Where to start in this two-pronged story…

Have you seen this lovely online shop A Rum Fellow? It’s run by Dylan O’Shea and his partner Caroline Lindsell who have (respective) backgrounds in charity and fashion. This is their first shop venture, which they started at the end of last year. It’s full of colourful and unique, vintage and new homewares from around the UK, France and South America, among other places. Here are a some of the things catching my eye.

The duo has a strong interest in travel and supporting and promoting the livelihoods of small communities – for example, they commissioned a remote tribe in the Amazon for a collection of hand embroidered tapestries that they later had made into cushions in the UK. ‘The plan is to work with a new culture / country every year,’ says Dylan.

Dylan, in fact got in touch with us on a different matter – part 2 of this story, which is summed up in this picture he sent.

Folks, that’s one broken Smeg. Here’s what Dylan said about it:

‘This is my partner’s 3 yr old Smeg fridge freezer, in mint green, being taken to its final rest place (Hackney recycle centre). I punctured the freezer compartment whilst giving it a rushed defrost with a hammer and chisel.  In my (meagre) defence it was late evening just before Xmas and heavy rain had blown the electric supply to our house which would take 5 days to fix, so a last minute candle lit evacuation was in motion. The tiny puncture hissed out a smelly gas which I later found out is highly flammable. Luckily the candles didn’t cause an explosion! One tiny little puncture killed the whole thing. She very nearly killed me.’

Dylan has since replaced the Smeg, which he notes, was ‘expensive’. Dylan, we feel for you but also salute your reaction to the event.