The Brocante Home Chronicles.

Annie Scampton

 

 

 

Amongst the many, many Victorian scrapbooks that turn up on Ebay, there is occasionally literary and aesthetic treasure. And none more so than Annie Scampton's absolutely gorgeous ode to her lovely life: a scrapbook I bid on in the early stages but ultimately lost to a high bid worthy of its charm.

What makes Annies scrumptious scrapbook so special is not just the sheer prettiness of its pages, nor the gorgeous fountain penned calligraphy, but that each page contains not just notes and quotes from Annie herself, but newspaper jokes, resplendent with the innocence of the era (Says the conceited young student proudly: "I say, look there! That shoemakers boy is putting his tongue out at me!"  Friend: "Why you seem quite pleased!" Student: "Of course, he takes me for a doctor already!") and more tellingly, scaps, notes, autographs and letters, glued carefully into the pages, from friends and relations, that reveal Annie to be the wonderful woman we would have her be from this tiny peek into her 1889 life...

I worry sometimes that Typepad will go bust. That I will wake up one morning, flick on my computer and discover that BrocanteHome, the past four years and every self indulgent little whim of mine will have been swallowed up and hurtled into internet heaven. That there is no way of securing my site in it's entirety, at least in it's current form and that we give so much daily regardless, never certain that we are committing those words, this little bit of who we are, to infinity. Because 100 years from now, there won't be a lucky ebay bidder holding our dreams in her hands. Nobody looking back on the life of a stranger and wondering who she was, what became of her, what she did with that abundance of spirit... 

And perhaps this is a good thing. BrocanteHome was never intended to be a diary and lately, through the circumstances of running in and out of libraries, without the intimacy of the relationship between me and my personal laptop, I feel it is going that way: a rushed outpouring of the dailiness of my life, not the scrapbook of dreams I always meant it to be. Not the place of scrumptious inspiration it used to be and for that I apologise. I get so very caught up in myself sometimes...

At night, I still sit, glue in hand, journal on knee. While this yellow covered journal, an illustrated memoir of who I am and who I want to be, does not have the focused beauty of Annie Scamptons scrapbook, and has  never been offered out for public consumption, it is in it's less self conscious innocence a better representation of who I really am. Uncensored by the magnitude of living up to the me I have somehow created here, the voice I expect to find on BrocanteHome, it is instead a playful representation of a life less ordinary, and one way or another I want to find a way to incorporate the essence of my illustrated self into BrocanteHome...   

I don't have to wait for more than a century to be found. We, none of us who commit daily to this blogging life do, we are here, now. And we owe it to ourselves to create online, scraps of who we truly are, because writing, even autobiographical writing is a funny thing: at some point we start to believe more in character than in truth.

Mister Rob

Well yes I think that just about sums up  the reason I can be seen sporting many an irrational grin in the face of far too much adversity.

Leave it to my gorgeous sister to give me  a handful of  pure cosy reassurance wrapped in art so beautiful it leaves me green with envy. Isn't that a terrible thing? I am so in awe of Mister Rob I have skewed that emotion with jealousy and will, should I ever discover him innocently minding his own business, feel the urge to pull his hair and run away.

Buy the book, stalk the website, pull his hair.   

Martha's Blog

Hot dawg! How I miss having home access to the internet: it's causing me no end of grief! How's a woman to call herself a good housekeeper if she's so wrapped up in her own fur lined little bubble, she didn't even know our very own Domestic Goddess has a blog all of her own?

Normal service will be resumed as soon as I can afford  broadband access again: life is a whirl of bills and birthdays and school activities that quite frankly cost a fortune and leave me scraping around my money box for inspiration and erm... bread.

In the meantime BrocanteHome will come from libraries and laptops across the nation.

Have a gorgeous Thursday Housekeepers. Tis raining here but theres Cosy Potato soup bubbling on the grill and I fully intend to teach myself to knit a pretty little washcloth this afternoon.

Wish me luck. I can't cast on to save my life!

The Bad Mum Pinny

Because on the days when you no-one is going to enter you for Mother of the Year Award you may as well shout it from the rooftops, shove violet cremes in your gob while the kids risk life and limb in the bath, pour white wine over your cornflakes and make BabyJane your role model of choice...

If you are going to do it, do it in style please.

Wallflowers

Oh my.  Haunting and beautifully described by Ray Caesar using a method that frankly flummoxes me but ultimately delivers art of such  deviant ethereal beauty it takes my breath away.

I do so adore spooky little girlwomen. And roses. Oh how I adore roses.

Refueled Give Away.

