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Southern Vintage Table Event – The Grace of a Vintage Teacup

Photos are coming in from this year’s wedding receptions and we are so pleased to share them with you! Today’s post features table settings from Sara and Brook’s April wedding at Fearrington Farms in Pittsboro, captured by Krsytal Kast Photography.

Sara and Brook choose a mix of our vintage blue & white plates along with a variety of floral patterns. The little gem on the tables were our vintage mixed and matched teacups. Don’t you love how these were gracefully styled at each place setting? We certainly do!

Thank you, Sara & Brook, for sharing these photos with us. It was our extreme pleasure to help with your wedding celebration!

Southern Vintage Table Vintage China Rental NC

Vintage Feature – Retro, Chunky, & Cool Coffee Mugs

No doubt, we L-O-V-E vintage glassware – the colors, heft, patterns, and textures – but today we want to give centerstage to their counterparts – vintage coffee mugs. Over the last few years we patiently have accumulated an array of colors, shapes, styles, and patterns and, until now, they have been stored away, waiting for the right occasion.

We have two upcoming events where these mugs will make an appearance – a Boho styled shoot this Friday with HoneyBee Mine Events at the 1870 Farm and a wedding reception in October. These hearty mugs will complement our vintage casual and stoneware plates wonderfully!

Many of these mugs are probably from the 1960s-1980s when shades of browns, yellows, and greens were trendy. Some are from Japan but most were made here in the United States by companies such as Buffalo China, Syracuse China, Homer Laughlin, Shenango China, and Fire King.

We know we have at least 80 solid retro mugs in our inventory but we also have some chunky patterned ones to pull out. We think you’ll be crazy about these, too!

Vintage Feature – Vintage Centerpiece Jam Session

Today is centerpiece creation day! We’ve pulled samples of of our vintage items – milk glass vases, tins, small silver-plate trays, books, candle holders, petite art, and such – and we are ready to work with our engaged couple to help them design unique reception centerpieces.

We’ve measured a space equal to one of their tables, set it with plates, and will be filling the center with a collection of wonderful vintage treasures. Our goal will be to create a set of vignette formulas for their tables so there’s both cohesiveness yet unique-ness for each table.

Want to know more? Please visit our post – Vintage Feature – Announcing Our Centerpiece Packages – and our page with our pricing Vintage Centerpiece Packages.

Vintage Feature – Join Us On Instagram!

Southern Vintage Table Vintage China Rental NC “So, are you on Instagram?” she asked.
“No,” I replied, “but we’re on Facebook and Pinterest.”
“Oh, if you were on Instagram you could see how the tables turned out.”
“Dang,” I’m thinking. “Do we really want another social media account to manage?”
The answer turns out to be, “Yes, indeed we do!”

That was one year ago when a wedding planner explained that she would be posting photos of our vintage centerpieces on her Instagram account. We really, really wanted to see how they turned out so that night we did it – we opened up an account. It didn’t take long to understand why folks love this mobile social media app.

Instagram may be our favorite way to share our wares and see what others are doing. We still appreciate our connections through Facebook and Pinterest, but we absolutely love that Instagram is all about photos. For a visual business like ours, when we post our recent find or photos from an event, the post is fed to all of our followers. They get to see what we are doing and, in turn, we get to see what’s new with all the folks we are following. With the hashtag feature, users can search for photos on a topic or trend (like #vintageblueandwhite) and connect with us and others who have used this hashtag to describe their photo. It’s quick, uncluttered, and a visual treat. And, did we mention fun?

Blue and White Screen Shot

After one year, we are happily posting and sharing photos, making new connections, and visually exploring the world through others’ experiences. We would love to bring you along. Follow us on Instagram (@southernvintagetable2) and if you don’t yet have an account, consider joining the Instagram community.

We have to warn you up front – it’s addicting. No joke – you’ll find yourself checking for “likes” on your posts, looking through your feed, and searching hashtags for things you love – like #pugs or #succulents or #foodogs or even a place, like #ncmountains – and you’re hooked. A good thing, however, is if you are looking for an inspiration, waiting for an appointment, or drinking your first cup of coffee in the morning, you have Instagram to fill that time in such a delightful way!

Here are couple of things you should know before you sign up. Instagram is meant to be a mobile app which means you take photos from your phone and upload them from your phone. On a laptop you can create and view your account, edit your descriptions, “like” others posts, and do searches but you cannot upload photos. There probably are ways around all of that but the notion of “instant-ness” is its intent. Another cool feature is that you easily can share your IG posts to your Facebook so your FB friends don’t miss out on that cool thing you just did or saw.

