Vintage Teacups

Features – A Tea for the Mitford Museum

“Mitford is not just a place to live, it’s a place that lives within us.” – Jan Karon (Bookeye)

It was our second trip to Hudson, NC to help with an annual fundraising tea at The Hub Station which houses the Mitford Museum. Many folks will recognize the fictional town of Mitford, aka Hudson, as it was the center of a series of 14 popular novels written by Jan Karon.

This annual tea, set to benefit “the museum’s plans to develop StoryLab, a facility that will house our oral history library, traveling exhibitions, and a creator’s space for youth,” was set for 140 guests. After days of preparation, we packed vintage teacups, teapots, sugar and creamers, luncheon plates, flatware, goblets, and platters.

After unpacking our very full van, we wandered around this historical gem, taking photos along the way. Once a public school, the town has created an art center for the community. Along with the Mitford Museum, a tribute to Jan’s fictional town, there’s local artwork donning the walls and in a shop known as The Red Awning Gallery featuring local artists creations, Three Doors Down which is a really cute bar, Junk Gypsy Angel Boutique, and Happy Endings Bookstore. Upstairs is where the magic happens – artists’ studios, art classrooms, a fiber art center, a performing arts studio, and a music studio. There’s even a cool space called “Creations after Midnight Studio.”

To find out more about the museum and hometown author Jan Karon, watch this video, “Learn About Best-Selling Author Jan Karon at the Mitford Museum | NC Weekend | PBS North Carolina.”

We look forward to hearing how everything went when we return to Hudson on Tuesday. Hope your week is filled with many happy moments!


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Vintage China with Roses

Features – Roses On Vintage China

 “There may be many flowers in one’s life…but only one rose.” – Anonymous

Happy Mother’s Day! We thought you might enjoy a vintage bouquet of roses represented on these vintage plates to celebrate this time-honored holiday. Roses given to a mother represent love, respect, and appreciation – a mother’s dream.


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Vintage Teacups

Features – Four Vintage Weddings and a Tea Party

Note: The photo collage shows examples of the vintage pieces selected by the clients and the circles are the packed items.


Event 1 – Tea Party at the Westroom in Raleigh


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15 Vintage Tiered Stands
40 VintageTeacups


Event 2 – Wedding at Fearrington House

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80 Blue and White Dinner Plates
60+ Blue and White Decor


Event 3 – Wedding at the Chapel Hill Carriage House

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100 Amber, Blue, Green, Brown Goblets
100 Stoneware Dinner Plates
150 Stoneware Dessert/Salad
100 Sets of Stainless Flatware


Event 4 – Wedding at The Parlour at Manns Chapel

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55 Pink, Blue, Clear Goblets
34 Champagne Coupes, Tumblers
12 Sets of Gold Flatware
20 Dessert Plates
5 Pink Candleholders, 6 Votives


Event 5 – Wedding at Windy Hill

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156 Floral Dinner Plates
156 Pink, Green, Blue, Yellow, Peach, Amber, Teal Goblets
156 White Dessert Plates
128 Champagne Coupes
156 Sets of Silverplate Flatware
95 Brass Candleholders with Clear Peg Votives


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Clear Peg Votives on Brass Header

Features – The Elegance of Candlelight in Vintage Peg Votives

Romance, intimacy, and magical joy – feelings evoked by the beauty of candlelight, deeming it as an essential detail for any wedding reception table. Whether you use tapers or votives, the soft glow creates the ambience every couple wants for their wedding day.

At many venues, open flames are not allowed; therefore, tapers must be enclosed with a glass chimney. Votives, because they are inside a glass votive holder, are allowed and sit low on the table. Together, they provide a beautiful, soft light, high and low.

Did you know there’s a third way to have candle light using candleholders and peg votives? Peg votives have a “peg” that sits inside the candleholder. Pop in a tea light, light the wick, and that magical mood is kindled.

We’ve been pulling brass candleholders and clear peg votives for an upcoming wedding. The couple will be lighting 95 of these on their reception tables. Surely, everyone will be enjoying a most memorable evening in their glow!

