We’re crazy for lamps and have several in our space at Rural Origins Antiques in Royalton, MN.

Here’s one of them:

Hollywood Regency Revolv-a-Lite Lamp

Item: Hollywood Regency Revolv-a-Lite Lamp

Price: $90

Often when purchasing vintage lamps, we’ll find lamps without their shades or with replacement shades. This beauty has its original shade, which we discovered when we found a couple of ads from 1957 showing the lamp. You can see a copy of one of the ads in the picture, but here’s a link to another one in the Newspaper Archive. Finding an original ad for a vintage item is fabulous because it helps to date the item. In this case, the Newspaper Archive ad identifies General Electric as the manufacturer of this lamp. (Just found another ad in the Newspaper Archive for the same lamp.)

Incidentally, we found an identical shade without its lamp within about a week of finding this lamp. That serendipity happens to us on a surprisingly regular basis in this business.

The Revolv-a-Lite name refers to how the lamp is switched on and off – not by a knob under the shade, but by the black barrel switch you see in the middle of the lamp above. It’s a slick feature that allows for operation of a three-way bulb.

Hollywood Regency is a mid-century style that was meant to appeal to people who wanted a glamorous lifestyle, just like Hollywood actors. While the style supposedly started in the 1930s, it’s obvious from our lamp and its ads  that it continued well into the 1950s. Often there are touches of gold and graceful curves in Hollywood Regency pieces.

For more on the Hollywood Regency style, check out these links:

[HGTV] Hollywood Regency Style: Get the Look

[eHow] How to Decorate Hollywood Regency Style

[Addendum: Erik found the ad shown in the photo above for me. It's from the Cass City Chronicle, Cass City, Michigan, dated December 12, 1957. The newspaper is part of the Rawson Library's archives. Apparently just the Revolv-a-Lite switch is a GE product, not the whole lamp. The ad shows a heading that says "Designer Lamps with new Revolv-a-Lite switch. I can't tell whether "Designer Lamps" is a descriptor or a company name.]

Yesterday, Erik and I drove to the estate sale our friend was running in order to pick up a couple of pieces of furniture. Erik had been to the estate sale the day before to help and was so attracted to the pieces that he bought them.

One is a large handmade heavy-as-all-get-out mid-century shelving unit/desk. The other, a Lane cedar chest.

We brought our Honda Element, thinking it would be big enough for the two pieces. Umm, not. The cedar chest fit fine. The shelving unit, not so much. It was about an inch too big all the way around. Grr.

We loaded the cedar chest and drove it the hour-and-a-half home, where we picked up our other car (the one with the trailer hitch) and a trailer. We headed back to the estate sale after taking Doggle Woggle out for a walk.

We loaded the shelving unit and a few other pieces of furniture for our friend onto the trailer and went to Dino’s to eat. (Dino’s has spinach puffs and gyros that are to die for.)

Our bellies full, we set out for home. Not far into our trip, we suddenly heard a sound like a muffler dragging and pulled over. A tire on the trailer had blown. Seriously shredded to bits.

We resigned ourselves to changing the tire, even though it was dark and cold and we were tired, because what else could we do? Erik looked through the trailer kit for a wrench in order to loosen the lug nuts on the tire. The wrench we had wasn’t the right size. Nor was the one that was in our trunk for our car tires. Crap.

Erik decided to drive on the flat over to the gas station across the street and a block behind us. He wanted more light and there was a better chance we could get help there. Meanwhile, I placed a call to our friend, hoping she might have access to a wrench of the right size.

The gas station sold no wrenches.

Erik pulled off the spare tire while we were waiting for our friend and discovered that it was flat. And the air hose at the gas station was out of order. We were now stuck in a tragedy of errors. One thing heaping on top of another.

Our friend showed up with another friend who had a tool kit. (Yay!) While Erik was using the wrench to remove the lug nuts, I rode with my friend and the flat spare over to the Bridgestone tire business a block away and got air (their air hose was working).

We managed to get the tire changed, thanks to our friends. Hallelujah!

