The Swag of Smug

[teddy_radiator]

Big time score at the Goodwill Store today. I love thrift stores like you read about, and we've recently re-discovered one on a dodgy side of town that has cool stuff practically hanging off the rafters. You may remember it was the place we found the FAO Schwartz teddy for 33 cents. Well, today, we hit pay dirt not only in teddyville but everywhere else.

I started routing through this bin of handbags, which were on sale for $2-5 each. I wish I'd got more of them, frankly, but I settled for these:



The first two Ed Hardys were $3 each, and when I looked them up online they were selling for $80 and $10 respectively. The Lagerfeld Duffle Bag was $2 and I saw it online for around $37!

I also found this really cool D&G metallic bag with HUGE zipper pulls, but I can't find it online anywhere - it may be a knockoff, but it's dead cool anyway.

Other great finds:

Brass banker's lamp for $5. Westbend bread slicing guide - $1 (ranges from $10 to $30 on ebay), this awesome bed desk/laptop tray for $5 (can be found for $20 online):



The real find was more teddys. We really took a good long root around and found 7 teddys we quite liked (paid $3 for the lot). When we got home, TheHubs™ looked them up - I think the cheapest was selling for $20, and the most for $50 - and these are in pristine condition!

TheHubs™ found the 3 cds of Eric Clapton's Crossroads concert for 30 cents (unfortunately it's supposed to be a 4-CD set, but he didn't find that out until we got home), and I found about $30 worth of yarn for $7.

I'm feeling very proud of our haul. 

Comments

[stgulik.livejournal.com]

What a score!

[teddyradiator.livejournal.com]

We have been feeling inordinately pleased with ourselves this evening ;)

[akatnamedeaster.livejournal.com]

I really like the bag on the far right, it would be just the kind of thing I would tote around if I want to go outside to life draw.

I'm a hard-core thrifter and for a few years sold extensively on ebay all the things I would pick from thrifts. (Best find? A box of Halloween ephemera from the 40s and 50s I found in an attic at an estate sale. Paid less than $10 for the lot and sold everything for over $500.) Any new town I go to, the first thing I notice are the second hand stores. At Misti, I spent an afternoon just driving around to all the area thrifts.

My favorite find so far is this awesome barn owl lamp that looks like it's from the 70's. It's very art deco looking. I should get a photo of it, it's really neat.

Your Goodwill sounds cool, ours used to be, but they signed a deal with Target a couple of years ago and most of the items in the store are simply damaged box items from Target. There are some second hand things but nothing near as cool as there used to be. It's made picking a lot harder than it used to be, you need to be there when the truck from the distribution center comes in on Thurs. morning to score anything interesting.

(I also love that I often find HP items from before the films at thrifts. I love all those Enesco/Warner Bros. items. Only last month I found a tin bank with an illustration of the Ford Anglia scene on it. I'm always Potter hunting at the thrifts.)

[teddyradiator.livejournal.com]

Wow - that is a find and a half! I so would have gone with you at Misti - I adore new (to me) thrift stores.

Most of our thrift stores are awful here in my area. This particular one is in a bigger town, and near some well-heeled residents, so I guess they slum it by bringing their stuff to this one. Today in honour of Vinyl day all their vinyl was 10 cents each, but they had so many and they were just slung into these huge bins - I didn't have the patience to sift through them, although I wish I had.

I would love to see the own lamp.

There were a couple more Ed Hardy bags there I should have bought, but it really didn't occur to me they would be of any great value, even though one (appliqued with a skull with rings through it's cheeks) still had the tags.

I have never found HP stuff at a thrift store :( but yesterday I went to one in my hometown and found an old telephone pole insulator for $4. I also found a couple of floating shelves for $1 each, and a really awesome candle also for a $1. When I went up to pay, the guy said, "That'll be $4 all total." I pulled out my debit card and he said, I'm not set up yet to take cards." I had exactly $3 in my wallet, and he said, "Go on then. I'll probably find a way to get you back next time."

