Wow! Talk about a new invention that didn’t make it. Ironrite? Actually, it apparently did.

It definitely looks less tiring, just sitting there and feeding fabric into the machine. What strikes me is that we never see her ironing the ruffles. I like my ruffles crisp and fluffy, not smashed flat as it appears this machine would make them. I could be, and most likely AM wrong about that, because there are collectors today that do know how to use the machine and say it makes wonderful pant creases and such. Homemakers in the ‘40s often used large linen tablecloths that are a bear to iron, as well as bed sheets – no permanent press! It must have been a godsend!

Back in the day, (don’t you love that expression – so vague…) doing the laundry was a whole lot more than throwing some clothing into the washing machine with a little soap and softener, then coming back about a half hour later and moving everything to a dryer, followed by hanging up or folding to be put away. I’ll bet that at least a third of all households today don’t even have an iron or ironing board. Yet we still hate doing laundry. The next time you get your grump on when it’s laundry day, just be thankful no one has handed you a rock and sent you down to the river. (I can’t fathom how that would get your clothing clean – what if the river is muddy, dry, full of fish … ??)

One last thing I love in this video – the house dress aka The Housecoat! The similarities are striking, but this one doesn’t have ruffles to iron!

Depression Era House Dress, Hostess Dress, Housecoat

The best part is when I run across something that fascinates me – usually having little or nothing to do with the original subject, like this video that is a remix of several decades of Chanel fashion.  It’s kind of an odd video, a bit grainy and with a lot of strange background noises, complete with breaking glass (!) but the fashions are wonderful!  Toward the end are some close ups of gorgeous costume jewelry. You’ll see a dress where the fabric design has large leaves – oh, how I wish the film was in color! Then there are several Chanel suits, again – how I wish I could see the colors!

Looking at these suits brought to mind the wonderful pink and green linen and wool suit dress in my shop.  I have several wonderful pieces from the estate of a woman whose husband owned a local department store that closed in 1961.  Other that a couple of dresses, including the Mingolini – Guggenheim dress, it looks like she had most of her clothing made for her.  The pink and green dress has a lot of the same lines as the Chanel suits, specifically the slightly lower than natural waistline and boxy jacket.  I always felt this lady must have been quite tall because the skirts of her dresses are fairly long but, as you can see in the video, the style is a bit longer.  (I’m short, so one of the first things I notice about any garment is how much I’m going to have to shorten a skirt to wear it!)

Long waisted and boxy like Chanel's

T.C's Vintage Outfit

I was playing around with this really nice faux astrakhan fur bolero – getting ready to list it – when I thought it would be fun to make up an all mix and match vintage outfit.   I picked out an 80s suede skirt, a 50s nylon blouse, the bolero, and a gold tone multi chain vintage necklace.  That’s when it happened.  She wasn’t really rockin the outfit with that hair.

Lana & Hedy - The Silent Heads

So I grabbed Lana’s hair. (She didn’t say anything, but I know she was UNHAPPY.  After all, she’s the one with the GOOD hair and her attitude shows she knows it!)  Then I put it on T.C. and the brat looks pretty good!  (Shhhh … better than Lana.  She has a buffalo head.)

T.C's Usual 'Do

T.C.'s Borrowed 'Do

No female is ever happy with her hair.  If it’s straight, we want curls, if it’s curly we want waves.  If it’s brown we want blonde.  At some point in the last 10 years my own hair has become schizophrenic.  For most of my life it has been straight as a stick.  Of course, the 1980s brought us Big Hair.  I came by mine by getting perms every 6 months or so.  As hairstyles went straight, I was beginning to see some (gasp!) gray hairs so I started highlighting to hide it.  My hairdresser convinced me to either perm or highlight and I chose the highlights, but kept doing the gel and scrunch thing until it grew out.  Except it didn’t.  Apparently, gray hair has more texture and even though I don’t see it, it’s doing its thing.  So the happy news is that I can have straight or wavy curly.

But I digress.  The point is  –  now that I see Lana’s hair on T.C. – I want my hair to do that!  I’m the same calico color but … Of course, I also want my body to do that tall, slim, and shapely thing, too!  Oh well, joke’s on her — I have both my thumbs!

Oops!

So now that I’ve organized my workspace into vague piles of Stuff To Do with various levels of priority, I can get right down to business!

You probably noticed that I changed the name of this blog last year, but did you notice that I changed the name of my shop, too?  Why, you ask?  (c’mon … ask!)  The old shop name (Bonnie & Clyde’s Treasure Trove) was actually bringing more people to my website that weren’t looking for vintage clothing.  Some were looking for history, some were looking for B&C costumes, and all sorts of other items I don’t sell or even know anything about!  Since I didn’t want to have to change my URL, I wanted to keep the initials fairly similar and came up with our new name:  Belle à Coeur Treasure Trove Vintage.  I think it better reflects our shop and I hope you do too!