And I prayed all the way home that nothing else would go wrong. (If it had, Erik said he would cry. I would have joined him.)

What a day.

When it comes to antique or vintage containers, particularly those that are breakable, the lid is the thing. It is very easy to find vintage casseroles, candy dishes, soup tureens, and the like without their lids because lids are so drop-able, crack-able, and chip-able. A vintage item that’s missing a lid has less value than one with the lid intact, so if you’re into collecting such things, it’s best to find one with a lid.

Here are a couple of items we have available at Rural Origins Antiques that have their lids.

Fire King grease jar, December 2011.

Item: Fire King Grease Jar with Lid

Price: $75

Pyrex Pink Daisies Divided Casserole with Lid, 2011

Item: Pyrex Pink Daisies Divided Casserole with Lid

Price: $21

Within about a week of finding the Pyrex Pink Daisies casserole, we found a second one, also with a lid. The design is so quirky and fun that it seemed worth the risk to invest in two of them.

Hutch filled with melamine dishes, in the Cooler at Rural Origins Antiques, Royalton, MN. November 2011.

What could be more mid-century than Melmac? When we started on this mid-century venture, we gave no thought to Melmac. It was all Fire King this and atomic lamp that. And then we started spotting Melmac, which is a brand name for melamine dishes, and went ape for it, as you can see by the contents of the hutch pictured above …. and the one below.

The upper shelf in this pic shows pink and white melamine coffee cups and saucers and a sugar bowl and creamer. The other dishes are NOT melamine. October 2011.

Melmac came in lots of  fun colors and patterns. Dishes made of melamine were considered everyday dishes because they could be knocked around and were hard to break. True Melmac was made by the American Cyanamid Company, but other companies made dishes out of melamine resin. We have melamine dishes by Boonton, Texasware, Branchell, Westinghouse, Prolon, Watertown, Allied Chemical, and even one by Fostoria. There are also a number of melamine pieces that are unmarked.

The Fostoria piece we have (top picture, second shelf, light turquoise bowl on far right) is unusual in that Fostoria is commonly known for glass, but produced melamine for a portion of one year. (The year may have been 1958, but we can’t pin down a source on that.)

Come on in to Rural Origins Antiques in Royalton, MN, and check out our collection of Melmac. Items come in a variety of prices.

—–

Here are a couple of extra online sources related to Melmac:

[iramency.hubpages.com] Collecting Vintage Melmac Dinnerware: History and Information

Retro Chalet: Melmac Central

Bordallo Pinheiro Cabbage Leaf Teapot in the Cooler at Rural Origins Antiques, October 2011.

Item: Bordallo Pinheiro Cabbage Leaf Teapot

Price: $52

Available at: Rural Origins Antiques in Royalton, Minnesota

—–

Isn’t this teapot a dandy? I found it at a thrift shop, sitting in an unassuming manner behind some clear glasses. I almost missed it, but as soon as I laid eyes on it, I had to pick it up and turn it over to look for a maker’s mark. This is advice that Erik has passed on to me about picking antiques and vintage items. Never be afraid to thoroughly examine an object to look for a maker’s mark. He’s even been known to crawl under tables in the hunt for a mark. (It goes without saying that if you pick something up, you need to be careful not to break it. That’s why I was never in the habit of looking for makers’ marks before.)

The maker’s mark helps dealers and the public to identify who created a piece, which, in turn, can hopefully help to date a piece. The date on the teapot is unknown. (The date isn’t always easy to figure out if a company has been in business a long time and hasn’t kept track of the dates of its product lines or hasn’t shared that information with the public.)

When I turned this teapot over, I was met with a fine maker’s mark that also showed some artistry.

Bordallo Pinheiro maker's mark on cabbage leaf teapot.

Check out that great frog.

The maker’s mark often provides enough information for an effective online search. This one sure did. From it we know the name of the company, Bordallo Pinheiro, and that it’s located in Portugal.