Get yourself over to Chris Browns blog and put your name down here... cause the great man is giving away his advance signed copy of Midwest Modern to one lucky reader  and is teasing the rest of us with a taster of what is in store when the book is released in October...

Off you go.   

Dishwashers By Design.

Well now, I'm really not sure how I feel about this whole business of applying giant sized stickers to household appliances to snazz them up a  bit...

Buy these two from Fairy for £5.00 each (All proceeds go to the Make A Wish Foundation) and you will have bought yourself a little piece of Celia Birtwell  or Louise Redknapp with which to decorate your dishwasher.

Which would I think be all well and good, were it not for the fact that the designs are cruelly compromised by the Fairy advertising in the corner: when I spend my days decanting this and that into vintage loveliness in order to banish ugly packaging from my life once and for all (decant! decant! decant!), the last thing I want is to add advertising disguised as design to something as big as a household appliance...

Heavens above, I'm a stroppy madam aren't I? They are for charity after all.

This week sacrifice a magazine and go make a childs dream come true instead.

Clares Vintage Home Pinboard.

Is ever there was a perfect example of how to create  a thriving, scrumptious little  vintage business, Clare at Vintage Home is it.  With a gorgeous array of  goods with vintage soul, a happy, authorative newsletter, and a tagline...Furnish your home with your heart... that says it all-  in the few months that Vintage Home has been online, Clare could, in my eyes, already do no wrong.

And then she comes up with  the Vintage Home Pinboard... comments, feedback, memories and photos from delighted customers, vintage advice in Below Stairs, and  a link to Clares lovely blog, making her business not only scrumptiously tasteful but with a personality all of it's own...

Lovely. 

May it go from strength to strength. 

Mom's Recipes.

This is just lovely. With a  collection of 242 scanned recipes from his Mothers recipe box, Phil G has created something which is both an astonishingly emotional tribute to domesticity and something akin to what I can only describe as a work of art....

This then is why we do what we do.

Tamielle

Go see, go see, go see...

Combining the genteel aesthetic of bygone days with  very modern philanthropic ideaology, Tamielle creates products blissful with the souls of those whose skills bring  her  designs to life...

"My process of designing  begins with finding social enterprises or talented individuals  from developing communities. I  look at their skills, design a contemporary product to fit them, and commission their work.
As a designer I am able to see how a design idea transforms into the income and dignity  of the people I work with."

Worthy and beautiful. Go join Tamielles Handkerchief Club.

The Shreddies Nanas.

Oh please may I have a Shreddies Nana for Christmas?

Anthropologie

Oh Anthropologie, how I love you.

Come to London. Set up a British website. We want to share you with America and we promise to play nicely, not scrap over the lastest scrumptious prairie view shower curtain, nor come to blows over the last roll of Dotswold wallpaper and (though our bank managers won't like it), we solemnly promise to spend all our pocket money in your store on a Saturday morning...

Pretty please?

LP Vintage.

Lorraine at LP Vintage has created a lovely little set of vignettes inspired by the scrumptious art of Holly Farrell.

Do drop by and tell her Alison says hello...

Vintage Puzzler

Small things amuse small minds...
Happy Sunday HouseKeepers.

Nicol Sayre

Whenever I wander around Blogland I am reminded of what an utter priviledge it is to be able to peek inside the hearts, minds and imaginations of so many creative people. 

To find a blog by Nicol Sayre has brightened up my morning not just because her art is treasure, but because we are so honoured to be able to be a part of the creative process, the teeny celebrations (and occasional disappointments) that form a part of all artists work, and the business behind the scrumptiously pretty frippery.

Giving an artist context in terms of personality,  and the dailiness of her life means that we should consider it an honour to live in an age where blogging is  a treasured part of our day and reading the blogs of talented women like Nicol is a teeny joy that can only add soul to  our adoration of all that is layered in  vintage  inspired creativity...

Go swoon at her dolls here...

Janne Peters.

Interior still lifes to make you swoon at Janne Peters. Go pay homage.

Baby's Log Book

Really! What were the people of the good old days thinking? Is it really appropriate to advertise  books on "Modern Views on Sex", "Planned Parenthood" and "Youth, Sex and Life" on the back of a Babys Log Book?

Here we have a yummy (and unused) baby book, littered with gorgeous navy blue line drawings of babbas playing and the kind of advice likely to have you marched away by the Mummy police in this day and age (Dab pure orange juice onto teething babys gums?) and the publishers in their infinite wisdom, saw  fit to advertise a little collection of books designed to prevent the birth of anymore of the teeny little mites...