Now I have a teensy little request:  Please go to my new Facebook page and “like” us there.  You may already “like” my old Facebook page, but I need to close that down and delete it and I can’t do that until I get at least 107 fans.

Thanks so much for helping me with this … so let me give you a sneak peek at what I’m hoping to get listed this week!

1970s Persimmon color Maxi Dress

Lovely silk taffeta dress ca. 1860

Vintage Green Velvet Vest

Vintage Tapestry Purse

How many versions of the song “The 12 Days of Christmas” have you heard?  I know there are many, many more but Jeff Foxworthy’s Redneck version always makes me laugh and the one done by the GPS company always gets stuck in my head.  I admire the creativity of those who do parodies; I suppose I could do one, but it would take more than 12 days to complete!

As with the song, here are a few different versions of the “Partridge in a Pear Tree” pin.

Green enameled tree with gold tone Partridge

Cadoro Partridge in a Pear Tree Pin

Partridge in Pear Tree Pin

Brightly Colored Partridge in a Pear Tree pin

Partridge on a Pear Tree Branch

And … for your viewing pleasure an entire collection of vintage partridge in pear tree pins!  Here is a sample of what you’ll see

Signed J.J.

Bright Green Pears; Pin Unsigned

Signed ART

I wish I had Barbie's closet!

I was thinking about my best friend coming to visit soon and looking forward, not only to just catching up and enjoying her company, but to having her help me get some newly arrived vintage clothing inventory photographed for the website.

It was then that I realized … I’m still playing with Barbies!  Except this “Barbie” is 6 ft. tall (taller than either of us) and weighs enough to, well, she’s no lightweight – she’s a vintage mannequin – you’ve probably seen her in some of my listings.  Her name is T.C. (a story for another time).

I just love dressing T.C. in fabulous vintage fashions.  It’s even more fun when I’m able to accessorize with hats and purses. Just like back in the old days … with Barbie.

My friend, Lynne, and I would spend hours … well, actually, days playing with our Barbies together.  We must have literally had hundreds of different outfits between us.  My dad always growled that he felt he should be allowed to claim Barbie as a dependent!  Between us, Lynne and I had a collection of dolls, accessories and of course, clothing from the mid-1960s through the early 1970s that, if they had been real adult clothing would have not only cost a fortune, but would give any vintage lover today heart palpitations!

Sadly, like many girls, we grew older and sold our Barbies and their wardrobes at a <GASP!> garage sale.  I’ve lamented the loss now that I’m older and comfort myself with the thought that when we sold them, they weren’t collectible.

My overgrown Barbie Doll - T.C.

So imagine my surprise when, just the other day my darling husband gave me duplicates of my old blonde bubble hair Barbie and friends.  Talk about fun!  All I’ve been able to think about is trying to find some of the old sets of clothing that I had.  Of course, the outfits I’m most attracted to are the older sets, those of the early and mid 1960s.  I didn’t have many of those but the few I had, I’d love to find again.  (I did find one – one of my favorites!)

And then it hit me … this is just like what I do every day!  I search out great vintage dresses for the shop and I dress T.C. in them.

So, it IS all Barbie’s fault!

That’s my story and I’m sticking to it.

In the meantime, here’s a peek at some items that were added to our website last week:

Vintage Sarah Coventry jewelry … with lots more to come:

Sarah Coventry “Golden Lace” Ring

Sarah Coventry "Golden Lace" Ring

Sarah Coventry “Celestial Ice” Pin

Very Large Sarah Coventry "Celestial Ice" Pin

Whiting & Davis Huge MOP Ring

Vintage MOP Ring by Whiting & Davis

Coro Multi-Strand Chunky Bead Necklace

This reminds me of the colors of the ocean - Vintage Coro Necklace

And several unsigned pieces:

Cute Figural Frog Pin

Perfect gift for your favorite frog collector!

50’s Mesh Knot Pin with Rhinestones

Don't you love the dangling ends with the stones?

Coming very soon – hopefully this week – Carpet Bag Purse, Velvet Coat, and some hats!

Week of 9/12/11

Chunky but lightweight! Vintage copper jewelry

I love copper jewelry year round, but it’s particularly nice in the fall … goes so well with the deep greens, browns, yellows, and oranges of the season!  This vintage copper bracelet and earrings set is extra nice because it’s chunky but very lightweight.

This vintage Trifari set is just so pretty — textured gold tone metal swirls with beautiful sapphire blue glass chatons at the centers.  Super tailored!

Classy, tailored Trifari Swirls - Gold tone with Sapphire Blue Glass Stones

Vintage Sarah Coventry jewelry not only is well-made with interesting design — it’s downright fun to collect!  There are so many different designs and within each design, there are usually several different pieces.  Necklaces, earrings, pins, and rings are the most common pieces.  I’m thrilled to be able to offer 3 different pieces of the “Evening Profile” design, from 1964.  Its black glass faux hematite cameo motif goes with just about everything and no wardrobe should be without cameos!