A Google search brought up some great information on Bordallo Pinheiro. It turns out that not only is this the name of a ceramics company founded in 1884 that is still operational in Portugal, it is also the name of the artist/cartoonist who founded the company. Now we know why that maker’s mark is so artsy … not to mention the teapot itself. Pottery from the Bordallo Pinheiro company tends to have a nature theme (animals, fish, flowers, leaves, etc. – the frog mark is certainly appropriate) and is done in the Majolica style. Here’s Wikipedia’s definition of Majolica:

Majolica, an English version of the Italian word maiolica, is a term covering a wide variety of European tin-glazed pottery, typically brightly painted over an opaque white background glaze, with an earthenware body. 

Bordallo Pinheiro, whether the man or the pottery, is highly respected in Portugal. With the beautiful design of this teapot, I can see why. It’s so tempting to keep this one to myself.

—–

For more information on Bordallo Pinheiro, see the following sources:

[Wikipedia] Rafael Bordalo Pinheiro

[Wikimedia Commons] Rafael Bordalo Pinheiro

[eBay Guides] Bordallo Pinheiro pottery and dishware

[eHow] How Do I Collect Bordallo Pinheiro Pottery?

[Wikipedia] Picture of the Bordallo Pinheiro Factory in Portugal

[Portugal Daily View] Bordalo Pinheiro: The artist who would give Moody’s the finger – I love this article because it shows how important Pinheiro is to Portugal’s history, his sense of humor and justice, and how influential his pottery studio is.

[Muselia.com] Rafael Bordallo Pinheiro museum

Huntley hutch** in the Cooler at Rural Origins Antiques, October 2011.

Item: Huntley hutch

Price: $215

Available at Rural Origins Antiques, Royalton, MN

**Items in hutch are sold separately.

Additional info: According to this page at antiquerestorers.com, the B. F. Huntley furniture company merged with Thomasville Chair Company in 1961. This would indicate that anything marked Huntley is likely from before this time.

This info is further repeated on this page of Thomasville history at fundinguniverse.com and again at mahalo.com.We couldn’t find a more official source for this info, like the Thomasville website. There are so many furniture companies in North Carolina, where Huntley and Thomasville were/are based that Huntley doesn’t seem to make it onto most history sites. There are nice pictures of a B. F. Huntley Furniture Company fire in 1956 on the Digital Forsyth website.

This hutch has a Huntley marking in the top drawer (see pic below).

Huntley marking in Huntley hutch in the Cooler at Rural Origins Antiques, October 2011.

The Cooler at Rural Origins Antiques in Royalton, MN. There's a freezer, too. You'll find cool mid-century vintage items of desire in The Cooler. October 2011.

On August 6, 2011, Rural Origins Antiques opened in Royalton, MN. We, Erik and Mary Warner, were just helping out our friend, Jody Scott-Olson, in filling her new store with a few antiques we wanted to sell. Within a month, we were renting our own space and searching for our niche in the antiques business. After another month, we moved to a larger space, the walk-in cooler in the back, and had found our niche: Mid-century vintage objects of desire.

If you’re looking for funky atomic lamps, mid-century Danish furniture, melamine and Fire King dinnerware, or other items from the 1940s through the 1960s, come visit the Cooler filled with cool stuff. To get the location and operating hours of Rural Origins Antiques, visit the store’s website or Facebook page.

I’ve done it again. Taken on another personal blog that I don’t have time to keep up. This one is the Mid-Century Vibe blog I started to go with our part-time antiques business.

I love setting up blogs and tweaking the theme in order to get the look I want. And while I’d like to be able to produce content for a blog with a specific theme (as opposed to my all-over-the-place Woo Woo Teacup Journal), I don’t have enough time away from work and other obligations to keep up with more than one blog.

Here’s the argument I have with myself when I have two blogs and a limited amount of time:

Self: It’s time to write a blog post.

Self: I know. I’ve got ideas for both blogs, but only enough time for one. Which one should I work on?

Self: Well, you’ve got more time and effort in on The Woo Woo Teacup Journal. It’s also your online home.

