Archive for the ‘vintage’ Category

AUCTION

Tuesday, November 29th, 2011

White dudes love auctions. LOVE.

Well, I love auctions too, even if I have to spend the whole day psyching myself up for the sizing up stares, crazy quick bidding and dollars about to be spent. This particular auction was heavily MCM, which meant the local dealers were out in force and ready to throw down cash. I almost didn’t go after spending the day obsessing about how nutty and competitive these auctions make me and the inevitable painful losing that happens.

BTW, want people to look at you with anger and suspicion? Whip out a big camera at an auction preview. It’s not awkward at all.

Their eyes. Their judgmental eyes.

Maybe somewhere in the background you can spot my big spendy purchase of the evening?

Yes?

Yes you can.

Great dining set I didn’t buy but desperately wanted to.

I forget how much they ended up selling for…a lot…

There were loads of good chairs, but the perfect pair of well worn Falcon chairs (a personal favorite – but also designed by Sigurd Resell in the 1970′s for Vatne Möbler) initially beckoned me to the auction.

FALCON ENHANCE.

Sweet, sweet Falcon action.

Only got this one terrible picture of a single chair on account of my camera shame, but trust me, they were amazing and ended up selling to some dealers for something like $1600. Not to me. NOT TO ME, dammit.

This set of Plycraft armchairs (designed by Norman Cherner and also a personal fav) got a good deal of looking over from folks pacing around them in desperate circles of desire. Clearly, they were going to be the big battle of the evening.

The auctioneer mentioned the set came from an estate in Banning – which can’t be true, right? Have you ever been to Banning? Only shame and shattered lives come from there.

Along with the mid century stuff, there was a large estate of oil cans and gas station type signs being sold that would have made those American Picker guys get wicked half chubs.

It was mind numbing sitting through the oil can auctions.

A moment of memoriam please. Let’s reflect once more on those Cherners.

As expected, they ended up being the big battle of the night – to the shock and amusement of most the crowd. The guys sitting behind me had an insightful running dialogue about how crappy all this stupid crappy crap was. Anyways.

They sold for $2400.

Goodbye you gorgeous beasts.

Well, what did I get? A few things. Above is a little preview.

DUH. It’s a rug.

Also, I might have outbid someone who reads the blog on this puppy. A fact which became clear when she told me as much as we waited to pay. It’s hard to explain the wave of guilt and anxiety that then exploded in my brain…so I apologize. I’m sorry. I looked terrible. Oh man. Auctions turn me into a monster.

More crap to come.

THRIFTY!

Thursday, November 24th, 2011

Hit up Palm Springs for a little thrifting action on what turned out to be an ‘extreme’ wind day. Unusually strong gusts mixed up the fine desert dust with low hanging clouds to create a strangely ominous apocalyptic wasteland. This was some crazy end of the world type wind.

Anyways.

Despite the wind, shopping happened.

Having a soft spot for broken down classics, I grabbed this vintage Knoll Bertoia Diamond Chair on my thrifting route. For more than a year I’ve watched this puppy gather dust at one of my favorite consignment spaces as the price was repeatedly knocked down until it just recently hit $50. No rational person wanted to touch this thing because of a few broken welds and lovely dusting of rust, but I guess I have time to repair it?

Of course. Throw another project on the pile.

Perhaps I’m a tad blind to its many faults, but ever since missing out on this Bertoia, the hunt has been on for a similar piece to fill the sad black hole left in my heart. With some welded love and the addition of a full cover, this wounded specimen will be all sorts of design gorgeous.

Otherwise, Palm Spring thrifting was fairly sparse with only the usual ceramic pieces and this awkward Tom Wesselman amateur style painting found and purchased despite the crazy wind and my waning enthusiasm.

I must stop buying thrift store art, but it was impossible to resist that furry little blond bush.

Oh, J.BEAN, you perv.

The wind apocalypse eventually cleared up early in the evening and the floating dust clouds made for an incredible sunset. Palm Springs is always pretty beautiful.

Enough of that nonsense.

Enjoy your Thanksgiving! – or – Enjoy your normal weekend!

With pie and such!

DUVET

Monday, November 14th, 2011

Long I have pined for the perfect gray duvet and by some strange bi-coastal internet twitter miracle, this enduring quest seems to have come to an end.

It’s really all thanks to Daniel, wonderful (and similarly duvet obsessed) splendid man about town Daniel, who twittered with Anna from Door Sixteen and I about our initial hopes in finding the perfect gray duvet and then our ultimate disappointment when the CB2 Coast Bed Linens ended up being a bust.

But…because they are in New York, where shops besides JC Penny exist, Anna and Daniel just popped into Muji and stumbled on this great warm gray linen duvet…that is unfortunately nowhere to be found on Muji’s website.

I got a flurry of texts and pictures of what looked like a fantastic (and affordable!) duvet and proceeded to beg for them to purchase and ship one of these lovelies to the west coast to live in my house.

By the way, we don’t have Muji in Hemet. Shocker.

Then Daniel, even though he’s in college and working like crazy on projects and busier than a rabid squirrel, was kind enough to grab me one of the last duvets and mail it out to me like a goddamn sweetheart. Like a completely perfect and lovely human being.

That gray duvet longing runs painfully deep. Daniel gets it. Oh yeah, he gets it real good.

Apparently though, I took my sweet time posting about this, since it all went down in what? August? What happened? Is this not summer still?

Anyhow.

Besides the greatest duvet ever, there are a few new things around the guest bedroom that I’ve been meaning to post about.

Like these sort of brutalist studio pottery things. Someone got all crazy with that ceramic knife. So angsty.

Feel that powerfully emotional thrift store ceramic turmoil.

You knew that some kilim pillow style action would leak into the rest of the house. Say what? There are some actual colors in here besides black, brown, gray or white. Crazy.

I don’t believe I’ve mentioned this fine Craigslist procured vintage safari chair.

Awwww yeah. Awwww boy.

Sling that thing all up in here.

Hold on, I got distracted by that devilish safari minx. I cannot forget to mention that after months of use, I really dig the new duvet. It gets better with every wash and sort of shifts color in different light; sometimes the color feels warm and sort of taupe and then shifts to cool and silvery gray. It’s like a magical creature that transforms day to day.

I love it and can’t thank Daniel enough.

Possibly worth noting, this thing above? This is about as ornate, flowery and “fem” as I can get.

That’s just a detail shot of the vintage brass Moroccan lamp that I can never photograph properly in the guest bedroom, which – surprise surprise – I still really love and don’t want to get rid of. Unlike everything else I own. I’m possibly going through some weird, “WHY NOT START FROM SCRATCH” phase that is really unproductive. Stupid dark wintertime.

And these bright things down below…

…these are luxurious flowery yellow billy balls. The only flowers I’ll own.

Wait, are these flowery? I don’t know and apparently am too lazy to google, but these last forever and thrive on neglect.

Just like my grudges.

Come on, I just can’t resist you. Work it you hot thang. I’m liking what I see and the way you move? Regal. Confident. Sexy. Frugal. I love safari and I don’t care who knows!

Oh, wait. Oh, craphole.

Now that I’m thinking about it, I probably should have bought two Muji duvets. Since…I never want to give you up. I never want to let you go.