A pop-up department store selling top quality ethical products is coming to Dulwich Village in October
Jane Langley wants to change the way you shop.
The Dulwich-based artist and teacher turned retail entrepreneur founded and runs Blue Patch, the online marketplace for British-made top quality and sustainable products. It is hosting its first ever pop-up department store on October 1.
“I wanted to do something local,” Jane tells me when we meet. “It’s really important to remind people that you can buy from independent businesses. October is a great time to start Christmas shopping too.”
The department store will pop up from 10am-6pm at St Barnabas Parish Hall in Dulwich Village. There will be 100 stalls to browse and all 250 members of the Blue Patch retailers’ collective will be showcased.
The carefully curated range of businesses will be selling everything from handmade rugs and organic beauty products to artisan chocolates, alpaca jumpers and Beepalace’s stylish homes for bees.
Everything Blue Patch endorses is the very best from British designers and manufacturers. Exclusives will include the launch of local tailor Mr Dulwich’s first range of womenswear, and new furniture from Katie Walker, who made Prince George’s high chair.
Other stalls will sell couture upcycled bags from Camberwell’s Kamera Obscura, handwoven “pear pod” hanging seats by Ellen Mulcrone and Kreisdesign’s contemporary pegboards made from sustainable birch plywood.
The day will also feature a cookery demonstration from restaurateur Tim Sheehan of Lordship Lane restaurant Franklins, with a kitchen display unit created by local cabinetmaker and design studio Ian Dunn.
Beauty fans will be able to indulge in a little TLC with British-made products; while those interested in planet-friendly power will have the chance to chat to eco-energy companies and witness a cutting-edge Tesla renewable power wall brought along by Joju Solar.
The event will also focus on indie business. Blue Patch recently announced the winners of their first ever Blue Patch New Business Awards, and the winners will be showcased at the store.
First prize went to East London-based social enterprise The Soap Co, which makes ethical luxury products for the bathroom and employs people who are blind, disabled or disadvantaged.
In the afternoon, local MP Helen Hayes will host a discussion about the state of the British high street, and there will be a business hub for people who want to set up a business or are already running one.
Visitors will have the chance to sit back with experts over coffee and cake (or glass of English wine) to discuss the pros and cons of running an independent business. “It’s stuff you would never see in a department store in town,” enthuses Jane.
“Everything’s unique, a great price and straight from the people who made it. These are people who really care about the supply chain, who are proud of what they do, and want you as a customer to have something you really value.”
Jane has strong roots in south-east London. “Something like 12 generations of my family have lived around here, in Peckham, Camberwell, Brixton. My grandfather was a postman on Walworth Road.”
She studied at Camberwell College of Arts and the Royal College of Art and then began “teaching, exhibiting and curating”, putting on her own shows and forming artists’ collective The Pattern Lab to break down the barriers between fine art and craft.
It was all experience that would prove invaluable for starting Blue Patch. “I learned about being an event manager, promotions, deadlines, diplomacy, pitching – it was a good learning curve.”
The seeds of the business were sown in 2009 when she attended a talk about the threat of climate change. “I had always been really interested in nature and very concerned about it – the pollution and corruption,” she says.
“By the time I came to the end of that lecture I knew I had to use my creative thinking to do something radical. Our economy is locked into what’s happening to destroy the environment. I wanted to change the business model.”
She laughs that she is “the last person to do anything like this”, but Blue Patch, which launched in 2014, is the result of years of careful research and planning with economists, environmentalists and shoppers.
“We have looked at every aspect of why people aren’t turned on by climate change,” Jane says. “People aren’t engaging, they don’t understand it. But what people do like is shopping.”
The result was Blue Patch, which she named after the moment of hope sparked by looking out the window on a grey summer’s morning and seeing a patch of blue in the sky. “It felt so deeply happy amid all the gloom, it symbolised hope. I bought the URL straight away.”
Blue Patch works as a “colourful catalogue” of British-made products and services dedicated to sustainability. The website showcases products ranging from willow garden furniture to silk underwear, directing shoppers to the businesses’ websites.
Run as a collective, it’s also a hub for member businesses to connect, share resources and collaborate. It is funded by modest annual members’ fees and profits are directed back to Blue Patch members and invested in community projects and renewable energy companies.
“We’re up against big platforms like Not On The High Street and Etsy,” Jane admits. “And we recognise that there is no way we can compete [on that level] – but the heart and soul and emotion of the consumer will win in the end. We are in a very strong position.”
Talking to her members is what inspired her to try the pop-up department store idea. “Through all our research, we know that what our shoppers want is to see, touch and feel our products. Plus we’re always talking to our members and really want to meet them.”
Jane has big dreams for the pop-up department store, and if the event is a success she would love to expand it next year so members can stay over in local homes and turn it into a weekend event.
As for Blue Patch, she wants to scale up members to 3,000 and to “go out on the road and meet businesses in their home towns”. She would also love to host a “department store of the British Isles” themed by country.
“If we can scale Blue Patch and make it big, the profit will go towards community projects and helping people,” she says. “We want to prove that you can make a business that is resilient, looking after your community and the environment.”