Self: I know, but I really should add to the other blog.

Self: Should nothing! The Woo Woo calls!

Self: I can’t resist!

Self: No, you can’t.

Self: Woo Woo it is.

As you can see, a blog has got to give and it’s not going to be The Woo Woo Teacup Journal.

I will not, however, abandon all the work I put into Mid-Century Vibe. While I only wrote 8 blog posts and a sticky post there, I put a lot of research into each (well, not so much into the sticky post). I have taken the text from the sticky post and created a page for it here. (See the menu above the banner.)

I’ve recreated the 8 blog posts on Woo Woo and they will be posting each day starting tomorrow until they’re all here.

The Mid-Century Vibe blog will be going away within the week. I simply can’t have that extra open channel out there to keep track of. Nor can I confuse the Googles or readers with identical posts on two different blogs.

When I want to post something related to our antique space, I will do it here. No longer will my Self have to argue with my Self about which blog to post to.

As a consumer who doesn’t want to consume more than she can possibly use, I’m not a very good capitalist, but I know someone that is. Meet canis lupus familiaris, more specifically, our very own canis lupus familiaris: Aleksandr. He is a consumption machine.

Caught in the act, Aleksandr destroying his dog bed, January 2012.

When he is not lounging about the house, Aleksandr is busy consuming the products we buy for him. In this picture, he is finally lounging on his new dog bed (less than 2 weeks old), but only because he has taken all the stuffing out and created a nest for himself. Apparently it’s more comfy that way.

Industry must love these four-legged engines of capitalism. “Consume away, doggie! We’ll make more!”

But only if we dog owners give in and continue to buy stuff for canis lupus familiaris to consume.

While we won’t be buying a new dog bed for Aleksandr any time soon, he’ll surely be the recipient of numerous toys over the duration of his life, each of which he’ll eventually destroy. Capitalism lives on in the Warner household.

Since Daughter is also having a few vague symptoms that make her feel less than healthy, we both decided to make appointments. We’ve both been put on elimination diets, which basically require one to remove every possible allergenic food from the diet and eat lots of vegetables and fruits. It’s not an easy diet to maintain, at least not at first, because so much of the available food in grocery stores contains common allergens (soy, dairy, peanuts, oranges, corn, wheat & other glutens, eggs, refined sugar, and most meats). It’s getting somewhat easier now that we are a week-and-a-half in, but we’ve done our share of kvetching and fresh fruits and veggies are expensive.

We’re supposed to be on the diet for a month, then we add back allergenic foods one at a time and note any symptoms they cause. The diet is meant to detox the body while also helping to determine foods that cause ill health. The only other way to figure out food allergies is to take an expensive test that involves lots of needles over a few days.

I have definitely suffered from diet adjustment and detox symptoms, gas, rumbling intestines, notably muscle weakness, fatigue, trouble focusing (brain fog), and headache. Nine days in and those symptoms are mostly gone. I still have the rash, though. I’ve read it can take longer for the body to get around to healing the skin because it works on more vital organs first (liver, kidneys, etc.)

While we’re working through the elimination diet to figure out food allergies, we also went through traditional environmental allergy testing using a scratch test. Quite the interesting experience. It felt like we were using our bodies for a science experiment. The nurse used these plastic devices that had eight round thin cylinders with teeth at the bottom. The teeth were coated with different allergen proteins and were ground into the skin of our backs. If that sounds unpleasant, it was, although the first “bite” was the worst.

We were tested for 37 substances and our nurse did an excellent job of explaining her process of comparing the reaction from these substances to the positive and negative control portions of the test. My skin is so sensitive to touch (and biting plastic) that the positive control had a larger reaction than any other substance tested. There were only two things I had a reaction to: Pigweed and Hormodendrum. I had to look up both as I had no idea what pigweed looked like and didn’t know that Hormodendrum is a type of fungus.

The really good news is that I’m not allergic to …

Kitties with glowing eyes, 2008

Or …

The Cute Puppy, December 2011