It's a open and shut case of vintage madness if ever there was one. Madness. Madness I tell you!

Shadow Boxes

One of the first puttery treats I ever remember writing was framing a pair of your babba's tiny ankle socks...and now you can do it in style, with one of these gorgeous shadow boxes from Cox and Cox, each one backed in a scrumptious piece of vintage fabric and gently distressed..

Gorgeous.

Literary Dreams.

"Su Blackwell's work is handmade. There is something of a delicate beauty at work here. It is evocative of dream-time and puts into visual form some very transient ideas. An empty child's dress transforms into hundreds of butterflies. The work is fragile, precious. There is a desire to utilise non-art materials; she uses what is at hand. There is an obsessive, repetitive action at work, transforming the everyday into the fantastical. She transforms old books into three-dimensional theatres, and her reconstruction offers up to the viewer many questions. We can no longer physically read the book, so in that way it is made redundant; and yet on another level it has taken on a new life and is telling a different story."
Steffan Jones-Hughes.

Just one more truly ethereal example of the life cycle of all those things they would have us throw away... 

Holly Farrell

Sometimes art is mystifying. Sometimes we shake our heads in wonder and walk away no better off. Other times we stand in front of the work of an artist who captures so perfectly the essence of an emotion, we almost feel it rise in our chest. And then there are artists like Holly Farrell: quietly capturing everyday  beauty; making us see again the poetry of domestic bliss and showing us the way to honour it.

She's capturing our lives here, Housekeepers. The elusive shabbiness of a battered pink chair and the fraying covers of our cherished collection of vintage cookbooks. If it wasn't taking all my efforts to save up the trifle that is an ipod, I'd start a Holly Jar, and pop a penny  or three into it daily, until I could afford a piece of this gorgeous artists work.

Really Rural

There are tiny little companies in this world that I wish I worked for. Really Rural is one of them. Thoroughly British at heart but drawing inspiration from Shaker and French Rustic influences, the result is a yummy little business creating truly useful oddments of tiny furniture, storage items and acheably desirably country pieces like this Family Notice Board.

Which would, in my house, no doubt, find itself scrawled with bossy refrains like "Buy washing powder Bimbo!" and "Get some car tax you silly woman!"

My alter ego is a stroppy little Madam. It's probably because she has to put up with me.

A Letter To the Child We've Chosen Not To Have.

Sometimes you read something, that plain old breaks your heart...

"A friend sent your dad and I a Christmas card last year, wishing us peace and joy. Under the news of her two little ones, she wrote that the past year had brought her "lots of joy, but not much peace".

Your dad and I have chosen peace over joy, which is why you don't exist. Most of the time, sitting in our calm, ordered home, relishing the peace, freedom and all the other perks of childlessness, I'm happy with our decision.

But sometimes I wonder what I've turned my back on and who I'm missing out on.

You see, I won't ever know what it is to cuddle you tightly in my arms and feel consumed with a love for you that is so strong that nothing can rival it.

I won't experience you curling into me on the sofa as we look at a picture book together. I won't smell your hair, still damp because you wouldn't let me dry it properly after your bath. I won't marvel at your shining brown eyes, so much like your dad's. Instead I've chosen to fill my lap with the warmth of a cat.

I won't look on with horror as our small, carefully furnished house fills with coloured plastic tat. Feathers, stones and other treasures gathered on Sunday afternoon walks won't ever make it on to our windowsills. The beige sofa will remain blackcurrant-stain free..."

Oh for a sofa that remained blackcurrant stain free.  Hair never damp because he won't let me wash it without world war three breaking out. Mess. Constant mess and early mornings I  quietly resent...

Life without him was easier, cleaner...and yes, indeed, in retrospect, peaceful. But I need him now. He's a little piece of me I wouldn't have the chance to meet.
I am him and he is me.

But respect where it is due; to make a decision that clearly steals a bit of your soul, is a brave one indeed. May she always be content.

Read the rest of the article here.

Velvet Finch.

Oh quick! There is just one box of loveliness at Etsy seller  Vintage Finch's store. I do so like boxes of fripperie like this, or indeed the pure scrumptiousness that is One Good BumbleBee's  Jars of Whimsy and  Piles of Paper...

Why risk life, limb and muddy car, rooting for treasure when there are people with extraordinarily good taste to do it for you...?

Isabella

Get the prettiest accessories made up in Celia Birtwells gorgeous "Isabella" print by Lavenders  Alresford  (who also offer a very reasonably priced monogramming service, tres chic). If only because dear little Isabella is so utterly Darling and deserves to grace the homes of those of us who will treasure her...