In addition to clear votives, vibrance can be added with colored glass votives, as you can see here. How beautiful they are!

Psst – Here’s a behind-the-scenes photo of Sarah getting the candleholders and peg votives ready to pack. She’s almost finished!


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Vintage Tiered Stands

Features – Crafting Vintage Tiered Stands

Tea parties, which have been around since 1662, had their start with this historical event:

“… the first tea party was hosted in England. In 1662 Catherine of Braganza, the wife of King Charles II, hosted the first ever tea party on record following the marriage of her and the king. Queen Catherine was originally a Portuguese princess, born into the noble house of Braganza by her father, King John IV of Portugal. As a wedding gift to King Charles II and Queen Catherine, the Portuguese royal family gave her a casket full of tea.” Hackberry Tea

That’s fun to know, right? Well, 362 years later, tea parties have become quite the thing here and we have all the niceties to help you, including a tea party essential, tiered stands. Coming up in the next few weeks we have several parties booked and we need lots of them, so we are crafting a few.

We are well on our way – just 3-4 more to fashion. After we coordinate the stand with a teapot, tea cups, small plates, creamer and sugar, and platter, we’ll be ready for our clients’ tea party!


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Vintage Purple Tablescape

Feature – A Tulip-Inspired Purple Tablescape

Tulips are a favorite flower for many folks, including us! We knew that their beautiful shape and range of colors would provide the inspiration for our new tablescape featuring the regal color of purple.

Did you know tulips once grew wild in Central Asia? About 1000 AD Turkey began cultivating them and named them tulips which is Turkish for turban. Once they were brought to Europe in the 1500s, their ever-increasing popularity was sealed – everyone adored these delightful blooms and that love continues today. – Bloom and Wild

We gathered a vintage floral topper, grass chargers, napkins, gold flatware, vintage plates featuring purple, and vintage purple goblets. In a variety of purple vases the tulips were arranged. Lastly, we selected petite art pieces and vintage postcards, green and purple candles, clear and green peg votives, and brass candleholders. Our plan was to leave the basic place setting and florals in place and switch out the decor to see what impact they would have on the overall design.

In this series of photos, you’ll note the purple candles and vintage post cards.

In each of the photos below, we switched out a few decor details to see which we liked best.
Top left – green peg votives; top right – purple candles; lower left – clear peg votives; lower right – green candles. Also, note each setting has its own lovely petite art piece to enjoy!

In the end, the tablescape with the purple candleholders and vintage postcards was our favorite; however, we also believe that isn’t a wrong choice!


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Daffodils in vases

Features – Daffodil Inspired Vintage Tablescapes

A harbinger of spring is the arrival of these sunny, happy flowers – daffodils! Their rich yellow color invites us to smile and get ready to greet warmer weather filled with bird songs and the fresh green of nature.

These daffodils, provided by Fernrock Farm, inspired us to design two vintage tablescapes that embraced their golden color. In the first, we filled blue and yellow vases with the flowers, set the table with blue and white vintage plates, yellow goblets, gold flatware, and different napkin patterns. Petite art pieces were placed with each setting to add to the eclectic look.

Notice the round grass chargers? They are new to our offerings, available up to 65 guests. Their lighter hue is quite lovely with these two spring tablescapes.

Now to a quick change-over to a green vintage tablescape. This design featured four different vintage plate patterns, vintage green goblets, green vases filled with the same daffodils, vintage green votive-topped candleholders, and four different napkin patterns. The vintage gold flatware and grass chargers remained on the table.

Thank you, Fernrock Farm, for providing the sweet daffodil focus for these two vintage tablescapes and for today’s blog! We look forward to a new floral inspiration as the growing season opens up. Happy Spring, everyone!

Daffodils in Vases

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Vintage Green Goblets

Features – Vintage, You Look Good in Green!

