A Very British Blanket Tale.

Do any of you have another half who loves to drive with the temperatures turned down or is it just my husband?

Whatever the outside temperature, he loves to drive in a cold car and before zoned heating we used to have a rule that the driver selected the temperature - unless of course I was driving when the knobs were regularly tuned down by the passenger !

So, for years I have always carried a blanket in the car. Not for any
small children .....they are all grown up now and there are no grandchildren ( as yet!) ...but for me, to throw over me when the air temperature is chilly and, despite the advent of climate control and heated seats, I still like to snuggle under a blanket on long journeys.

I kept it either in the boot but mostly on the back seat so it was always within easy reach. The only problem was it looked so untidy that I felt it needed a proper home. So I set out to design a gorgeous leather blanket bag to store it in.

But once designed, I knew that The Albert and The Charles needed a better throw than the one I had in the car. They needed something special, something woven here from scratch, a beautiful blanket, or a lovely throw in various colours and shades, and so my search for an English mill that would work with us at Englana® began.

Finding them was no easy task. Over recent years, as the world scrambled for cost over quality, we lost so many of these indigenous industries and skills because many of our proud mills either stopped working or went overseas.

But there are a few left and I spent many months looking at what each could offer and sampling the cloths they wove. In the end, however, there was only one that stood out in terms of what we were looking for ......its capability, its longevity, its heritage and the sheer loveliness of the final products....the soft, sumptuous, warm blankets and throws that make up our range today. Hainsworths , one of the last vertical mills still in existence in England today and who have been producing cloth since before the Battle of Waterloo in 1815, weave our blankets and throws from the raw wool of merino sheep each to different designs and for different end uses....but all echoing the Englana ethos of beautiful products using natural fibres and made here in Britain by dedicated craftsmen and women.

..complimenting our exquisite leather blanket bags perfectly.

 And which one do I now use in the car when my husband is driving? Is it the luxurious Cambridge or the lighter, fun ‘York” ?!