Sunday 28 August 2011

Bedroom Junk Pt2: Free Junk

 Is there anything better than being given or finding random exciting and unique objects d'art?! This blog post is a sample of the things that have been given to me, or I have gotten for FREE. This wooden ship's helm barometer was given to me by my Dad. He is absolutely in love with it, and it used to hang in the kitchen of my Mum and Dad's house, but the Mum renovated the kitchen and she didn't want this kitschy piece ruining the effect of marble bench tops and steel appliances so she made Dad put it out in the shed. I promised him it would find a good home with me and would take pride of place in my house! I love it. The barometer doesn't work anymore, but it looks fantastic.
 When my ex-boyfriends grandfather died, we were told we could take anything in his apartment that hadn't already been packed into boxes. I really really had to struggle to hide my excitement, and not go too nuts out of respect for the deceased, but boy did I pick up some fantastic stuff. This old ceramic water jug, rimmed with gold paint, for example. It looks so beautiful filled with fresh flowers.
 This toy 'Saturday Night Fever' toy was given to me by one of my close friends! It's still unopened in the box and on the back of the box it has cheesy 'pick up lines' of this 1970s lothario. Hilarious.
 The same friend (who is a toy collector, mostly Star Wars) gave me these Star Wars toys. They date to late 70s, but aren't in good enough condition to resell. They look cute on my shelf though! One toy collectors junk is a junk collectors treasure!!
 These Beswick ceramic birds were another great find in my ex-boyfriend's deceased grandfathers house. He had this amazing HUGE 3 bedroom apartment overlooking Manly beach in Sydney. It was chockers with potentially valuable antiques, but out of respect I only took a few items. Turns out these sparrows are worth quite a bit of money. I ebay searched Beswick ceramics and collectors are buying them for over $100 per piece. A really amazing find.
I adore this print. I found it near the skips at my local shops, about to be thrown out and it is in perfect condition! I spent 6 months travelling through Asia in 2008/2009 and this print reminds me of those travels, lazy days on islands, sleeping in wooden huts, drinking out of coconuts and swimming in crystal clear oceans.

Part of being a hoarder is the sentimental attachments you get to items which might mean nothing to somebody else. I am not (yet) one of those really gross hoarders you see on television. As soon as I get too much clutter I will do a ruthless clean out and usually I don't miss the items I throw away. I also often give things to friends. A while ago I gave a friend of mine a scarf printed with cowboys, spurs and horses. I was pleasantly surprised when a few months later she gave it back to me for my birthday sewn into a pencil case!! I'd forgotten about the scarf until then, but what a great way to give old junk a new lease of life.

7 comments:

  1. My husband lost his luke skywalker figurine in kindergarten during show & tell. So I bought him a new one, 30 years later. It meant a lot to him. You could probably sell those on ebay. That's where I bought mine.

    I'm a staunch believer in finding old random objects and making them relevant again. All the brand new items with a "made in china" label on them are so boring.

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  2. That last print is awesome. :D

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  3. all of them look great! personally, i hit the flea-market every now and then for old, used, stuff like that. you can find amazing things

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  4. Words can not describe how cool I find the Star Wars figures, honestly. I'm such a geek when it comes to stuff like this.

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  5. +1 for yeamiewaffles post :D i like the shiny c-3po figure ^^

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  6. I love those old Star Wars figures, still a huge fan, my friend used to have these old star wars figures and the jedi had white lightsabers haha

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