Arranging The Tea Table.

BakeSpace.

Who needs MySpace when you can go and hang around The Pantry at BakeSpace...

MySpace for cookers and cakers...

Mon Journal.

This gorgeous little collection of  exercise books, surely represents the prettiest way to commit your secrets, whispers and delicious little lies to the page. Who need's blogging when you can fill a pen with ink, pull up a cushion topped chair to your delicate little writing bureau and shape your words to suit....

Is it just me, or does the medium truly make the message? I am a different person on paper than I am here online: as if the very act of writing slows my mind down a degree, and thoughts come out more considered, less prone to the act of destruction that is the delete button.

Never is a truer word spoken than in mon journal.

HollyWood ScreenSavers.

The loveliest collection online.

Jan Constantine.

Isn't it just lovely? Now all we need is a beach side hut in an up and coming English seaside town, so we can escape the daily grind in the lazy hazy days of August without adding to the carbon nightmare that is apparently air travel.

Go kit out yours at Jan Constantine.

Rachael Ray Cleans Her Chopping Board.

Well goodness me I just wasn't expecting her to talk like that. Goodness knows why, but I was expecting an ethereal, delicate little creature and I was wrong. She's kind of fiesty and she says 'erbs! Still standing your chopping board on it's side each evening is a terribly good idea. Nobody likes a warped chopping board...

Bianca and Family.

Cute and French.

The Cath Kidston Clearance Sale.

Cath + Bargains= Happy Days.

(Not to mention the scrumptious new Spring collection!)

Anusha.

Now I suspect I may have raved about this yummy little tin before- old age is creeping in and I am given to repeating myself, but never mind, sparkly sequins deserve their moment of glory and here it is: the very idea of adorning florally old tins with  twinkly things makes me smile.

No wonder it's an  Anusha bestseller.

Cape Cod Cupboard.

How pretty is this? Yet another scumptious means of incorporating vintage textiles into modern craft...

From Cape Cod Cupboard at Etsy.

Caravan Style Podcast.

Though the heartbreakingly beautiful website still isn't open for business, Caravan have created a whisper of a podcast showcasing this special little shops compellingly adorable take on vintage style...

Watch it here or download it at Itunes...

Jennicakes.

Your eyemasks are wonderful Jennicakes! The perfect combination of shabby chic and cheeky cow.

Perfect on a glamorously bad morning for the naughty girl we can all occasionally be...

Tattooed Cowboy.

"I like to take the things people don't see as beautiful and somehow make them beautiful."

Blogs are just about the closest thing we get online to a conversation with those we have yet to meet, so I'm just plain old thrilled to tell you that Chris Brown of Urban Prairie has gone and got himself a blog. Let's face it there is stuff we need to know about this enigma of a man...

Oh and Chris? Though it makes me blush to say so, you are right: I am a true fan.

P.S: Go check out his style tips too, then get out and start hunting down those glass bottle tops and vintage canteens...

House On The Hill.

When it comes to online boutiques, to me presentation and intuitive navigation are all. House On The Hill is beautifully designed and showcases it's scrumptious stock with quietly spoken shabby elegance.

Plus their Christmas stock is currently reduced! So now is the time to buy yourself something delicious and wrap it smugly in tissue paper ready to be re-discovered the next time the festive season is upon us.. 

Winters Child.

Gorgeous mixed media collage from Etsy seller Sushipot. Isn't she just lovely? She kind of reminds me of Twinkle... 

Love/Hate.

Me likes. Kinda Cath Kidston with a subversive edge. Perfect for the mood I'm in tonight.

The Old Painted Cottage.

My oh my oh my. Another scrumptious blog to  die for. Go swoon  right now.

My Space.

Well I've got no idea why, but I have spent the past few days troubling my little mind with creating a MySpace page. It's an all singing, all dancing affair with nugget's of information I'm sure I don't need to share, but which seem to be essential in the parallel world that is My Space.

Once there you will discover that I was, for a brief spell, the worst hairdressers receptionist ever to wheadle power over the fate of your hair. That I have strangely  eclectic taste in music and that I am, I am truly  sorry  to say, strangly drawn to the  angelic charm of  Pete  Doherty. You will be forced to listen to Brigitte Bardot singing in a silly fashion , and have to stare at the ludicrously pouty expression I always pull whenever there is a camera in the vicinity...

Come be my friend?

Martha Stewart On Crack.

The Kim Family Auctions.

This week I have given over the space usually reserved for the Housekeepers Auctions to some of the delicious little handmade items being auctioned in honour of the Kim family.

