Saturday morning saw us venturing quite far from our usual weekend stamping ground and as the building process moves forward, we’ll probably be doing this more frequently. This weekend we drove across to Kensington in the south east of Johannesburg, in search of The Yard which specialises in features – doors, window frames, stained glass windows, floor boards etc – salvaged from demolition sites. We found it easily largely because I went to a birthday breakfast at Pastelaria Princesa there a few months ago and it’s in the same street.
One of many crowded rooms at The Yard.
The Yard is very interesting and we could easily spot other people just like us trawling through it. We didn’t see anything that we felt we could use on this visit but did discover an amazing shop directly across the road called Barter Buy Antiques where I could have spent the entire morning. It seems though that a spousal embargo has been placed on furniture shopping until we’ve figured out just where things will fit in the new spaces…. But I’ll be keeping an eye on Barter Buy in the meantime.
One of the VERY many rooms at Barter Buy Antiques
Pasteleria Princesa, though unprepossessing from the outside, is renowned for its Portuguese breads and confectionery and was an obvious place to have lunch. It’s always interesting to go somewhere in your home town and find yourself in a very small minority. The prevailing language in Pastelaria Princesa is Portuguese. We heard hardly a word of English and felt like visitors in a foreign city.
Queens Street in Kensington is lined with little antique and furniture shops, florists and cafes. If you’re in the mood for browsing, it’s a good place to spend a Saturday morning under a typical Highveld winter sky.
Queens Street, Kensington
The Yellow Corner building is Pastelaria Princesa.
home-in-the-making 
Those Portuguese tarts are to die for.