Happy St. Patrick’s Day! It’s the perfect day to feature Green as a styling color for tablescapes and decor. This primary color of nature brings a sense of calmness, healthfulness, and optimism, and shows up quite often in our vintage inventory. Enjoy the green of vintage in our photo galleries showcasing a variety of items, from vintage goblets, to vintage plates, and decor.


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Vintage Lemon Dishes Circle

Features – Sometimes It’s The Little Things That Count : Vintage Petite Dishes

Petite vintage serving dishes – lemon nappies, platters, bowls – can be the perfect dish for the tea table, filled with lemon slices, cheese straws, and chocolates. Although meant for a small delicious treat, they also can be used to hold jewelry, small soaps, or trinkets. Such versatility!

We first came across these small handled dishes at a thrift store. The owner explained that they were lemon dishes and were part of a client’s collection who had decided to downsize. Instantly falling in love with them, we left with several and still continue to find them here and there. Our collection is now over 20 and we won’t be able to resist adding more.

Below are petite vintage dishes that include small platters, bowls, dishes, and spoon rests which are perfect for the treats served at the tea party table. We also can see them enticing your guests with small bites set along the dinner table for your guests to enjoy along with the main meal.

Petite Dishes Slide Show

We couldn’t find much about these adorable dishes except they probably emerged during the late 1800s and lasted until the mid 1900s. They were made in a variety of countries, such as Germany, England, Japan, and the United States. Such beautiful, petite works of art!


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7 Things You'd Like to Know

Features – 7 Things You Want to Know!

We’ve just marked 10 years as a company! Such a milestone of great pleasure meeting so many different folks at one of their happiest moments. We are grateful and humbled by you!

Though we have a FAQ page to answer many questions you may have, we are extending this information to include more things you’d like to know.


First, when the event is over, we’ll be sending you a request for a review from Wedding Wire and the Knot. These two prestigious companies house all of our reviews for prospective clients to read. At the end of the year, they award companies that have a certain number of high ranking reviews. When we make this request, we are thrilled to hear how the event went and what aspects you enjoyed regarding our rentals. We consider it an honor when you do this for us.

Second, we also ask for photographs to share on our blog post and social media. We love sharing this happy moment with our followers and they often refer to your photos when they are making decisions about their own event. Most photographers allow us permission to browse the online gallery. We select photos that showcase our wares and also like to have a few of clients. When this request comes, please consider and if there are any photos you’d like us to not share, let us know. We will ask for names of the collaborating vendors including the photographer, so all of us can enjoy a shout-out.

Third, a word about the cleanup. If rinsing is available, we’d love to receive them in this condition. If not, then we want all the plates to be wiped down with little or no food debris. Please consult with your caterer regarding which they can do. One other little request that goes along with this – all the dishes are wrapped in plastic after the sanitation rinse. It is important to leave the bags on the plates so food debris doesn’t get tracked into the vehicle or studio. We tie the bags, you untie, leaving the bag on the sides. Once the rack is full of wiped down plates, pull up the bag and retie.

Fourth, please do not use our napkins to clean up spills, especially red wine. Many stains remain that we cannot remove and then the napkin is relegated to a dish cloth. Sad…

Fifth, to fill an order we first select and then pack items in specialized crates to avoid breakage. Crate by crate, they are placed in the sanitizing, energy/water efficient dishwasher. After drying, they are wrapped in food-grade plastic bags. Items are then either loaded up and delivered, or the client picks up and returns. If picked up, we’ll have everything on a cart, you’ll drive around the back of our building, and park near the back door covered by an awning. We will roll the carts to the door. Clients have commented that this is made easy for them. After noon is our best times for both deliveries and pickups; however, we can work out times if needed.

Sixth, if you choose to pick up and return (which we appreciate so much!), we can extend our rental window as needed, up to 5 days rather than 3. A typical order will be more than what a small car or SUV can hold so a van or large SUV will be needed. If you are unable to secure the larger vehicle and you still want to pickup/return, look into renting one.

Front Window at SVT

Lastly, and our most important, number 7th thing-to-know is that we want you to be happy with every choice. We don’t charge by the crate but by the piece. We welcome all studio visits and love helping you with your vision!


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