in London, the Royal School of Needlework, the two centres deliver a truly memorable experience.

For further information on these and other ideas for UK-bound Girls Getaways, email pjtickner@yahoo.co.uk

For the past 28 years, Paull has been fully committed to helping travel agents to find, develop and convert untapped niche markets into customised UK-bound FITs and group tours.  His hard earned experience, extensive knowledge and impressive connections make him an invaluable resource for those wanting to harness the potential from the different sources that are on your doorstep.