Playful Furniture



An interesting thrift store find, about the right size for 17" Playmate dolls. Yeah,Yeah, I didn't notice her bare feet until I had finished the post.  It reminded me of an item in aunt Irene's collection, albet on a smaller scale.
 
I recall reading about itinerant artists who earned their living decorating furniture. Otherwise ordinary furniture (often built by local carpenters) became fanciful works of art.

 

 



 

Aunt Irene and Me

                             Me and Aunt Irene



Irene turned 86 last week, and I'll be 69 next week.  She lives in Noank, Connecticut and not only has several doll houses, but a doll room!

These photos show only a few pieces of Irene's doll furniture.  The decorative art on some of her doll furniture is a real inspiration.   If anyone is interested I'll post more later.
 
I found the the Battat doll at one of the local thrift stores in Mystic (which is only about 5 minutes up the road) and put her in as an 18" reference.  She turned out to be one of our Grandaughter Alexis' favorite dolls.

 

 

 

Obviously she's been collecting a lot longer than I have.

Playmate Furniture

This is one of my Playmates with a Thrift Store find too cute to resist.  That is a mirror, by the way.  It's a bit confusing because it's reflecting the curtains on the opposite side of the room.

I've collected Playmate dolls for quite a few years (all second-hand, pieced together from the best parts).  The photo below shows as many as would fit in one of my bookcases (There are quite a few more). 

I have as many as four variations of the same costume for individual characters and lots of extra tights, socks, and undies. Of course shoes are always scarce 

A Loving Greeting

I wonder which navy has green trim on their uniforms . . . I like it.

Piano Lodeon

I never shop Antique Stores, but . . .

I purchased the Piano Lodeon below for $25.  It's a miniature Player Piano manufactured by the J. Chein Co. in the late 1950's and early 1960's.

Below is from Wickipedia:

One of the final original Chein toy products, and one of its most complicated, was the electromechanical "Piano Lodeon", a child-sized player piano.  It utilized a combination of plastic and tin, and a mechanism that used spooled rolls of punched paper with well-known songs programmed onto them. A total of approximately 50 tunes were available.  The piano's keyboard was actuated by a vacuum produced by an electric fan, with a rubber tube connecting each key with a corresponding hole in the front of the piano's housing.  When a hole punched in the paper passed over one of these holes, it caused the correct key to strike tuned tines inside the case, producing the desired tune.  The keyboard could also be played manually.  The device was never financially successful for Chein due to its complexity, high price and the rise to dominance of purely electronic musical instruments.

They were also manufactured in a dark maroon color.  It's in good condition with a few minor problems, but I've restored several player pianos and even a vintage Ampeco reproducing grand.

The rolls in the photograph are: No. D-3 'The Old Piano Roll Blues'; No. P-1 'Alexander's Ragtime Band'; and No. P-3 'Frosty the Snowman'.

I find it interesting that there's no number on J. Chein's street address.

I've found old post cards with nothing more than the intersection of two streets as an address.

Thrifty Chinese

Everything in these photos is from thrift stores except the pajamas.  Apparently, I purchased the last set 'Lovebug' had in stock.  They're really beautiful (Are guys allowed to say 'cute'?).

School Days

You've already seen one of these desks (from an outdoor flea market) in another post. I found the second one in a thrift store ($5). At first I thought they would be identical . . . not so.