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Original poster

Was anyone else at Snape Maltings today? Did Alan get his table?

538 replies

WonderfulSmith · 30/08/2025 22:31

Before I start I know it’s none of my business and I’m a bad person I’m sure but…

I was at Snape Maltings today which is a nice arts centre with a lovely shop selling all sorts of home wares and furniture. It’s very quiet and sedate.
Anyway, a woman started yelling at her husband. The whole place was pretending not to listen while giving each other looks. Turned out that he had ordered a perfectly innocent side table without talking to her about it first. She demanded that he cancel the order and he refused. He sat down on a sofa in the shop and she went and sat in the car. Every so often she’d come back and stick her head around the door, tell him the table was disgusting, and stomp back out.

When we left, Alan was still sat on the sofa. But I want to know how it ended. Are they still there now? Did Alan cancel the order?

Were any of you there?

OP posts:
Thread gallery
19
SadTimesInFife · 31/08/2025 14:46

I think some flamenco moves must be incorporated. V expressive.

CharlotteStreetW1 · 31/08/2025 14:48

@Boiledbeetle

I do hope you do this for a living!

IDontKeepChickensButBelieveTheyExist · 31/08/2025 14:54

I’m curious to know the rough age of the couple.
I know I was certainly less tolerant at 20+ years of marriage than I was at 2 years of marriage. I’m wondering how long she has been tolerating his awful taste to get to the point she lost her shit in public.

#TeamAlansWife

CrystalMighty · 31/08/2025 14:57

Boiledbeetle · 31/08/2025 14:35

Someone mentioned interpretive dance ..

🩰 Interpretive Dance: Alan’s Table

A three-act domestic ballet of stubbornness, betrayal, and pine veneer.

🎭 Act I: “The Purchase”

Setting: A stage dressed as a boutique furniture shop—soft lighting, scattered ottomans, a single spotlight on a modest side table center stage.

  • Alan enters with angular, deliberate movements. His arms form a cradle as he lifts the invisible table, his torso twisting protectively around it.
  • The Wife storms in, her steps sharp and staccato, clutching a small dog (played by a dancer in a shaggy costume). She circles Alan in spirals of fury, her gestures slicing the air like refund receipts never printed.
  • The dog-dancer trembles in her arms, occasionally barking in rhythm with the percussion.
  • Alan pirouettes away from her accusations, shielding the table with exaggerated mime.
  • The ensemble of shop assistants (in beige leotards and name tags) freeze mid-fold, watching the tension build.

🛋️ Act II: “The Sit”

Setting: A plush sofa downstage right, lit like a throne of defiance.

  • Alan collapses onto the sofa in slow motion, arms still wrapped around the imaginary table. His body sinks, but his resolve stiffens—his spine a protest.
  • The Wife exits stage left in a flurry of indignation, dragging the dog behind her like a furry comet.
  • A solo cello murmurs her offstage fury.
  • She re-enters moments later, her choreography now more jagged—lunges, finger-pointing, a dramatic lift of the dog toward the heavens as if to say, “Think of the puppy!”
  • Alan responds only with a slow, stubborn shake of the head, his feet planted like table legs.

🚗 Act III: “The Car and the Chorus”

Setting: Repetition and escalation.

  • The Wife performs a looped sequence: exit to car (offstage), re-enter with renewed rage. Each time, her movements grow more frantic—arms flailing, dog spinning, hair unraveling.
  • Alan remains seated, now rocking gently, hugging the table like a lost child.
  • The shop assistants begin a slow chant-dance around him, whispering “Refund… refund…” in syncopated breath.
  • The Wife’s final return is a crescendo—she leaps, she pleads, she collapses.
  • Alan rises, lifts the table above his head, and performs a triumphant jeté.
  • The lights dim. The dog whimpers. The table remains.

🕯️ Finale:

A single spotlight on the side table.

Alan and the Wife stand on opposite sides of it, frozen.

The dog curls up beneath it.

Curtain.

There truly are some magnificently brilliant people on Mumsnet 👏👏

In awe of all of you!

LittleBitofBread · 31/08/2025 15:01

fromthegecko · 31/08/2025 13:27

I'm seeing a Rashomon version in which the three actors take it in turn to play the three parts, to totally different effect.

Show quote history

We HAVE to persuade them to take this on!

deeahgwitch · 31/08/2025 15:02

hotchocdrinker · 31/08/2025 13:51

I work on the snape Maltings site and am here today! I may pop over to the shop later and see what I can find out…!

We are relying on you @hotchocdrinker

LittleBitofBread · 31/08/2025 15:04

NoBinturongsHereMate · 31/08/2025 13:55

There used to be a furniture shop at the corner of Euston Road and Tottenham Court Road that would have given you a comprehensive answer to that question.

I suspect it's long gone, but if it still existed something like this would be at the 'plain' end of their range: https://hampshirebarninteriors.co.uk/shop/occasional-furniture/lamp-coffee-tables/ornate-flower-plant-stand-or-lamp-stand-cherub-design-gold-leaf/

Show quote history

It is indeed long gone (never forgotten), but similar emporia still exist along the Kingsland High Road. China life-size leopards and all.

ginasevern · 31/08/2025 15:04

Maybe Alan has a side table fetish. Do update us @hotchocdrinker

hotchocdrinker · 31/08/2025 15:20

Unfortunately I couldn’t speak to the staff as they were all busy. But, photo of green sofa and several coffee tables is attached if OP can identify the table in question?!

