Sleeves from heaven.

This may be my dream sweater....and amazingly it is from around 1895! it's so 70s isn't it? this fabulous piece was featured in the "High Style" exhibit last year at the Met, sometimes I just love to flip through the catalog and remember why 'old' clothes are just so, so GREAT. If someone can knit me this sweater, feel free! And....I am not really sure you could eat soup....or type....or really do much except hold a high ball in these sleeves below....but wow! this dramatic number by Madame Alix Gres is dated 1969. Now that's a sleeve.
*images scanned from the "High Style" catalog.

Food, food and more food....

Hope everyone here in the States had a lovely Thanksgiving! we cooked our butts off and dined for a long while on turkey, roast vegetables and a delicious miso gravy that i would like to replicate for Christmas, so delicious, (stuffed and rubbed our turkey breast with miso butter paste and made the gravy from that...easy and so intensely flavoured!). Above are the first of a few non-clothing items making their way into the shop for the holidays....I LOVE these mugs and if they don't sell...well, I shall happily keep!

Let's give some thanks....

Well, it's Thanksgiving again! this year it really snuck up with this starting my business thing and J opening his shop we haven't had time to really think about anything past paying the rent! In New Zealand we obviously don't have Thanksgiving either so many years it just passes me by apart from eating a little of someone else's turkey....but this year I'm cooking a big old roast turkey and a ton of vegetables just for the 2 of us, dinner includes an old fashioned Christmas pudding which I know if a bit early but YUM.
Here's a couple things that I am very, very grateful for this year, and what a year it was!

Most grateful to come from this place. Hoping my little business enables me to spend more time in NZ over the next couple years....MISS it always.

Def' giving thanks to this guy for marrying me in June, what was he thinking?

Thanks to my Mum who loves vintage and digging through junk stores just as much as me, plus she reads my blog even on weeks when it seems no-one else really is!....thanks Mum!

Thank the heavens for friends like this.

Hugely grateful for all my vintage buddies this year, not sure how I would've got by without the mad online Etsy/twitter/blog (and in market) crew who help me feel normal when I actually feel crazed.

.....and thanks for my shop. It's in such a steep learning curve right now and god knows how it will do long term but super awesome that this year I got to spend more time doing it...and next year? kinda can't wait!

Happy Thanksgiving everyone, what are you most thankful for this year?

for the love of denim

If I could be re-born I'd like to come back as Blondie wearing this denim outfit. Think my denim obsession started when I was about 14, when I hunt for vintage it's the first thing I go for, just love it...it's a little silly how many jeans I have and selling them gives me just as much joy as selling a fab 1940s dress....in some ways more because it's my first love! These 70s denim numbers are all available in the shop right now....just in case you are feeling a little like being an Angel...or a Blondie.
(if I came close to fitting the tie-waist pair they would not be anywhere near the shop but hanging securely in my own closet!)

Pre Thanksgiving Shop Update!

Coziness in the shop this weekend! the leaves are allllllmooooost off the trees here in Brooklyn, brrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr!

December 1st....

I wish everyone I have met here on the internet could come to our trunk show! Vintage will be represented by me and Giana of the wonderful The Greedy Seagull plus handmade jewelry supplied by Camille of Cam ci Cam ca, should be fun night and really any excuse for a holiday party right?
Thanks to Mr John Reardon for the flier....and for hosting in his grand tattoo shop.....see you there we hope!

Line dancing?

If this dress doesn't sell by the end of November it's moving over into my closet....borrowed for a friend's cocktail party last week when my own closet seemed so lackluster! It's comfy, fits and I kinda feel like line dancing in it! Thanks to my husband who took so many rather dodgy photos for me to choose from....

Weekend Sale!

Super lucky this weekend, get to celebrate a friend's birthday all the way down in Miami!
All weekend, including Friday from 1pm,  the shop will be on sale....25% off! See you all back here next week. (Last time I went to Miami a shark almost ate me so it's poolside for me only this time)

It's looming....

Hello! so this morning I am tinkering away with the cat beside me on these holiday gift certs for the shop! I was hoping to be tinkering away at unpacking great vintage dresses but yesterdays hunting proved good in a thrifting kind but not the drop dead spectacular kind that gets you working your butt off for the next 3 days....I did come across some ultra beautiful dresses but sadly the prices also made me drop dead. Anyway I see this inventory lull as a time to work on this new blog (do you like it? I wanted something that represented my Victorian obsession....) and get my holiday shop plans in place...the shop will be on sale all this coming weekend as I'll be out of town till Monday, in the sun....which I can't quite believe....I'm rambling, have a lovely day friends!
p.s. I am trying desperately to replace the blogs I lost from my list, please send me your links and I'd be most honoured to grace your blog roll in return.

My model got pregnant during the shoot.....

So when Bonnie put this 50s maternity dress on her creative powers got the better of her....she whipped a cushion off the couch, wrapped it in a scarf, tied it on and proceeded to hug her belly lovingly for the next few shots....two things: what a cool maternity dress and secondly, she's quite convincing!
This fab dress is in the shop right now. You also don't need to be pregnant to wear it....

Full time vintage seller and nutcase.

So I have been full time at this gig now for almost 2 months. There are some things which
have really surprised and downright shocked me about giving up my job, I thought some people who were still receiving a regular paycheck and considering a vintage career might be interested to know how it goes when you give that up and land in a big old pile of used clothing.....

These are the most startling realizations I have come to over the past few weeks.

1. Yes it's full time but that doesn't mean you have 5 days to list the stuff, I have almost
as much time as I had when I was working as now I have to find SO much more clothing,
this takes serious time, money and commitment...and is considerably harder than I thought, sure
there's a ton of thrift shops and antique malls but most of it is a. crap and b. too expensive....which
leaves a smaller amount for me and others to find.

2. More clothes means.....you guessed it, more cleaning, mending, photographing, storing. Way
more. So much more.

3. $$$. My sales have not magically jumped up yet, I hope they do but I also realize that for
that to happen I need to source regular, quality vintage....like right NOW. That creates a cash
flow issue, no sales this week? too bad, I need stock and the shop must be fresh. Access savings
account commences.

4. Mental strength. This shit is HARD. I absolutely bow down and take my hat off to ALL
full time vintage sellers (and if you have a baby you should receive a letter from the Queen), you have balls of steel and are the hardest working people I know. If there's anything I did not expect to have to do battle with it's my confidence. I've always been ok with that but it's being tested right now....there are some amazing sellers out there, *too* much 'vintage' and only a handful of buyers. I need to toughen up over the next few months or I will be foetal-like on top of a pile of handbags before Christmas.

I'd like to make it clear that having said all of the above I am absolutely committed to the next
few months and will forge ahead, learning something every day and taking the rough with the smooth.
More smooth would be great but no-one ever got that without plain old hard work.

So, to sum up if you haven't run screaming to the nearest bar, there's changes afoot for Wildfell Hall, a new blog coming very soon, some tentative ideas to change a little of what I actually sell, some serious home organization....I predict in 3 months I'll be happily mixing cocktails at 6, baking a cake in the middle of the week and occasionally getting a hair cut.
 I would not for a second trade the decision I made earlier this year, this is the real deal, what I want to do and I will quite possibly die trying to make it work...ok that's a bit dramatic...more like wear myself out, have a nervous breakdown or discover prescription meds.....all for the love of vintage my friends. Rome was not built in a day!

this goes with that!

Not sure what's up with the arrows and hearts but I must have missed using photoshop at my old job....sometimes it's cool to flip through the shop and see what goes together, I think these pieces would fall in pair love if they were purchased together! but not too matchy matchy....