The Manhattan Vintage Show: Can't Get Enough of That Vintage Stuff

As if the Pier Show wasn't enough, we also went to the Manhattan Vintage Show. Remember? Because of a scheduling snafu, both this show AND the Pier Show were held on the SAME weekend. Since Manhattan Vintage is only on Friday and Saturday (key Melina Mercouri and the theme music from that fab 1950's Greek-American collaborative screen gem "Never on Sunday"!), and we're working girls, it was a no-brainer what we'd do on Saturday. Our friend X joined us at the Manhattan Vintage Show last Saturday at the Metropolitan Pavilion. Since she wears lots of vintage jewelry, clothes and handbags, it was a very fun outing for all three of us. (Valerie says she could not have done two days in a row prior to her twin foot surgeries. Well worth the time spent in the dreary post surgical booties.)

No sooner had we arrived than we ran into Lisa Caravalho and Rob Stuart. We loved Lisa's '80s silver raincoat, not to mention her silver hair. If she's not smiling, she bears an uncanny resemblance to Meryl Streep's Miranda Priestly in The Devil Wears Prada.

Oops!  Valerie thought this woman was wearing a fabulous '60s coat, but it turned out it's a very current Kate Spade.  Folks, it takes a lot of coordinating to get that pattern to sit just right when it's on the left and the right, AND over both shoulders.  Kudos to the people who planned this design, and to the people who sewed the pieces together!

This camera-shy woman let us photograph her marvelous coat, but not her face.

We had some celebrity sightings.  Here's designer Anna Sui.  She always shops the vintage shows and was extremely accommodating when Jean asked to take her picture.

Valerie spotted Vogue's Hamish Bowles, but Jean was strategically better situated to take a photo, so Valerie got her attention (ever so discreetly, no doubt) and motioned to her.  Mr. Bowles is somewhat less photo-friendly than Anna Sui.  As soon as Jean snapped this photo, he was off in a flash, only circling back after we'd left. (For those aghast at Valerie's hatlessness, she had just been trying on a Junya Watanabe shirt the putting on of which challenged not only her, but the booth employees, who were more familiar with its intricacies. So the hat had to come off. Momentarily.

And Jean found Market Warrior and interior designer Bob Richter.

Vendors are definitely among the most fun and enjoyable things about vintage shows in New York. Case in point, in addition to his expert knowledge about vintage design, Theo Banzon of Paradox Designs has great humor, high energy and enthusiasm.  He's wearing a skirt of his own design which incorporates roomy pockets on the side seams.  Thank goodness there's ONE designer who understands that pockets are essential.

Alana (far left) and Amira (center) were their own best advertisement at the Style Vault.

Elaine Klausman from Vintage with a Twist combines current and vintage and always looks crisp, classic and modern all rolled into one.  Check out the patches sewn to her Anne Fontaine shirt.  (Anne Fontaine regularly turns the humble and simple white shirt into a work of art.)

During NY Fashion Week last September, we participated in a 6-city fashion shoot and event for Phillip Lim 3.1 for Target. We appeared in a street scene in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, NY. Ken Weber from Vintage Martini in Carrollton, Texas appeared in the Dallas segment. He traveled to the Big Apple for the party, so we got to meet him there and then had the chance to reconnect at this show.  He had the most amazing white straw hat!  Sooooo soft!!!

And speaking of hats (as we so often are), Bruce Mihalski of Hollywood & Vine (from Massachusetts), was so excited about the headwear in his booth that he began to try some of it on to prove how fab the hats were.

Valerie tried on another of Bruce's hats.  You can just barely see it here, but it's made of two separate materials, with larger raffia in the back.  The visor is shaped more like a huge comma than anything else.

And X tried on this black and purple number.  We all loved this hat!

X also ran into her be-hatted friend Diane.

We found this wonderful huge Issey Miyake bag  with 'bubbles' at Susan Bergin's Pocketbook.  Next to it (not shown) was a small black bustier bag that Valerie wound up buying.  Not big enough to hold a wallet, a cell phone, a camera, and postcard sized business cards, so not terribly practical, but absolutely hilarious!

Jean did NOT buy Style Vault's leather brassiere (which is lipstick red, although it shows up here as pink), but we HAD to show it to you. Whatever else we outgrow, we never outgrow our need for fun.

X bought this cloak clasp to wear at the lapel of her jacket or coat or sweater.

We were in awe of this dress, which has a very '70s look about it. Those are shreds of porcupine quills sprouting from the bust and the apron.

