What if you only want a Junior Size portion of the Round Top Antiques Show experience?
The Fall Antiques Show is just weeks away, and many of you are happily getting geared up for some hard core tromping through the fields and tents of Round Top, TX. I’m with you for sure, but today’s post isn’t really for us. It’s for the others out there, the non-trompers, hiding in the corners in their cute wedge sandals. I’m with you too, and I understand your trepidation. You’re intrigued by the notion of Round Top and vintage shopping and countryside extravaganzas. But despite my efforts to demystify the experience, it still seems too much. What you really want is to gingerly mince into the whole scene with no more than one sweet, comfy day trip.
La Bahia it is! I’ve chosen this particular field for a few reasons. First, location. Driving from Austin or Houston or anywhere really, you’ll find La Bahia on 237 just below 290, well before all of the pedestrian v. vehicle v. parking v. gawking craziness of the highway further south. And the parking is free! Second, quality. The vendors here are a near perfect mix of hard core dedicated collectors of blueware or lindseywoolsey or whatever and plain old dealers of really great stuff. In fact one of the best episodes of this season’s Junk Gypsies showed the sisters shopping La Bahia, and those gals don’t mess around. Third, quantity. There’s plenty to see here but not really all that much. I’m guessing the 80+ vendors will be just enough.
Look! Don’t you just love that Lumiere decided to retire in Round Top? “Be our guest be our guest be our guest!!”
And when I look at the photos below that I took last spring, I must have been craving a Minnesota summer camp experience. I promise there’s more to the show than just shuffleboard and archery and plaid and totem poles!
And for you superfans of the show, if you’re still with me, I hope La Bahia’s on your list. Go on an early day if you can because there’s a lot of buying going on up there and you’ll want to see it all before it’s gone.
The Fall Antiques Show is just over a month away and it’s time to start getting our shopping muscles into shape. This is exactly like when it’s time to start doing extra lunges to get ready for ski season. Work, yes, but no one wants to hobble around Beaver Creek all week and the same applies to Round Top. (PS/BTW, I know you don’t come here for physical fitness advice, but I am loving my newfound Richard Simmons’ Sweatin’ to the Oldies on YouTube workouts.)
Now on to the task at hand. Let’s use these photos of Antoinette’s beautiful A. Vincent booth to practice one of the most critical skills for shopping a massive show like Round Top; seeing the trees for the forest. Flabby shoppers often dismiss a forest – a booth or a display area or even an entire field – because when they look at it, it doesn’t seem to be their style. That’s not good. Successful shoppers have honed their ability to look into a display, not just at a display.
Want to try it? OK here we go: You Mid-century Modsters and you Texas Tuscans and you Clean Contemporaries and you Cottage Shabbies, look into this forest of seemingly Old World European photos and find your tree – the item that would complement your design style beautifully. Go!
Admit it. That was fun! My tree? The row of white feathers in the top photo. Yours?
Kids grow up which is all good. But I miss certain things, many of them baseball: The shaky bleachers, the diet Dr. Peppers and pork-chops-on-a-stick, the side games of wall ball, the mom chitchat, the fund-raised road trips, the struggles with red clay stains on white pants. My few moments spent crushing on the Serbin Jackrabbits’ quiet field took me back to all that and then sent me on my way.
If you’re lucky, you’ve had a store just like this in your life.
When I was a kid, about once a year we’d go to visit my grandparents at their horse farm in Ocala, Florida. The big day trip of our stay was up to Micanopy, a tiny nearby town that my Grandmadean used to say had “possibilities.” I remember the Micanopy General Store because it had toilets hanging from the ceiling, which I guess was terrible feng shui but seemed like merchandising genius to me. In fact, I was such a fan of my visits to Micanopy that years later my husband and I spent our entire honeymoon there, except for the afternoon we drove to the Bob Evans in Gainesville for lunch.
So this post is for Micanopy’s General Store… and for Depasquale’s in Newtonville, MA (home of an amazing capicola, provolone and red pepper sandwich)… and for Petrillo’s Market on Miami Beach (where I once stood in line behind Silence of the Lambs author Thomas Harris who is apparently very private but I’m going to gossip and tell you he was buying a bottle of red wine to take to his office upstairs)… and all the other genuine neighborhood markets that continue to offer a non-homogenized, family-run retail way of life that’s fading far too fast.
Yes, those are boxes of ammo shelved right above the cans of yams. And no, I’ve never tried Underwood White Meat Chicken Spread. Please share a recipe in the comment section below if you know how to make it yummy. Maybe like a Tuna Melt? And no, I don’t understand how shaving powder works. Same request.
I hope you’ll pretend you’re standing in front of Jerry’s and really take time to read these bulletin boards. Did you ever wonder why there aren’t more bulletin board inspired hipster art shows? Seems like an idea that’s ripe for the pickin’. I know, I know, if you want something done right…
Wanna go shopping? Good. Me too. Let’s go to Leftovers in Brenham. I think of it as a different kind of General Store. The kind where everything is generally fabulous. Know what’s fun to do there? Look up more than down. You’ll find the most interesting things that way. And also, look in. Some of the best treasures hide in the cabinets. We wouldn’t want to miss the Tongue Dish. Well, maybe we would. Ick.
Or as my mother taught me, “No thank you. Tongue’s not my favorite.”
The good news? You've discovered The Crush List. The not so good? I haven't been actively posting here for a few years now, which means the never terribly reliable details about my crushes are even more unreliable. Antique vendors have switched venues, shops in town have moved or passed on, donkeys may or may not be in the same front yards... In spite of the risks of massive misdirection I've left the site up in hopes that it still achieves its goal - to inspire you to visit Round Top for the Antiques Show or any time you have the time.
With that said, I leave you to explore this random list of my very favorite things about my very favorite place. I’ve tried to capture the area’s special pieces and parts. Some are big deal, some are small gestures, some are legendary and some are just tiny pip and squeak.
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