[akatnamedeaster.livejournal.com]

It really was and what sealed the deal was how it came to be so low priced. I live in the Hudson Valley and the sale was in this gorgeous home overlooking the river in one of the more exclusive villages up north from me. I mean, this place was beautiful, not grand, but architecturally interesting and stuffed to the gills with antique pottery, art glass, and just all these odd and old items. It smelled like a library. I could have and did, comb through every inch of the place. You could tell the former residents had traveled extensively. The problem was, they had an professional estate company handling the sale so everything was more or less retail. The pro was a real prick too when I tried to haggle on a couple of pieces of pottery. No money to be made.

However, they were allowing people up to the attic and the pro hadn't bothered to go up there himself. I found the box under a heap of old linens and when I opened it my heart started racing since I knew what it was even though it just looked like Halloween decorations. What a rush! When I bought it downstairs and asked how much, I had to keep the excitement out of my voice to not queer the deal, but the guy just glanced at it, probably saw the cheesy jack-o-lanterns and thought it was worthless and sent me off with it for I believe $7 (I also found a few small, paper mache animals that I bought too. So cool and I'm guessing from the 40s. Kept those.) Sucker!!

Oh and the oddest things I ever thrifted and later sold for good money? An old dental model (like the giant set of teeth you see in a dentist office) and a gumball machine/telephone. I almost hated to sell them.


This particular one is in a bigger town, and near some well-heeled residents, so I guess they slum it by bringing their stuff to this one.

We have a Goodwill four towns over like that. I go there for clothes since I can only find the kind of jeans I like (all cotton and brands like 7 for all mankind and Lucky) that I can actually afford there and they always have really nice brand clothing often with tags still attached. I once got a 100% cashmere long black coat for $20.

Unfortunately, they have none of the fun nick-nacks I'm so fond of. I usually have to find a hole in the wall shop for those. We have one in town the hospital runs but it's very hit and miss and usually overpriced for thrift.

I had exactly $3 in my wallet, and he said, "Go on then. I'll probably find a way to get you back next time.

I love when things like that happen. :)

I'll take a photo of the lamp. I mean, it's pants as a lamp, not nearly bright enough, but it just looks wonderful and has the feel of the time period it's most likely from. My own collecting interest in terms of design is 60s and 70s. There's just something about the look that does it for me.

[arwitchywoman.livejournal.com]

You racked up! Whenever I'm out of town I always hit up Goodwill. There never is anything decent at the Goodwills in town, but out of town I always find something I love!

[teddyradiator.livejournal.com]

I don't know why that is, but it certainly is true!

[teddyradiator.livejournal.com]

I don't know why that is, but it certainly is true!

[nocturnus33]

The tray, I love that tray!

[teddyradiator.livejournal.com]

Thank you! I've been wanting one for awhile, and it's in pristine condition.

[mimimanderly.livejournal.com]

The Thrift Gods were on the ball today! I made out well garage-saling. Got a poster of the Eiffel Tower at night and a poster of Audrey Hepburn in Breakfast at Tiffany's (I LOVE her!), both of which I have hung in my computer room, replacing a couple Gothy pieces. (I think that I am safely out of my Goth phase.) The room seems to be an homage to France, as it already sports an Eiffel Tower table lamp and the sofa has a throw with various French landmarks -- all of which were purchased at garage sales. Also found three summer dresses that actually fit well and that I liked once I got them home and tried them on. And it's fig season! So I stopped at the produce stand and bought some to have for supper with manchego cheese and soppressata. And to think, I wasn't going to even go out today because the sales didn't sound very promising from the ads. That's probably why I had such a great time -- I had no expectations.

[teddyradiator.livejournal.com]

The garage sales around here are not very good. I found one really nice thing from one, very early on when we moved here (my writing desk - a steal for a solid wood desk for $35), and that's it. There are a lot of 'antique/junk' shops here, which means they really jack up the price.