Ring, Earrings, and Necklace - Sarah Coventry "Evening Profile" 1964

Castlecraft Moonglow Bracelet & Earrings Set

As an Indiana native, I’m quite fond of Castlecraft and Hillcraft vintage jewelry and have a hard time not picking it up whenever I see it.   Made in Greencastle, Indiana and Rockville, Indiana, respectively, they are always unmarked but are easily identified by the distinctive findings.  This is a moonglow thermoplastic very light grayish blue bracelet and earrings set.

Coming soon … HATS!

Many moons ago (many!) back when my husband I had just started dating, we had a standing joke that we were having too much fun together and, therefore, we were doing something BAD.    (As you might have guessed, our ex-spouses had managed to make anything FUN out to be BAD.)  One thing led to another and to make this long story short, we ended up calling ourselves Bonnie & Clyde.  NO, it is NOT our real names!

Bonnie & Clyde's Treasure Trove Vintage

Many more moons passed and we decided to follow a dream and open an antique store.  I chose the antiques because a location smack in the middle of north central Indiana is NOT really conducive to becoming vintage fashion central.  But I could still have an area for vintage clothing and jewelry in the shop.  We combed the area for antique and vintage items for the shop and were soon calling them “treasures”.  (See where this is going?)

When it came to putting a name on the sign in front of the shop, I was just at a loss.  Some people have a talent for coming up with cute and creative names.  I don’t.  (Obviously!)  We were coming down to the wire and needed a name for our sign painter and “Bonnie & Clyde’s Treasure Trove” came out as the best of all the terrible ideas we were having at the time.  Exhaustion will do that.

Since that time, I’ve been called “Bonnie” or asked if our names really are Bonnie and Clyde.  (NO, they’re NOT!).  Repeatedly.  I have had people ask me if I want to buy the shoes the real Bonnie was wearing when she was killed.  (SERIOUSLY??? NOOOO!)  Some have asked if they can buy Bonnie’s clothes.  (Um, no .. at least not here.)  People have asked if we are related to Bonnie & Clyde.  (No!)  It really didn’t take long to see that we’d picked a terrible name for the shop, but it was too late and we learned to live with it.

Then came the internet.  I did a little bit on ebay, but honestly, never really got on well with it. Back then, it was a struggle to just get a website up and running but we got a little website going.   After a few years, the website actually became a viable stand alone shop and my vintage clothing and jewelry were overwhelming people looking at antiques, so we broke the antiques off to another website (craigantiques.com) and left the clothing and jewelry on the original website because we discovered our page rank was doing well and we had repeat internet customers.  Now we were REALLY stuck with the name!

I still try to think of a better name for my vintage clothing and jewelry shop … when (if) I think of something … YOU will be the first to know!

Not us.

70 yrs later ... Pretty well preserved, arent' we?

In my defense, I have been over my head in STUFF.  Closing the shop last fall required more time and effort than I ever imagined.  Every time I thought I could get back to working on what I love – vintage fashion – MORE stuff showed up that needed my immediate attention.

So, it’s been a very frustrating 6 months for me, but this time I THINK I’m really back!  Just wanted to make contact and see if I still even know how to use wordpress.  I promise, the next post will be creative, informative, and exciting (probably!)

Early June Garden 2011

Plus, I admit I’ve been happily sidetracked by my garden produce.  I’ve been blessed with a bumper crop of green beans and have been busily picking and freezing.  Got a great deal on blueberries in bulk and made jam (haven’t done that in YEARS!) and am in the process of freezing the rest.  I just made a blueberry crisp from a new recipe with a strange ingredient that I, personally, hate.  But it turned out really good!  Now, I’m seeing some of my Roma tomatoes beginning to turn red so tomato sauce is on the near horizon.  And, my “critically acclaimed” salsa.   I made gallons last year and all that’s left are two jars.

Back on the tracks … all this madness has been due to the sale of my building and closing my brick and mortar antiques shop where I also had my vintage clothing.  This building is 100+ years old and had a minimum of 60 years of leftover JUNK in there that had to be removed.  While I had never used the “attic” (simply a crawl space above the 14 ft. ceiling for electrical and roof access), we went up there to be sure there was nothing that needed to be removed.  It was empty, as expected, EXCEPT for a small crate of old Sears catalogs from the mid-1960s.  Most are still in the mailing wrapper!  I’ve only had time to briefly look at a couple from 1965 and all I want to do is place my order!  Would love to see the “Cape Jacket Suit” on the left appear on my front porch! Anyway, I’m going to be studying these treasures and hope to show you a few fun “new” vintage in the coming months.

Attic "Treasure"

Fall & Winter Fashions of 1965