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The journey of a thousand miles begins with...the perfect pair of shoes.

Friday, January 20, 2012

The addiction: Transferware

It's no secret, I loves me some transferware. Love, love, love it. If you missed them, you can see some flea market posts where I scored some of my transferware here and here.
This past week we were fooled by the interwebs (what?  fooled by the interwebs?  yes, yes we were).  What was listed as a flea market turned out to be something like Goodwill, except that they had a little wine shop in one corner (I love Europeans!).  We were disappointed but decided to have a look around anyway and James Bond came upon a huge amount of transferware at a ridiculously low price.  He also spotted a red transferware coffee pot and some brown transferware cups and saucers.  Since I first told him I ♥ transferware he's become intent upon finding it.  He's got a really good eye and can spot it from a mile away.
Anyhoo, for the price, we had to have it.  Had.  We put it all in a big carton and hauled it up to the cash register.  The 3 brown cups and 4 brown plates had no price on them and the guy at the register (who also happened to be the owner) told us not to worry about it and didn't charge us for it!  We only paid for the blue pieces and the red coffee pot.  I won't even tell you how little we paid for it.  It's kind of embarrassing.  When we got home and unpacked the box there were 40 (FORTY) pieces in total-7 brown, 1 red and 32 blue.  Craziness!
We washed everything and then had to find a place to put it.  As I was shoving things out of the way praying we'd have room for it all I realized we might have an addiction.   I took photos of most of what we own so you could see how insane it's gotten.  I've sold several pieces on my etsy shop Tres Magnifique.  Each one I sold took a tiny piece of my heart with it. 

Here are our coffee pots and some of the sugar and creamers and a water jug we have.  The blue and red at the far right with the round lids are the same pattern.  The teal coffee pot and water jug (second row, left) are my favorite pattern.  Of course we have the fewest pieces of it.  One of the coffee pots is missing its lid (back row, center), but it makes a fantastic vase, especially for tulips.  I'd really like to have more tea pots (they are shorter and squatter than the coffee pots) but the coffee pots seem to be the most popular.  These aren't all relegated to a cabinet.  I have several of  them scattered around the house as part of the decor.  It would be a shame if they were never seen.


Okay, on to the cabinets.  These are our dinner plates and stacks of cups and saucers, bowls with handles (I adore those!) and random sugar and creamers.


You'll notice that there are multiple patterns. I'm not picky about pattern unless it's one that I find particularly unappealing.

Here's a close up of some of the cups, saucers and bowls.  Seriously, are those bowls not the cutest things you've ever seen?




Dinner plates!  I think there are 37 here and I have about 25 more not shown (yikes).  FTR, we actually use these as our dishes, which is why the patterns are all mixed up.  While there are several patterns, we do actually have enough of one pattern (same color) for a 12 piece service of dinner plates, salad plates and bowls and 8 cups and saucers.  We don't match them for our every day use.  It makes for a pretty and colorful table to have them all mixed up.




Cabinet number 2 holds small plates (salad size), bowls, serving pieces and more cups and saucers and more random sugar and creamers.  The small salad plates (24) are on the left on the bottom shelf and bowls (19)  are on the right.  The bowls are shallow, but we've found we like them.






Closer view of the upper shelves with some lovely serving pieces.



Covered dish and gravy boat.



Close up of some of the cups and saucers and sugar and creamers.  Notice the stacks and stacks of saucers and dessert plates in the back.



I think we might need an intervention! 

We find these at flea markets all over Europe and honestly pick them up for a song.  James Bond and I both take pleasure in spotting these treasures among the other flotsam and jetsam sitting on tables or piled in boxes and James bond takes extreme pleasure in getting me to haggle on the price.  If he would learn his numbers in German he could do the haggling, but he says it's easier to stand there looking like he's unhappy with the price while I try to talk them down.  Whatever.

Oh, I should also mention that after I took these photos, I discovered that I had another cabinet below the counter containing 19 plates, 17 bowls and 18 salad plates.  Yikes!

6 comments:

Confessions of a Plate Addict said...

Oh.my.goodness! You know I am drooling! I LOVE your collection! It's not an addiction...you are just giving them a good home where they will be loved and appreciated! lol I love the way you have mingled the patterns and colors! Lovely! Thanks for sharing!...hugs...Debbie

Carol-Anne said...

I'm laughing at the name of the blog of the commenter above mine: Confessions of a Plate Addict...and my blog is called "Use the Good Dishes!" and of course we're the first two to comment on this post! ha!

Love your transferware and love how you've mixed it up!

Toni said...

I have to say, I didn't know what transferware was before I read this but it's gorgeous! I love it!

Jennifer McLean said...

Ok, hand over the pitcher on the left and nobody gets HURT! You collect transferware, I collect PITCHERS. Come on, share the wealth, you got LOTS. LOL. Great find!
Best,
Jenn from http://www.JustAddWaterSilly.com, hopping from check Serenity Now.
(newest follower)

Susan (Between Naps On The Porch.net) said...

Let it be known, I am insanely jealous! I would be in transferware heaven over there. And it's inexpensive? Really? You're killing me! It's an arm and a leg over here. I say stock up while you're can! :) You can never have too much transferware. I've become consumed with the brown and white lately...love it! So awesome that hubby keeps and eye out for ya...what an awesome guy!

Jami @ An Oregon Cottage said...

OMGoodness! An addiction,yes, but one I can fully appreciate. :-) Thanks for stopping by my blog and leaving this link so I could drool over your finds!

Hmmm...probably not worth a trip to Europe just to score cheap transferware, is it? :-)

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