But I’m getting ahead of myself. It’s still the first weekend of the Festival. Outside, there’s a bustling street market. Inside, there’s also a certain amount of bustling. Cate Parsons tells me she was up until 3am on the first morning, rushing to get everything into place. It’s a lovely, cottagey home, but with the best will in the world it’s a fairly confined space in which to stuff the work of eight artists. But Cate’s done it before and, in a comment I hear repeated elsewhere, she says that every year she thinks “never again” and every year the pink front door is again propped open to welcome outsiders.
It’s here I discover for the first time the reasons why so many artists are represented at many venues. It’s the economy, stoopid. It costs good money to be part of the Open House trails, what with the brochure and the signage and whatever; and, despite the goodwill of sponsors, a multiplicity of talent at each house spreads the costs and the burden of having someone always available during opening hours.
Cate specialises in animal sculptures welded from mild steel. The hares are particulally dynamic, and I comment that you don’t see hares very often, though I’m about to be proved wrong. Amongst the other artists here, I noted the wearable jewellery of Posh Totty designer Alice River-Cripps, the clay figures of David Price and the children’s illustrations of Jasmine Mercer.

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