Wednesday, May 29, 2013

Weekend Finds 2: Clothes of Antiquity


Good morning!

The flea market finds continue with my clothing scores from last weekend. My favorite, favorite dealers were here again this month! I started my shed expedition by dutifully digging through the linens tables of the Andy Devine character (see my former haul from said dealer) whose scratchy, booming voice is audible from the moment you round the corner. My dad was interested in a WWII German rifle he had one table, but the $500 price tag (and the cut down barrel someone had modified post-bellum for hunting-- good eye, Pappy!) cooled his ardor for the firearm significantly. I dug but was disappointed to see a lot of the significantly damaged pieces I'd passed up last month, and left with a single black bolero jacket ($5, not pictured) to show for my trouble.

Better luck at the next dealer, however!

I love how long the skirt is on me!

The same friendly faced, chain smoking clothes seller that sold me this yellow gingham dress and the black ballroom dress that got me hooked on flea-markets-every-month in the first place had a hanging rack of maybe 30 dresses and a booth full of trinkets and baubles, from purses to repro Civil war caps to photographs. "Look!" I said to my dad, gesturing at the bounty of pre-1950's fabulousness. "This is my problem....this is what I'd like my house to look like! Just piles and piles of old handbags and crocodile wallets and recipe pamphlets!" He chided kindly against  my vacant dream-gaze, reminding me that I had recently successfully undertaken a pretty serious closet-cleanout that had left my house looking the most BREATHABLE it has looked in my adult life, to which I rejoined: "The heart wants what the heart wants!" In this case, though, I managed a modicum of self-restraint and only picked up this black taffeta and lace whirl of a dress, a blue fifties' formal, and the surprise at the end of this post.

And that the skirt has a swing circumference of like 120''!

I had a very serious "OH MY GOD" moment when I found the tiny, tiny jacket you see in the photo below:



A hunter green Victorian jacket with slightly puffed up sleeves, all military-style construction? Every one of the buttons laid out in a phalanx down the front of the piece, not a single one unaccounted for? OH. MY GOD. I think I might have mentioned before when I was talking about finding that Edwardian romper-set in the same post as the ballroom gown or when I got that gorgeous Victorian satin jacket for a song--it has only been in the last year or so that the possibility of owning clothes 100 plus years old has occurred to me. Not because I didn't think they existed, but the scant examples I've seen in vintage stores or on Ebay or in an antique mall have been three figure price tagged and in a state of delicacy comparable to butterfly wings or onion skin. Wearable but for their tiny sizes Victorian clothes? No way! Maybe in a museum, or Courtney Love's closet (she has Theda Bara grade authentic flapper clothing that makes me actually cry salt tears to think of owning), but not in my hot little hands. 

But think again!



Did I mention there are TWO SMALL, INEXPLICABLE FUR PUFF BALLS as decoration on the back of the jacket? Well, I should. I am still a terrible blog photographer and dependent on the good graces of an iPhone to show you what I see, but imagine the color is somewhere in between these photos, a true hunter green, though the construction is far more visible in the washed out photos below. Imagine a sweeping matching skirt and maybe a fur cap to match the trimmings in the back. I can't, I might faint from the glamour of it all, but you go on and think on it.


I wanna be with you, coat! The dealer quoted thirty on the jacket and ten apiece on the dresses, but I managed to piteously haggle him down to twenty on the jacket and...fine, ten apiece on the dresses. I'm poor! I think he could see that I might actually die if I didn't get the coat, but also that I did not have that much money to blow (especially at this point in my shopping excursion) on the lovely things clutched to my chest. A merciful merchant! I told him I planned on wearing the two dresses, but maybe hanging the coat on the wall in my office. "Yeah, it's tiny, but I figured someone might want it for display, like you said. How old do you think it is? Edwardian? Maybe Victorian?" I breathed a sigh of wonder. "No idea. Probably older rather than newer, if you ask me. I was thinking 1880's. It's in great shape, too!" We chatted amiably for a minute as the items were bagged and I pretty much skipped away from the booth, unable to conceal a mile-wide grin.

Neither of us was kidding about the diminutive size of this guy, either! The waist at its smallest point measures 20 inches, and you have to think of this as being OUTERWEAR (the inside is even fleece), meaning the person inside would have to be maybe 18-inches in waist circumference to even be comfortable. We're talking Gone With the Wind measurements! I think about the teeny, teeny sizings of more petite starlets in the day (Bette Davis, 21'' waist; Veronica Lake, same) and then plus a corset, and a 18'' waist doesn't seem that far off! From them, that is.



