I recently found out about the magazine Flea Market Style on one of my favorite crafty blogs, Cathe Holden. As soon as I saw that someone had published a magazine actually called Flea Market Style, my first thought was "those are my people!" & I immediately jumped on-line and ordered a copy. It arrived surprisingly fast and within minutes of arriving in my post I was devouring the gorgeous content.
The magazine features all sorts of tips and tricks and how to's and is chock full of inspiration to anyone who's ever been drawn to treasure hunting in thrift stores and flea markets.
One of my favorite articles was on the Bachmans House - which I had never heard of. It's in Minnesota and is a "vintage-style showhouse full of junk-tastick ideas." Swoon! I want to go to there. I don't think I'm allowed to scan and post the images, you really must buy the magazine to see the fantastic images - every single inch of the house is jam packed with imaginative, gorgeous re-use projects. An old metal rake head becomes a wine glass holder, an old teeter-totter turned into a table... and so many more inspiring ideas for the home.
In fact, the emphasis of the magazine seems to be on home decorating, but there are plenty of crafty how-to's as well. There's a bunch of cute ideas for projects made from vintage men's button up cotton shirts that go beyond the obvious - striped lampshade with buttons, anyone? I also liked their vintage "top 10" round up of objects that they predict will be hot for 2011 flea market shopping.
I think their tip number 8; "Personality from Patina" must have influenced my recent trip to the Salvation Army "as is" department. I came home with a bag full of silver electro plated small goblets & tea service items.
They were languashing on the bottom shelf, unloved, but of nice quality and each one has a fantastic, broke down patina. I also picked up a couple of small glass bowls (ice cream dishes?) that I thought would be cute paired with the goblets. I've seem a similar technique somewhere that inspired this combination - though it was wine glasses turned upside down and with tea cups on top. I just did a quick google search and came up with this.
I just popped a couple on my living room mantle. I know the last thing the world needs is more tea light holders, but these would at least be pretty and very unique tea light holders!
And I also like this combo...
I don't know anything about silver electroplating. Most of the marks on the bottom say "EP brass", which would be silver electroplated over brass. I don't know if this is any different than regular silver plating. If anyone has any info, let me know! One of the marks says made in Spain, one says made in Italy, a couple of them say "Viking Plate; Made in Canada". Anyway, they were only $1.00 each!
Continuing on with the theme of vessels, I was thinking about all the bits and bobs around my studio currently being held in cardboard boxes of varying degrees of decay. So I grabbed this cute stack of old baking pans. My next fabulous find was the huge horse shaped cookie cutter. It will be hung my wall of horse-related kitch at the studio.
One of the things that reading Flea Market Style reinforced is the notion of small collections of similar objects grouped together as a pleasing display. This was a fun, affordable way to create an instant collection of pretty patina objects. Everything I bought that day cost exactly $10.00. Thanks to the magazine for the inspiration!
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