We have a humungous flea market walking distance from our house, but it tends to be absolute tat (loads of phone cases, knockoff handbags, jewelry and perfume) or the cool stuff is overpriced because they see you coming. Plus it's so hot right now you just can't stand to be out there - it's basically just a huge slab of concrete with concrete tables on it. When it gets cooler we've promised ourselves another try.

[gelsey.livejournal.com]

What a wonderful haul! Lucky you!

[teddyradiator.livejournal.com]

♥

[bonsaibetz.livejournal.com]

I would love to go shopping for finds like these, but my house is so full of stuff, my husband would bitch, "But we don't even have space for all the crap we already have!" He complains we need to ditch about a third of our house's contents. It wasn't a problem until his mother passed away and we bought back a lot of her paintings, several LARGE boxes of her genealogy I now want to ship off to my mother-in-law's old genealogy research partner who would get all the research put into the LDS database for free public access, her old Apple computer with printer and portrait monitor from the 80's and a few pieces of her furniture back, and then my own mother selling off her house and me taking stuff before she eventually moved to the Philippines.

I need a bigger house so I have more wall space to hang paintings, have a proper buffet and put a lot of my mother's and mother-in-laws fine china and crystal into it instead of sitting in boxes and more room for more bookcases.

[teddyradiator.livejournal.com]

Sometimes I think I'd love a bigger house, but I'm so lazy I don't keep up with one this size, much less a bigger one. You're lucky, though; my parents come from people that don't keep anything. I have a handful of plates and a couple of things from my mother's side, and a chair from my dad's. They just weren't well enough off to buy anything of lasting value, coupled with a distinct lack of sentimentality.

[blueartemis07.livejournal.com]

I want to shop at that store!!!

[teddyradiator.livejournal.com]

It's one of the best!

[bloodcult.livejournal.com]

happy birthday!

[teddyradiator.livejournal.com]

Thank you!

[hbart.livejournal.com]

Good grief, I suck at tech. So, I am just going to use this venue to tell you that I wish you the happiest of birthdays ever! Have a great day!

[teddyradiator.livejournal.com]

Thank you so very much - it's been lovely because of all the love I've been given. I can truly feel it.

[adelaidearcher.livejournal.com]

Happy birthday! That's a fabulous haul, well done!
My best buy was a genuine English (can't recall the brand and its downstairs and I'm lazy) mid-century sideboard that I bought for $100. Restored ones sell here for $2000-3500...

[teddyradiator.livejournal.com]

Thank you! ♥

I love it when you find something and realise you've just got the sale of the century!

[melusin-79.livejournal.com]

Great stuff!
Happy Birthday - have a great day!

[teddyradiator.livejournal.com]

Thank you so much - it's been a great weekend!

[ex-logospil.livejournal.com]

Happy birthday, most beloved! Awesome haul! :-)

[teddyradiator.livejournal.com]

Thank you so much! ♥

[http://users.livejournal.com/_hannelore/]

Sneaking in to wish you a very happy birthday! Goodwill stores are great for so many reasons! :)

[teddyradiator.livejournal.com]

They are, aren't they?

Thank you so much for sneaking in - I appreciate it so much! ♥

[darklotus1211.livejournal.com]

You made out like a bandit!

I, too, love op shopping! We call them op (short for opportunity) shops over here and there's nothing like getting a good haul, or coming home with that "special something" is there? I also love to upcycle things so a lot of my clothing is one off things I've made or refashioned from op shop garments.

I'm a bagaholic, so these really got my attention and that laptop tray looks really useful. The best thing is that you get a bargain and the money goes to a good cause - win/win.

Well done!

And I hope you had a lovely birthday!

[teddyradiator.livejournal.com]

I may end up selling off some of the bags, but I kept the white Ed Hardy one - it's just so quirky and fun. I think this particular Goodwill is just in the right place - the ones near my hometown are just junk, but this one had some genuinely nice things, and the people who work there are very realistic about the stuff there and don't try and charge stilly prices for it. As one of them said to me, "It comes to us for free, so everything we make is profit. There's no need to be precious about it."

Thank you for the lovely birthday wishes - I've had a lovely day! ♥