Lastly, you can make your account private which means only folks you have invited can view your photos but you still can view accounts that are public. In other words, you can look through the Instagram window without opening your Instagram door!

For those who may not be ready to take the leap, we now have our Instagram feed coming in our home page and we also placed it below for you to get a quick look. Listen to Eleanor and jump in!

“Do one thing every day that scares you.”
-Eleanor Roosevelt (verybestquotes.com)

(Please note that we are not @southernvintagetable as you might think. We stumbled at first and created this account but couldn’t figure out how to delete it so we became @southernvintagetable2. We are still working on how to get rid of the first one!)

Here’s our feed and an easy “Follow” button if you are already part of the IG craze!

[wdi_feed id=”2″]

Vintage Feature – It’s August and We’re Back!

Our summer hiatus is over and we are back! Our weekly Sunday blog post picks up today and lots of things have happened in July. Truthfully, we can’t check off several things on our to-do list, but we are here today to celebrate two triumphs.

1. We hit 100!

Whoop, whoop! We now have 100 white dinner plates in our inventory. If you want a clean, crisp palette with unique touch, we have a mix of white and cream china/stoneware patterns that will add a cool factor to your tables.

2. We went for gold!

We finally did it – got the gold spray paint out and transformed a few pieces. We’re going to hold off sharing all of our make-overs, but here’s one that’s like, Wow. Feature this stunner on your table to reflect a beautiful bouquet or use it as a gleaming sign. Many possibilities!

Thanks for your visit. We thought this quote expressed our sentiments about why, alas, our to-do list is still a bit too long.

“Doing nothing is hard; you never know when you’re done.”
coolfunningquotes.com

Exactly.

Vintage Feature – This Week’s A-ha Moment

Savor your aha moment

Sometimes it just happens, sometimes it takes time, and sometimes you have to work at it. I’m talking about that magical a-ha moment. Maybe it’s as simple as remembering where you left your keys (haha, I experience this a-ha moment several times each week) or finally figuring out something that just takes time and mental energy. The latter happened this week as I was updating our website.

The exasperating thing I finally figured out was how to insert a table on a page and then add photos in the cells. I tried to make this work months ago and, after spending days on it, I finally gave up and figured out how to create slideshows. I knew I would try to tackle this again and this week, with fresh eyes, I looked at it once more. I tried a couple of plug-ins that didn’t work well, and then I returned to the toolbar’s table tab and fiddled with it. Voila, it came to me! And, the crazy thing was the solution was right there all along. Isn’t this how it oftentimes happens?

After finally registering that “yes, it did work,” I savored this long-awaited a-ha moment for just a moment longer and began to realize how much this was going to change the style of the website. I dug in and began revamping our inventory pages. This was my focus all week – setting up tables, finding and resizing images, taking more photos, redoing the header menu, and so forth. I still have more to do but I am really pleased with the progress.

As an example, here’s the table from the Vintage Collections page. I hope you’ll agree it is visually pleasing and easier to view our extensive vintage collections!

China	Glassware	Flatware
Serving Dishes	Linens	Silver-Plate

Hope you have a fabulous week and month ahead. We’ll be taking a break from our blogging schedule for the month of July. Look for a new post on Sunday, August 7th!

Vintage Feature – An Antique Teapot Steeped in History

Oh, my goodness, you are going to LOVE the historical connections to this pretty vintage teapot. Recently we found it on the shelf at one of our favorite thrift stores, *Paws4Ever in Hillsborough. We really liked the size of this pot – it can hold 12 cups of tea – as well as the pink roses and gold detailing. What we didn’t realize at the time is that this vintage teapot is actually an antique, probably made in the late 1800s or possibly early 1900s. But the story becomes so much more interesting …

We began our search with the mark on the bottom – Oscar Gutherz Limoges. The google search came up with several images of pieces by this china company but we couldn’t find this particular pattern. Finding the bit of information about the company, however, gave us pause because it lead us to estimate its age – at least 100 years old!

“Oscar Gutherz had originally started a porcelain decorating business with Maximilian Marx in Altrolau in 1884, using financial backing from the American importer Lazarus Straus & Sons. The company subsequently expanded into porcelain production.” – Porcelain Zone

We couldn’t find much more about Oscar so we looked into the American importer, Lazarus Straus & Sons. This search was the key to the astounding historical connections to this teapot. Here are the highlights:

