Guilt free splurging: the flea market in Brussels

Sunday in Belgium (otherwise a most godless country) is still a day of rest, much to my frustration. Basically, the choice is between hiking, visiting family or brushing up on your art knowledge in an overcrowded museum. Or you can go to the Marolles/Marollen in Brussels! It's a pretty poor but colourful and fascinating neighbourhood that has one big attraction: the flea market at the Vossenplein/Place du Jeu de balle. (It's surrounded by cool cafés, by the way.)

If you can't take a bit of chaos, this might not be the place for you. Some of the vendors carefully display their goodies, others just throw them on a blanket and some just sell straight out of cardboard boxes.

Stylish, right? You'll see this kind of installations every weekday (Saturdays and Sundays can get quite busy, especially when the weather is nice) from 7 am to 2 pm. When closing time is near, one of the cardboard vendors will usually give a signal that everything he displays can be taken away for free. It'll be mostly old cutlery and fake porcelaine, but it's always fun to watch the frantic searching and grabbing.

There's few things you won't find at the Vossenplein. Some of the clothing (especially the ones with labels - we spotted a beautiful Max Mara coat, too bad it was made for a woman the size of an elephant) is lucky enough to come with hangers and racks, but most if it form soft piles of thrifting discipline on the unforgiving ground. This kind of piles of clothing scares me at Zara during the sales as well as here:

I mean, for all you know there could be a small Bulgarian family living underneath those layers. Or a rabies infested dog looking for a nice nest. I'm all for budget buys, but I ain't risking my hands for them.

This looks safer, too bad most of the shoes are pretty fugly:

Diagnosed with bad eyesight or desperate for a bit of geek chique? These glasses are probably as cheap as they come!

If you buy perfumes just because of the pretty bottle, you can save yourself some money right here:

There's also quite the collection of old suitcases and leather purses:

Fur coats to imagine you stem from Russian nobility:

That white coat! Are you thinking what I'm thinking? Look at this:

Now tell me there isn't a resemblance! Me thinks Leandra Medine could do a really great styling with this.

If you're not really the vulture type, common magpies will love the array of trinkets:

Last week I found this bracelet on the blanket in the middle:

I'm not usually into gold and swirly whatevers, but I kinda liked this one. It got me some compliments too, mostly from men. One of them told me it looked like something straight out of Lord of the Rings, so I styled it on a gollum-like creature:

He was thrilled, obviously.

Anyway, back to the market. Just some random scarves:

There's a booth with some really nice hats, too. There's a little mirror and people trying every hat they can find. I bought the one in the middle of the picture, black with a small leather bow. (If I get lice out of this, I'm killing the friend who talked me into buying it.) Don't try to haggle, the guy selling them will yell at you because you're crazy and he's already selling these handmade hats way under their price, I mean, you couldn't even pay for the material for that kind of money let alone the working hours! But other than that, he's nice.

And finally, I found a kick-ass crystal cocktail shaker.

Again, I'm not the gold-and-crystal kind of gal, but I liked this. Got it for a bargain too, my mom (ever the budget conscious woman) was real proud. It wasn't until I got home that I realised it looked a little like the bottle of one of my favorite perfumes:

Maybe from now on I'll drink Petite Chérie and spray myself with a zesty cosmopolitan. Hope you had a great weekend as well!