Best part? I spent $40 on all three pieces (I know, I know-- but my entertainment budget is nil, and this makes up for it once a month), and each garment still had the tag from the antique dealer my guy had wholesale purchased the clothes from. Wanna see what retail on just the two items pictured is?


Two hundred and five smackeroos, folks! Now, for something I love as much as I love these two pieces, PLUS getting them for $30...the best feeling! Simply the best feeling.

How about you? Do you have any truly antique clothes or items in your collection? What's the best you've made out at an estate sale or in a flea market setting lately, when you knew an item was worth x but only had to pay y for it? Let's talk our successes, folks!

That's all for today, I've gotta get back to work! Have a great Wednesday and I'll see you tomorrow. Til then!

16 comments:

  1. Both finds are thoroughly fantastic. The dress looks ace on you and I am in love with those useless but adorable fur balls. When I learn to sew....

    My best finds of late are a pair of snazzy vintage rabbit fur shoes for $1, a Persian Lamb muff for $2 and a hardcover 1960s hairstyling book for $1. Each time I felt like I won the lottery.

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    1. Thanks! You had me at PERSIAN LAMB MUFF and TWO DOLLARS. Atta girl! I love the feeling of making a really particularly good buy like that, it IS like winning the lottery! :)

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    1. Thanks, Helen! If only I were tinier! Still, it will be cherished worn or not by me!

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  3. Wow, amazing finds! The dress is so flattering and that jacket, wow, amazing condition!

    My latest find is a vintage tailor ham :)

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    1. I had to look up what a "tailor ham" was, this is the state of my ignorance! Now I can remember my grandmother having one of those in her sewing room. With all the gorgeous sewing you do, yours will get a lot of use!

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  4. I've got to get out your way to shop, as it's a bloody wasteland of, well...crap, here. You always find the coolest...and small sized...stuff! That jacket's gorgeous! One of my favourite vintage markets in London was once a month in Camden. One of the dealers always had tons of victorian clothing. And for pretty good prices too. I could kick myself for not buying a little pale blue and pink jacket very much like yours!

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    1. Come out here sometime! We'll shop til we drop, gal. Pale blue and pink victorian jacket...oh, dro-o-o-o-ol! I hate non-buyers remorse like that, I regret not grabbing stuff much more than grabbing it (most times).

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  5. I once scored a Japanese silk-with-silk-lining haori-type jacket with a HUGE dragon embroidered on it in gold-and I am talking seriously fine goldwork-type embroidery, not tacky cheapo-deapo embroidery- for TWENTY-FIVE DOLLARS. I am quite sure that it was mis-priced; I saw another dragon-embroidered jacket right next to it that WAS "cheapo-deapo" and was at least TWICE the price!-but damn'd if I was going to point it out!

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    1. We need to brainstorm an appendix-list of different types of hardcore vintage collector/buyers scores...the "they didn't know what they had" buy, the "they gave me a crazy low price even though everything else was super expensive" buy, the "I never thought I'd get one of these in a million years" buy-- I love them all! Yours fits a couple of those categories, what a win!

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  6. Oh my goodness - congrats on an amazing haul and your bartering all's!

    That dress fits like a dream and that jacket was just too gorgeous to pass up on.

    Www.mancunianvintage.com

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    1. I almost was good and said no when he said $30 on it, but as I watched him put it back on the rack, I caved. He was nice not to hold me to the $30 quote, thinking back on how desperate I must have looked when I was like..."Howabouttwentyohpleasesayyes!" :) I'm glad he wasn't an opportunist!

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  7. such sweet scores! i didn't make it out this month but it looks like you did enough damage for the both of us! (i kid, i kid. . . ) i can't go to the flea without picking up a sack full of vintage books so i seriously had to put myself on a restriction! buuuuuut we still need to venture out together soon— i want me some lisa time!

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    1. Let's make a plan, I would love to get together and shop some time! :)

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  8. Omgosh I love your finds!
    Here in the UK I've missed out on quite a few pieces to dealers *sad face* but recently scored a 1940s St Michaels dress which I absolutely treasure. LOVE that feeling when you find something so unique for such a bargain price :)

    www.Hellcandy.com

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    1. That sounds GORGEOUS, you're exactly right, there's nothing like the thrill of the amazing vintage deal. :) Thanks for reading!

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