First, you should know that Lina Gutherz, the sister of Oscar Gutherz (the maker of this teapot) married Nathan Straus, the son of the Lazarus Straus, the American importer who financially supported her brother’s porcelain business. This piece of information, which we found on Geni, was pivotal to understanding the rest of the story.
Lazarus Straus (the father of Nathan who would marry Lina, the sister to Oscar the teapot maker) immigrated to the United States from Germany in 1852 and settled in Georgia. After peddling wares to families with a cart, he opened a dry goods store. The success of his store made it possible to bring his wife and children, which included 4-year old Nathan, over to America.
The Civil War disseminated Lazarus’ business so he moved with his family to New York and began his porcelain import business. His sons joined him and it was on a business trip abroad that Nathan met Lina (sister to Oscar the teapot maker), instantly fell in love, and married. Nathan returned to America with his new bride.
Lazarus Straus & Sons, after renting the basement of Macy’s department store in New York City to sell their imported porcelain, eventually became partners with RH Macy. In 1887 Nathan and his brother, Isidor (brother-in-law to Lina, the sister to Oscar the teapot maker), bought Macy’s. There’s so much history about this American department store we couldn’t include it in this post except for this little bit. Macy’s star logo was chosen because the original owner, RH Macy, had it tattooed on him when he worked on a Nantucket whaling ship as a teenager. You have to love this!
In 1912 Isidor and his wife (in-laws to Oscar who made the teapot) bought tickets to sail on the Titanic. Alas, they were not on the survivor’s list.
Nathan and Lina’s son, Nathan, Jr. (the grandson of Oscar the teapot maker) attended Princeton and then went overseas to study at Heidelberg University in 1908. He befriended art scholar, Otto Frank, and convinced Otto to come to New York to work with him at Macy’s. When Otto’s father died, Otto returned to Germany and fought in WWI. Because of growing antisemitism in Germany, he took his family to Amsterdam and asked for Nathan Jr.’s help to bring his family to the United States. Nathan Jr. tried but the visas for the Frank family were denied. After being discovered in the hidden rooms above his shop, Otto and his family, including daughter Anne Frank, were sent to the Nazi concentrations camps. Only Otto would survive.

So, in summary, this little antique teapot is steeped in history and the connecting thread is Oscar Gutherz, owner of a porcelain factory, and his sister, Lina. We imagine it was imported to the United States by Lazarus Straus & Sons in the early 1900s from Limoges, France and was placed on a Macy’s basement shelf in New York. Then, soon after, a woman shopping for a large teapot at Macy’s bought this one made by Oscar and took it home. Although we can envision many cups of tea being poured over the years from this lovely pot, we wish we knew more of its story from the time it was bought at Macy’s in the early 1900s to showing up on a thrift store shelf a hundred years later in 2016!

Serve up a little history at your next tea party with this lovely antique teapot made by Oscar. You may even want to share a little of its historical connections with your guests. (Especially the story of Macy’s star logo!)

Sources:
Porcelain Zone
AJCArchive
Straus Historical Society
The House of Brilliant Glass
Wikipedia – Nathan Straus
Wikipedia – Macy’s
Geni

*We love to support thrift stores with a solid cause and Paws4Ever‘s mission is one dear to many of us – dogs and cats in need. It is a “guaranteed-adoption animal shelter and sanctuary dedicated to improving the lives of cats and dogs through adoption, training and education.” There are many ways to become involved with this caring organization so check them out!

Vintage Feature – Petite & Sweet Vintage Dishes

Ah, petite and sweet… and, just like the lovely Morticia Addams, these small vintage dishes are delightful. Whether used as a serving dish for berries or a dessert bowl for ice cream, these wee pieces of china are hugely charming.

Vintage petite serving dishes are perfect to display mini delectables like fruit, candies, and small pastries. With their elegant shapes, designs, and patterns your guests with enjoy your treats for both their taste and presentation.

Southern Vintage Table — These petite vintage leaf dishes can hold lemons, candies, or any mini treat!

We have collected a few vintage specialty petite dishes that were, at first, a mystery. We thought these dishes had unique uses and it turns out they do indeed. First, the two handled dishes below are meant to serve lemon slices during teatime and are called – you guessed it – lemon servers!

The next specialty dish is for a vegetable that once was only affordable by affluent households so, of course, it deserved a dish of its very own. What was this highly revered vegetable – celery! And, because celery was so magnificent (and expensive in the late 1800s), this status vegetable was displayed for all to see – in a celery vase. As celery became more affordable but still highly desired, the less prominent flat celery dish evolved. Now, this may be one of our favorite china history lessons of all time and, after learning this, we’ll surely appreciate every crunchy bite of this once coveted vegetable.

This final vintage dish really stumped us at first. I remember holding it in the thrift store, turning it over, and looking at it from all angles, wondering what it was. The strange shape and indentation in the center is the perfect design for – as you can see – holding spoons!