Noriko Miyamoto was the only dealer able to overcome the scheduling snafu. She had her assistant Taeko Miyamoto (same name but no relation) work at the Manhattan Vintage Show at the Metropolitan Pavilion while she herself worked at the Pier show.  Here's a find: a Japanese workman's jacket from Esso (later Exxon) while it was still called Standard Oil (thus the SOCONY - Standard Oil Company of New York logo). This jacket has tigers stenciled onto it, but some SOCONY jackets of the period featured the iconic Pegasus.

Meika Franz was running Another Man's Treasure without her usual sidekicks, husband Warren and daughter Biba because the baby was under the weather.

The women at Tracy Chambers Vintage were having as much fun as we were.

This woman's ombre'd hair and multicolored outfit really hit our radar screens.

We loved this woman's look too.  And she's also wearing lace-up boots.  Was it the weather, or is it a trend?

A show stopper!  A suit that looks like a Roy Lichtenstein painting, and open-heeled Clergerie shoes.

Charlotte and her mom travel to NYC for the vintage shows from Massachusetts.  Time sure flies.  After reminding us that we first met her when she was 14, she merrily announced that she had just turned the grand old age of 16. She is already working on her Associate's degree at Harvard Extension and is quite well known by the vintage vendors at the local flea markets there.  The black net dress is a Comme des Garcons dress that she treated herself to at a Massachusetts second hand shop for her birthday.

Our timing was impeccable!  We stopped by Amarcord's booth at the end of the day, just before the chilled Prosecco and cupcakes arrived to celebrate owner Patti Bordoni's 50th birthday! (Patti is the one on the left.  We have to tell you because you'd never guess.)

Here's a better look at the goodies in the pink boxes.  HAPPY BIRTHDAY, PATTI, and many more!

After spending the entire day at the show, we had to sit and chat about whom we'd seen or just met and what we saw. The fact that it rained all day did not deter us in the least.

We had another engagement at The Standard High Line Hotel in the Meatpacking District later that evening, so we stopped by one of our favorite haunts, Cafeteria, for a nosh. Because the main dining room was in full swing and the music was blasting, we were agog when the FABULOUS staff escorted us to a downstairs lounge that we'd had no idea existed. There we could actually hear ourselves talk. We went through our photographs and compared notes. Jean had the truffle fries which she pronounced to be divine while Valerie tried one of the cheese biscuits. The cocktails, needless to say, were scrumptious.

What we're wearing:

Jean is wearing an Amy Downs knit turban; Junya Watanabe Comme des Garcons coat for Puma; Theory shirt under an Alice and Olivia knit dress; Donna Karan opaque tights; Trippen boots; Alexander Wang purse; Danil Khutorianskii faux ostrich neck collar; resin and bakelite cuffs, bangles and rings.

Valerie is wearing a vintage unlabeled so-called funnel hat, wood and leather pin by Tereza Symon's mom, vintage earrings marked "Western Germany", unlabeled cropped jacket, Charivari sweater, vintage Issey Miyake hip wrap, Talbot's skirt, Frye boots.

The Pier Antiques Show

The Pier Antiques Show, presented by U.S.Antique Shows, is one of the largest antique events in New York City, featuring more than 400 vendors.   Although it wasn't done intentionally, the unthinkable happened: two antique shows were scheduled for the same weekend (!), so we had to do quite a bit of scurrying to see them both.  If we were frazzled, so were the dealers, who usually have booths at both shows, but this time had to decide between one and the other. It will probably never happen again, and just as well.  We like to savor our fun slowly, like port wine, rather than take it all in in fast gulps, like shots of whiskey lined up in a scene from a movie.

Canny dealers Carol and Dan Walker of Walker's Collectibles put this polka dot hat out where it could be seen from one hundred feet away.  Just as movie vampires are drawn to blood, Valerie was drawn to the hat, and had it on her head before anyone could overcome her.

We failed to get Jean to buy any hats this time, but she found these marvelous bakelite earrings at What Was Is Vintage.

We very much miss the Asian Art Fair, but some of the dealers, who carry the most marvelous ethnographic art pieces, have started coming to the antique shows.  Below, an early 20th century Chinese woman's headpiece from the mind boggling collection of Linda Pastorino.  It's a treasure trove of small semiprecious stones in luscious colors.  Have a look at her Pinterest page.

Linda's young daughter Coral talks so knowledgeably about the objects on display that you'd think she'd been in the business twenty years if you couldn't see her face.

Love this lady's nonchalant look.  Turns out she is one of Gudrun's ambassadors of style.