I didn't know James. I don't know his wife Kati or the two little precious girls he left behind. But I do know this: the blogosphere is as real, as tightly knit and as heartbreaking as real life. In the week James was missing I held my breath daily. Can we feel love for strangers? For their broken hearts and grief we can do little to dissolve?

I don't know. The same day I read that James had died, I went over to Kiss Me Over The Garden Gate to have a look at some of the scrumptious offerings Jean Abramson had created for Christmas, and found that  lovely, vibrant, happy Jean had passed away in September.  I don't know how or why. There is no place to offer my condolences but here.  To mark the death  of two inspirational, creative strangers with tears spiking my eyes.

We do what we can. We offer friendship and daily reminders that we are here. Good people create wonderful things like the Kim Family auction, and each of us hope that the sheer weight of emotion demonstrated in our  little virtual worlds is enough to describe just how much we care.

A Year of Mornings.

Oh wow. Does anyone else feel as inspired by this  beautiful project as  I  do?

Junk Shop.

Good Lord what is she on about?? But I like her! Do you think she'd be my friend if I asked her? I wanna go smell old books with her and form an Elizabeth Taylor fan club...

I tell you- the internet never ceases to amaze me. People are just so mad and utterly crazy wonderful.

Long live eccentricity. I like a bit of looniness in a person.

Writing Bureau.

Oh I am so in love with this scrumptious little fabric wrapped bureau, as seen in a recent edition of Country Living. Who wouldn't want to disguise ugly furniture in a fabulously floral wrapping, Squint style...?

The Holiday.

Have you seen it? Yes it is scrumptiously romantic mush of the  most deliciously sickly sweet kind, but my word, it is eye candy  for the girl who likes fairy tale  English cottages,  yummy tin baths and the bestest, most magical  tent in the whole wide  world.

Watch it  and swoon. If not over Jude Laws gorgeous eyes, then over his fabulous christmas tree and the kind of  kitchen we would sell our silly souls for.

A seasonal festive feast in so many senses of the word.

Silly Goose Creations.

Once you start to think of your collection of treasured books as your own personal library, they take on a whole new dimension requiring care and respect for all the memories they hold and the things they have to teach you and those with whom you wish to share them...

Now sharing is all very well, but certain somebodies may not honour your books in the same way that you do. They might drop them in the bath. Crease their spines or spill vats full of Ribena all over their precious pages. They might decide, oh heaven forbid, that such books have transformed their life and they cannot live without them...

And so darling, it would serve you well to add a gentle reminder that these books, these volumes full of enchanting wisdom, belong to you, and what better, cuter, more scrumptiously old fashioned way to mark your literary territory  than with a bookplate from Silly Goose Creations?

Laura Long.

Tell me now: is it too  late to be adding last minute scrumptiousness to your favorite peoples stocking? Could Laura Long get a vintage button tea cosy delivered to me in time for Christmas? I want one for my snuggly post childrens service tea party at five o'clock on Christmas Eve: just me and Finn in orange scented jim jams, with trays full of teeny tiny treats, empty stockings, mince pies for Santa and The Polar Express...

And if at all possible Father Christmas, I would be nothing short of delighted if I found a little Laura Long lavender doll or  pretty beaded purse in my own little  fishnet stocking. Koi?

Bev Was A Bored And Frustrated HouseBird.

Bev you darling little birdie, I think we've all been there at one time or another...

See Bev, Prime Minister Goldfinch and other wirey little birds at Cathy Miles.

You know what I love most about this artist and others like her? That she cares enough about her feathered little creations to provide the kind of narrative designed to make us chuckle...

Love  'em.

Christmas Spirit.

Well I've searched and I've searched and I've searched and trust me, nobody is documenting the traditions, recipes and rituals of Christmas around the world quite as wonderfully as whoever is in charge at Christmas Spirit.

More scrumptiously Christmassy whatnots than you could shake a tinsel wrapped stick at.

The New Simple Abundance

Oh my goodness me! At long last, a newly designed Simple Abundance site with a subscribeable  online magazine coming in January. What a scrumptious Friday morning surprise...

Go now. Pour yourself a cup of Earl Grey and go now!

Paula Wirth.

Described by one little soul as "simply the most inspiring girl  on Flickr",  Paula Wirth's  Flickr pages are indeed eye candy for those of us with a passion for all things nostalgically vintage...

With over 8900 photos uploaded Paula has an amazing eye and prolific dedication to recording the past through the pulp fiction and domestic literature of the time, and runs more than 20 yummy Flickr sets dedicated to the kind of images that make us vintage girls swoon.

Kudos where it is soooo due. She's a star.