Was anyone else at Snape Maltings today? Did Alan get his table?
lifeonmars100 · 31/08/2025 15:25

I am hoping that Netflix buy the rights to Alan's tale of interior design rebellion and make a documentary about it. "The Table" which would take us all the way back to when Alan first met his wife and how his dreams of occasional furniture have been snatched from his grasp for years until one day on a shopping trip he found his inner interior designer and fought back

Original poster
WonderfulSmith · 31/08/2025 15:25

hotchocdrinker · 31/08/2025 15:20

Unfortunately I couldn’t speak to the staff as they were all busy. But, photo of green sofa and several coffee tables is attached if OP can identify the table in question?!

Bless you for taking a picture. But it’s not that sofa.
if you put your back to the cash desk then it’s the sofa to the right.

OP posts:
Pluvia · 31/08/2025 15:26

LeavesOnTrees · 31/08/2025 13:12

I agree with not letting the Americans get hold of the televised dramatisation. This is a very British middle class scenario.

The supprting cast of shoppers would have to be able to portray the silent shock and horror of someone yelling in such a naice public place, but also be secretly thrilled, whilst trying catch surreptitious glances at the warring couple.

Does anyone else picture Alan as someone who's spent his entire working life in a boring but well paid office job, never reaching the top to big boss level ?

Au contraire, I think we need to let the Americans see Alan's Table: a Brittenish Tragedy in order to balance out their suspicion that since Brexit/ Covid/ Labour (take your pick) Britain has turned into one huge deprived housing estate populated by little girls brandishing axes and knives in the faces of illegal immigrants. They need to be reassured that the middle classes do still exist, at least around the watery fringes of East Anglia.

hotchocdrinker · 31/08/2025 15:27

@WonderfulSmithaaagh! I’ll pop back later and see what I can do!!

Ellmau · 31/08/2025 15:36

The dog curls up beneath it.
No no, the finale surely consists of the dog lifting its leg on the table.

Clafoutie · 31/08/2025 15:40

hotchocdrinker · 31/08/2025 15:20

Unfortunately I couldn’t speak to the staff as they were all busy. But, photo of green sofa and several coffee tables is attached if OP can identify the table in question?!

If Alan’s table was anything like any of those in this picture, then I feel myself going over to #TeamAlansWife 😦

Clafoutie · 31/08/2025 15:42

CaptainMyCaptain · 31/08/2025 12:28

Whenever a Mumsnet thread turns nasty and I think of packing it in a thread like this reminds me what I like about it.

Completely agree!

AntonDuPig · 31/08/2025 15:43

@Boiledbeetle Bravo! 👏
I can just see this as a Couple's Choice in this year's Strictly 😄

lcakethereforeIam · 31/08/2025 15:47

My reckon is Mrs Alan has been saying for months/years 'we need a side table'. Something they both agree on. Perhaps the previous one was ruined by tealights. However, every single one she's vetoed, possibly for well thought through reasons (wrong colour, wrong size, not actually a table). Often though just petty nitpicking. Finally Alan has had enough and just bought the bloody thing. Mrs Alan actually preferred the act of shopping for a table than the reality of buying one. Now Alan has ruined that for her but she can't say that, she'd sound unhinged.

In the film, Tom Hardy is her bit on the side that she complains about her husband too.

Neil Innes is dead!?😢

When do they get the Christmas baubles in? I've got a bit of a problem, but I can give them up anytime.

TheHillsIsLonely · 31/08/2025 15:49

I thought Snape Maltings was in Norfolk, so you learn something new every day.

I'm amused by the idea of having to carry our (giant) dog in to Snape Maltings. One person at the front, one in the middle, one at the rear! Perhaps it would be easier to dress him up in country casuals suitable for Suffolk - pink trousers, checked shirt, deerstalker, country boots? - and get him to walk in to Snape Maltings on his hind legs.

He's not really suitable for the role of 'dog under table' unless you want the table to levitate several feet in the air when he stands up, as has happened with a coffee table in our house several times in the past.

AuxArmesCitoyens · 31/08/2025 15:49

I want an Alan Bennett Talking Heads about this

TheHillsIsLonely · 31/08/2025 15:52

Ellmau · 31/08/2025 15:36

The dog curls up beneath it.
No no, the finale surely consists of the dog lifting its leg on the table.

This however he could achieve and from a great height for dramatic effect.

Ireallycantthinkofagoodone · 31/08/2025 15:58

@FortuneFaded @gillefc82 How fabulous you both are! Really made me chuckle 😄

Pluvia · 31/08/2025 16:05

TheHillsIsLonely · 31/08/2025 15:49

I thought Snape Maltings was in Norfolk, so you learn something new every day.

I'm amused by the idea of having to carry our (giant) dog in to Snape Maltings. One person at the front, one in the middle, one at the rear! Perhaps it would be easier to dress him up in country casuals suitable for Suffolk - pink trousers, checked shirt, deerstalker, country boots? - and get him to walk in to Snape Maltings on his hind legs.

He's not really suitable for the role of 'dog under table' unless you want the table to levitate several feet in the air when he stands up, as has happened with a coffee table in our house several times in the past.

I mentioned this thread to my partner and she is adamant that last time we were there (2023) dogs weren't allowed into the furniture store. We tend to be in the area around Christmas and so we walk the dogs by the river to wear them out, then leave them in the car while we have a browse and something to eat in the pub, which is v civilised too.

Snazzysausage · 31/08/2025 16:07

Well poor old Alan.
I'm with Mrs Alan on the aesthetics of the tables, they are horrible.
But ...poor Alan. How embarrassing.
I can be forthright but have never shouted at anyone or made a scene in public.
Yet.