I am not really an antique store connoisseur. I thrift sporadically, and without much purpose. I tend to get overwhelmed in places with shelf after shelf of stuff. I know that some people thrive on the thrill of the hunt, but for me – I just wonder how in the world we got to a place with so. much. stuff.
There are a few places that I’ve visited that I consider a rare exception to this stuff-overload syndrome. One of them splits the difference between our house and E’s school, which is oh so convenient on the rare occasions that we walk home. R Ege Antiques. It’s a very carefully curated collection of treasures – there was a particular one that I coveted for a good long time. It was a twelve foot long work table on these beautiful industrial steel legs and the most gorgeous worn and aged wood top you’ve ever seen. It was a work table designed for standing and I wanted to design a kitchen around that piece of furniture. I could design my sister’s kitchen around it – if it was still around. Alas, it’s not, but that didn’t stop me from stepping in every few weeks and walking straight through the store to the back and rubbing my hands across the surface in a somewhat inappropriate way. I’m not sure why I felt the need to check in on it but I did. My heart fell the first time I saw that it was gone.
I’ve only made one purchase there in all these years. The constantly changing window displays almost satisfy my window shopping urges – they are truly gorgeous. But one of the days that I did go in, after saying hello to the lovely table of my dreams – “why, hello gorgeous – you stay put until I find just the right place for you” – I spotted this pen holder. And ha, ha – this is how inept I am at “antiquing” – this is a glass flower frog, not a pen holder. The owner told me it was a rare height and color, and it really was in perfect shape. I thought it was beautiful and would hold pens nicely – and it does. Perhaps I’ll set it in a bowl or vase and put flowers into it one day as well, but for now it catches the light in the window so nicely, and I didn’t have to mortgage my house to purchase it.
Update: I scrolled back in time and found not one, but two photos of my long lost table love posted on the store’s blog:
Above: on the right hand side of photo
(I love the back room of the store with the white glazed brick)
Above: Against the wall – see how long it is? Can you imagine the amount of cookies I could ice at one time on that puppy?
Have been to R Ege’s on more than one occasion and have fallen for so many of the objects there. Did you see the huge colored pencils? Fabulous.
Yes – those were great. My daughter was also in love with this giant freestanding plinko-like game. It was really cool.