Perhaps our very favorite piece of china is the wee berry bowl. These small bowls are the perfect size for all kinds of edibles, whether it’s a side dish like peas, squash or brunswick stew or desserts like berries, ice cream, or – yum – banana pudding. We have great collection of berry bowls and we’d love to share them with you at your next dinner or event.

No doubt, when you are planning for a celebration or dinner party, it’s always important to remember the essentials – dinner plates, glassware, flatware, linens, etc. Remember, though, the small details – including these petite vintage dishes – are also wonderful to add to your list!

Vintage Feature – Inspired. Appreciative. Thank You.

We have been delighted to take part in many events so far this year! These past few months our vintage treasures have traveled to weddings, showers, styled shoots, wedding shows, and dinner parties in Chapel Hill, Durham, Pittsboro, Raleigh, Louisburg, Winston Salem, Virginia, and even West Virginia. Sweet!

Even sweeter, though, are the four brides who recently posted these lovely comments on Wedding Wire. We are oh-so pleased and humbled to share them with you today.

Tracy said…

Shelly was a joy to work with. She accommodated our last minute needs wonderfully and her dishes did not disappoint! Shelly is extremely organized and it shows that she truly loves helping make events special!

Katie said…
Southern Vintage Table provided beautiful mismatched vintage plates for our dessert table and sweetheart table! Shelly has a gorgeous collection that went perfectly with my vintage-rustic-romantic wedding!

Jessica said…
Shelly made it happen and even managed a last minute delivery to our venue. Everything she provided was beautiful! I always wanted vintage-wares at my wedding and Shelly has the best prices of anyone in town. Do yourself a favor and go to the website to see all the wonderful items available to rent for your special day!

Private User said…
Shelly was wonderful to work with and provided beautiful china for my wedding at a very reasonable price. She helped me choose the perfect types and colors for the event. My guests were so complimentary about how beautiful they looked on the tables. I can’t thank Shelly enough and would definitely recommend Southern Vintage Table!

Thank you. We are inspired by you, grateful for your trust, and loved being a part of your celebration!

Vintage Feature – A Vintage Postcard’s Inspiration

Oh! you who sleep in Flanders Fields,
Sleep sweet – to rise anew!
We caught the torch you threw
And holding high, we keep the Faith
With All who died.

We cherish, too, the poppy red
That grows on fields where valor led;
It seems to signal to the skies
That blood of heroes never dies,
But lends a lustre to the red
Of the flower that blooms above the dead
In Flanders Fields.

And now the Torch and Poppy Red
We wear in honor of our dead.
Fear not that ye have died for naught;
We’ll teach the lesson that ye wrought
In Flanders Fields.

~ We Shall Keep the Faith by Moina Michael ~

Memorial Day has come to signify leisurely fun – a 3-day weekend, parades, family cookouts, and the official opening day to the summer season. Many of us, however, overlook the solemnness of this holiday as a day of remembrance for our veterans.

I wanted to capture the historic essence of Memorial Day and began searching for an inspiration in our vintage postcard collection. I came across one with a beautiful bouquet of red, white, and blue flowers. Perfect, I thought. As I began researching the background of Memorial Day, I serendipitously found the inspiration for today’s post – the remembrance poppy.

The red poppy as a symbol for Memorial Day began with the poem, “We Shall Keep the Faith,” written in 1918 by Moina Michael, an American professor. Her poem was in response to “In Flanders Fields”, a poem penned by Canadian physician Lieutenant-Colonel John McCrae, as a tribute to a friend who died in WWI. Why red poppies, you may ask? Here’s what I learned from Wikipedia.

“The red poppies that McCrae referred to had been associated with war since the Napoleonic Wars when a writer of that time first noted how the poppies grew over the graves of soldiers.^[45] The damage done to the landscape in Flanders during the battle greatly increased the lime content in the surface soil, leaving the poppy as one of the few plants able to grow in the region.”^[46]

After teaching a class to disabled veterans at the University of Georgia, Moina Michael realized these men needed more help than they were receiving. Having read McCrae’s poem and then writing her own, the idea of a red poppy as a representative icon was conceived. She fundraised using silk poppies to help raise awareness and monies for the veterans and in 1924, the remembrance poppy was adopted by the American Legion Auxillary as a symbol for those who have died serving their country.

My quest to find something meaningful to share on Memorial Day began with a vintage postcard – what a wonderful coincidence to discover its floral symbol of remembrance.

And, to add a little vintage china in this post, here’s a new vintage set featuring red, white, and blue found by my friend, Trudy. Won’t it look terrific with blue & white patterns?

Resources:
In Flanders Field
Moina Michael
US Memorial Day
The Great War