Antiquing In the Brimfield Tradition

It has become a tradition (cue the Fiddler on the Roof theme!) for my mother and I to hit Brimfield twice a year- once in spring, and once in the fall. Brimfield is a town in Massachusetts that becomes the antique mecca of the US three times a year. The town is overtaken by a baffling quantity of antiques dealers from all over the country, selling every possible thing ever made. That is what I like most about it. While I may be seeking certain things for my various collections, mostly I like to take pictures of the oddities that I never expected to see. And so, I share them with you! I hope you appreciate the old and odd, too!


Who you lookin’ at, punk?

I didn’t expect to see Harrison Ford, for example.


Harrison and Mom, together at last!


Early Christmas!


Are they live, or are they cooked?

Here you can see a set of the original, deadly steel-tipped Jarts, along with a painting of…questionable content.

What is going on in that painting?

I can’t buy everything, but IF I could, this would be amongst the purchases:


You can never have too many wooden bunny carts, I always say.

Here’s another one of those “Wha???” kind of items. They are plaster wall hangings depicting… human peas?


OH, the humanity!

These make me want to be a chocolatier, so I would have an excuse to own them all!


Continue reading “Antiquing In the Brimfield Tradition”

This is how things are in Glocca Mora.

Do you like paper dolls? I loved them as a kid, as well as any kind of cut-out craft like “build your own town/diorama” books like that. My daughters seem to have inherited that gene (the gene for wanting to cut and assemble stuff). I recently found this odd vintage set on Ebay:

OK, so it’s a set based on the 1968 movie version of “Finian’s Rainbow”, which starred Fred Astaire as Finian and Petula Clark as Sharon. It also starred one of my movie favorites, Tommy Steele as Og, the leprechaun. Yes, there’s a leprechaun in it. Needless to say, this is one weird movie. It’s got a very fun musical score, and a very bizarre story line. But in 1968, you could get paper dolls based on it! And wow, only 29¢. What a deal!

I wouldn’t cut such a lovely thing up, but I WOULD scan it and print it onto card stock so my girl could cut it up!

I particularly like how the characters each have outfits from the movie, and also extra outfits that are just stylin’ sixties garb- vests and scarves, oh yeah!

I miss the times when paper dolls were seen as legitimate entertainment. Well, they still are around here.

Danish Delight- Bjørn Wiinblad

I found this fab Bjørn Wiinblad tile at Savers the other day:

He was a Danish artist who cranked out a great amount of decorative ceramics and art. What’s not to love?? He had such a charming style, very distinct. His ceramics are sometimes printed with his line work and sometimes rendered in 3-D:

He also illustrated posters and prints like these:

He lived a good, long life, apparently- born in 1918, he only died in 2006 after creating decades of design. What do you think about his art?

Piggy New Year!

Well, what do you know? It turned into another year! As I was poking around looking at vintage images, I found a bunch of New Year pig images:

Pigs. For New Year. Hmmm.

It appears to have been an all-Europe phenomenon, imported to the US.

I am surprised I never noticed this ‘gluckschwein’ (lucky pig) imagery in conjunction with the New Year before.

By luck, I happen to have a pig book coming out early in this New Year- in a mere 17 days! This is what my little pig guy looks like.

With maybe just a little more luck, it will be discovered and enjoyed by actual kids.
Happy New Year everyone! Oink!

New stuff from Brimfield…

As I said, I picked up a few things at the Brimfield show last week, because you can’t go there and NOT find anything, that would be impossible.
For me, anyhow!
Old stuff is aesthetically more interesting than most new stuff.
Again, for me, anyhow!

Some of the things I am a sucker for are vintage children’s books:


This coloring book is from 1934, and was never used. Why is that a little sad?


These are from 1950- I especially love the alphabet one!


These are teeny- about 3″ each. Wee stuff is always extra cute!

A little salute to Belgium and Holland:


That’s a wine label, I think…plus some sweet wooden shoes.

I always manage to find at least a few “new” old fabrics…

New-old stock Easter candy box= LOVE!

Another mysterious love- old, unused stickers, preferably the gummed paper kind, and especially if they’re in their original package!


Also an unused decal from one of our favorite meccas…Santa’s Village in NH!

And a little something more medieval, too:


Rampant unicorns! Huzzah!

That’s most of what I picked up. I guess I am generally an ephemera lover!

Antiques in the Air…

… can you smell it? Fall, Autumn, the wind whistling, a few leaves blowing by…and miles of antiques!

September is when one of the three yearly Brimfield shows occurs, and I snuck away for the day with my mom to partake in the hunt. It turns out that I collect pictures just as much as real stuff (no, more), so herewith are some photos of things I thought were cool, and some of the stuff I got while there. Really, I think the fun is just in the poking around, looking through decades past.

‘Twas a brisk fall day, cloudy for the most part, but with sun poking through occasionally.

Every season is Christmas at Brimfield:

These are some mighty fine paper candy containers:

Here’s something you don’t see anymore, not even in Scotland!

I love the naive painting on this set o’ dwarves…


Continue reading “Antiques in the Air…”

Brimfield!

Took a day with Mom and went to the antiques haven that is Brimfield. If you like to scrounge around through old stuff, then this is the place for you!

Hundreds upon hundreds of dealers…thousands of weird items…

Here’s my mom considering a new sewing machine:

They have things you wished you could take home:


Any home would be enhanced if it had a ride-on squirrel! Continue reading “Brimfield!”

Brimfield…Brimming With Style!

Yes! I finally managed to get up to Brimfield for the fall show. If you’re not from these parts, it’s a simply gigantic antique show that sets up 3 times a year. Sprawling. Hundreds and hundreds of dealers. If you’re into vintage, retro, etc. you WILL find something interesting here. I did not come home empty-handed!

I saw this cute guy on patrol in his owner’s booth at the beginning of the day. Sure enough, he was still there when we headed to our car at the end of the day!

dog

First thing I found was this wooden/paper litho target game. LOVE it. Vintage games from this era are a big favorite of mine.

birdz Continue reading “Brimfield…Brimming With Style!”