Enid Collins...ish (The Real and the Faux)

Good morning!

Here's a first-thing-before-walking-out-the-door photo of me from this morning-- yes, I wore all black and pinned a corsage of artificial flowers on because I woke up thirty minutes late and eyeliner/lipstick application is not optional in my morning routine, but it's my chief accessory that I'm hoping is drawing your attention:

I don't usually have as much luck at antique stores as I would like...it doesn't keep me from looking, but a good sixty percent of the time I spend in a retail antique or consignment environment involves me furtively looking at price tags, eyes widening, and muttering curse words under my breath. Lord, the state of store-based vintage! Granted, estate sales have spoiled me rotten with full price day being half what it'd be in a store, and half price day...don't even get me started. Being as the estate sale trail has been cold as ice lately, however, I needed somewhere to dig for baubles, and turned my sights as I often do to Goodletsville. After resisting a particularly cute pair of nylon pajamas at the Goodletsville Antique Mall (white with pink and blue piping...but I never know if the pants are going to fit!), I was browsing the upstairs-galley area of Tara's Antique Mall across the street when I came across THIS:

OOOOOOoooooh, WHEE, people! Among an entire booth of reasonably priced eighties' formal wear and jackets, I spotted it....Faux Enid Collins in the wild! While this is not one of the bejeweled masterpieces of that great woman in Texas, it's a humdinger of a find if I do say so myself. Bracing my guts for the price tag reveal, it gladdens my heart now as it did then to report it was only $15! The most I'd paid for an Enid at that point was $10 (I have four, but again, I'm unnaturally a) persistent and b) lucky), but the dress from yesterday's post was involved, and I needed something extraordinary to wear with it to the wedding. Voila. Please note that my tights were black, and the dress turquoise, and man alive! So are the key colors in this bag! Plus cats!

One of my chief complaints for the real Enids I have is their taupe or tan background-- I'm a real stickler for matchy-matchy with accessories (it bothers me to have gold earrings, a gold necklace, and a bag with silver fixtures, or silver earrings and a gold bracelet, for example) and it's hard for me to get them to "go" with the outfit I'm wearing unless there's a lot of white or tan or taupe the outfit's material (I own no shoes in those colors). Is that ridiculous? What I love about this bag is the piercing-quality of the plastic stones for the cat's eyes and the general craziness of the embellishment. At first, I thought it might be homemade, but judging from the precision application of the jewels and the complicated nature of the design (do you see the ball of string! The tasselled pillow! Etc, etc!), I think this is just a good knock off from the same time period. Rejoice!

Here are some of the other Enids I have at home, from previous posts (remember when....?) :

From this post

From this post

From this post (and an unknown original source)

I have one more that's principally butterflies, but I couldn't remember the name nor find one like it online (booooo). Previous to finding the last of these three in Southern Thrift in 2010 for freakin' $2.99 (WHAT), I think I had seen them before at estate sales and the like and gone "Eh, too ongepotchket." In the words of Lou Reed, "Goes to show...how wrong you can be." Because now and ever since, I'm obviously nuts about them.

What about you? Do you have any over-jeweled Enids or Enid-esques in your closet at home? Do you remember making knock offs of them from craft kits or your grandmother swinging a tote bag sized version around the grocery store in the seventies'? Do tell, do tell.

That's all for today, kids. I'll see you tomorrow for Photo Friday!