It's always fun to run into Maki and Junichi.  Maki never fails to wear vintage, and pays great attention to period accuracy.   Maki has her own website, Maison Murasaki, and also does a Pinterest board on hats.  Feeling down?  Check out Maki's Pinterest hats.  As good as chocolate, and other forms of serotonin.



































Valerie has to be dragged away from the Japanese textiles.  On the left, a pilgrimage coat for people visiting temples as an act of piety.  The large lettering is Sanskit.  The red stamps, a bit difficult to make out, are inked on to the coat for each temple visited by the pilgrim.  On the right, a fireman's jacket.  Too thin to be worn for protection, it was most likely worn at festivals, and identified the firefighting team the wearer belonged to.  These were at the booth of Karen Murphy and David Dew Bruner.

The jacket below, in Ainu style, which is very different from the predominant Japanese aesthetic, is from Miyamoto - Japanese Art of Textiles - in Sag Harbor, New York.

We enjoyed Shin Huang's singular look.  When she took off her colorful coat, underneath was this austere shirt.  And we loved her lucky cicada, having a few of our own.  Shin Huang is a fashion blogger.  See her peripatetic blog here.




































We first met Lee and Vichai Chinalai, like Linda Pastorino, at the Asian Art Fair.  The Chinalais seem to have an inexhaustible supply of wondrous and mysterious wearables that double as pure art objects.  If you ask about anything in their booth, you can tell by their response how much they love their work, and how much they know about the various cultures the objects represent.

Willard Morgan stopped by the show before jetting off to tour Japan with the Ideal Orkestra.  Their new song, Sweatshop Boogie, is in response to cheap, fast fashion.

A camera-shy friend of ours with flaming red hair placed this fabulous necklace on her friend Renee for a photo op. The balls are made of banana leaves.

Valerie posed in front of an antique stuffed clown suit to give some idea of its size.  This is the stuff of nightmares and strange dreams.

At Deco Etc., we saw this colorful juxtaposition of a classic bakelite radio from the '30s and a coral evening bag from the '50s - '60s.

When we overheard someone talking about "Spring Shoes", we took it to be  a reference to Spring footwear. Imagine our surprise to learn they were literally Rube Goldberg-style shoes.  We thought the idea started with Z-Coil shoes a few years back, but no!  Every generation thinks it's the first, until proof - um - springs up!

Loved this metal car at the same booth, Past Pleasures Moderne from Annandale, Virginia.

Kathleen at Beads and Baubles looked spectacular in a bright pimento-colored poncho.

Michal Feinmesser of What Once Was looked terrific in her black and white jacket and minimalist necklace.  (Covet, covet!)

Hannah Schiff at David Owens Vintage was wearing a necklace that Valerie talked her into buying into at the last show.  Love how this gal wears vintage -- with such flair!  And oh, the fabulous one of a kind hat!

Last time we photographed Barbara Kennedy, she was wearing a hat adorned with asparagus.  This time, she sported a large pink rose.

Vendor Caryn Abroms shows off one of her Monies necklaces.  It was so much fun to view and try on items from her extensive collection.

Valerie tried on Monies earrings at Caryn's booth.

This lovely lady purchased an orange-colored Monies necklace that afternoon which coordinated beautifully with her outfit.  She and her husband were totally enjoying the show.

Just as we were about to leave, we ran smack into the booth of Ira Scheck, who had mounds of Monies jewelry.  We've loved Monies for ages, but fashion is fickle, and Monies retreated to the background for a while.  We had our memories refreshed (to use a bit of TV legalese) when we went to the Museum of Arts and Design's LOOT show last fall, and saw a display of want-them-all pieces, so we welcomed this endless display.  Valerie, still doing the vampire thing, made a beeline for the necklace you see here.  What you DON'T see, alas, is the HUGE amethyst colored rough hewn quartz stone closure that finishes it with a bang.  One of Ira Scheck's assistants draped two red Monies necklaces with magnetic and polished wood clasps on Jean's neck, for this great look.  Valerie wound up buying one of the pieces seen in the background.  More about that another time!

As we mentioned at the opening of this post, the Pier Show was only one of the two vintage clothing shows held last weekend.  Come back and see us again on Sunday, and we'll tell you about the other show.

What we're wearing:
Valerie is wearing: vintage Chisato Tsumori hat, vintage pink straw earrings, vintage Kaffe Fassett knock-off sweater coat, Yoshiki Hishinuma shirt, Issey Miyake pants, Icon shoes.

Jean is wearing: Amy Downs origami turban; Porto skirt; Alexander Wang purse; Kyodan jacket; Trippen boots;  vintage bakelite earnings and rings, vintage frames from Fabulous Fanny's.