Return from the Dead

Hello there friends,

I have not indeed died.  I did drop off the face of the blogging earth for a couple months,  but for a good reason;  my life has been entirely consumed by renovating our store.  It has been a labor of love, filled with literal occasional blood, a lot of sweat and even some tears.  Oh, and a lot of checks and debit card transactions.  Which is mostly what caused the crying.

However,  I am really pleased to say that we really are at the end of construction;  we move our merchandise in this weekend and will open up our doors for friends and select clients next week!  Within the next three weeks, we will be fully open and be sending out invites for our grand opening party.  We're also planning to do a little story on how we turned a junky old office space into the swankiest joint in town on a very small budget.  You are going to laugh at us,  probably pity us, and ultimately be amazed by what our hard work has produced.

For now,  have a little peek at what's in the shop this week;  I don't want to spoil all the lovely surprises we've built into the shop just yet ;)

xoxo
Giana

A sneak peak...

Brimfield ended in a torrential downpour. I stood on the side of the two lane highway, my muddy boots soaked through to the toes. A procession of filthy cars sagging with the weight of purchases rolled by like a funeral march. I waited, umbrella in hand, half protecting my face and half protecting a large black trunk standing upright in the gravel.

The large black box comes up to my shoulders, has three rusted latches and is peeling away at the sides. Its weight is tremendous and we can barely heave it into the back seat of my accomplice's car. We barely manage to fit it across the back seat and we rejoin the procession, rolling single file through the mud all the way back to New York City. Success.

What, you must be asking is in the box? The new dressing room for my shop of course! How does it fit in a box? Pure magic.

Under construction!

I am proud to announce that The Greedy Seagull had found a new home right here in Astoria, Queens! I am teaming up with my amazing friend Jessica who owns La'che Et Occupe in a little storefront in the heart of our neighborhood.

We are excited to be pioneers around here- there really is no proper vintage shop! The area I rapidly changing and filling up with young people so we think we will be filling up a bit of a void here!

The spot we picked is a fixer-upper and is requiring gut renovations- but it is the perfect size, and it has a skylight!!! Please excuse the dust around the blog and website over the next month as we tear it up an get ready for an amazing launch party in June. More details to follow, and contact me if you would like to be invited to our opening party- thegreedyseagull at gmail . Com

Hooray!

Pier show purchases

I don't splurge on myself all that often, but when I do I make it count! Yesterday I visited the Pier Show, it has 500 antique, jewelry and vintage clothing vendors in a huge convention center! Needless to say, I could have spent days in there and emptied my whole life's savings... But I compromised and came away with two pieces I've been searching for for ages now. One is a Victorian perfume bottle necklace, the other a perfect pair of pink cat eye glasses! It was finally sunny and warm enough outside to wear a dress and I actually needed the glasses on the way out- smart purchases!

Exclusive Cadoro via Market Publique

I'm excited to announce that TONS of Cadoro jewels are now available through one of my favorite vintage shopping sites, Market Publique! Check out the exclusive jewels along side tons of cute vintage clothes.. or layer it up with one of owner Pamela's designs in collaboration with Brooklyn Charm like this herringbone bead necklace. Check out some of these exclusive designs with the links below:

70's flying saucer beaded collar


70's sequin and orange bead statement necklace



70's giant chunky red hemp tassel necklace

Oepning Night Party at Chelsea Market

I'm so excited and can't believe I'm moving into Chelsea Market with Artists & Fleas in just three days! My friend Irina and I are going to be right by the window, front and center and loaded with up with fresh spring vintage.

The launch party is next Thursday, March 8th and there's going to be a party- drinks, music and discounts in my booth! Please stop by and say hello, and mention the blog for a little deal. Hope to see you there!

Smiling thrift gods

Wow, this morning the thrift gods really rewarded me for waking up early and taking a walk down to my local shops! I found a 50s Chinese novelty print cotton shirtwaist dress, a hand tailored 50s emerald silk faille blazer, and a 50s celluloid clamper bracelet- all my size, and strangely well coordinated when worm together! It's like the perfect vintage spring outfit was just waiting for me to gather it from three different spots! I even found a vanity fair slip to wear under it... Genius!

Mineral Inspiration

How cool would any of these mineral thin slices be as a fabric print?

The Greedy Seagull HQ tour!

My business started out as a plastic bin. Then it grew to a flimsy garment rack. Then to a commercial rack. Then to an Ikea closet. It went on to take over the living room and a storage space. Eventually, it forced us to move to a bigger place where I took over the largest room in the house!

I feel very fortunate to have this room all to myself. It has great natural light, beautiful wood parquet inlaid floors, art deco crown molding and a high ceiling to boot. It keeps all my stuff out of the rest of the house and frankly, has probably saved my marriage (my husband hates clutter!). The room used to be the perfect size, but business has evolved and I do a lot of private shopping appointments. The space isn't quite big enough to function as a shop, photography studio, and shipping annex. I started looking at commercial spaces, but now that I'm moving into Chelsea market it's on the back burner for a bit.

As a result, I've come up with ways of shifting pieces of the room around with relative ease to get tasks done. The rolling racks all get moved to one side of the room to reveal bright photography walls, and behind them are two white cabinets. The hat boxes are stuffed full of hats and accessories, and that cute little dresser holds all the folded things. All of my off season garments are being moved to a small storage spot.

Regardless, I think the space looks pretty cute when it's set up as a shop! If you are in Astoria and want to come visit, drop me a line!

Icicles melt into spring

Here's part of a collection entering the shop that is one foot in winter, the other in spring. Though the palette is icy, don't let it fool you; everything here is waiting to be taken to warmer weather.

Hello from T Street!

Though I'm anxious to get back to shop tending, I'm not very excited to leave here and get back to hideous weather and city living.

the Cadoro archives

This vintage find is the stuff of legends. If I told you how it happened, I would have to kill you (just kidding, but not telling!). You all know I am a hopeless magpie, completely obsessed with hunting down jewels. Well, let's just say I stumbled down a rabbit hole and landed in vintage jewelry heaven.

I currently came into possession of hundreds of pieces of some of the rarest, most collectible costume jewelry out there. My head is still spinning as I try to archive and research this stuff. I have hundreds of pieces of Cadoro necklaces that were samples, straight from their vault. Some of these things probably never went into production and are one-of-a-kind treasures.

Cadoro was founded by the actor Steve Brody and Dan Staneskieu in 1945. They traveled all over the world to source only the highest quality materials. It was originally very expensive, fashion forward and sold in Neimann Marcus. They stopped producing in the mid 70s, though their designs were sold through the early 80s. They used materials that are now highly sought-after; lucite, japanned metal, leather, handmade pottery, seed pearls and a whole lot more. Cadoro jewelry is highly rare, collectible, and sought after. As I mentioned, a lot of the pieces I have might not even be in books because they were production samples.

I have a pretty vast array of materials, styles and pieces from every era as far as necklaces go. Since the pieces are production samples, not all of them have the signature oval "Cardo" hang tags. However, I can vouch that they are all from the same source; they've been sitting undisturbed in a vault since the company closed. Below is just a small sampling of what will be slowly released into the shop. If you are a serious collector and would like to see additional pieces, please contact me via my etsy shop. All the pieces shown here will be up for sale in a separate category in my store within the next couple days.

Pretty Victorian Baubles

I've recently developed an obsession with Victorian jewelry; the delicate work but the overall simplicity of form and often minute scale have won my heart over. I usually keep it when I find a good piece, but here are three little pieces I'm sharing, all in the shop as of today!

fraternal order pin, most likely read "STRANDS International Fraternity Hudson Valley"

love knot pin with paste rhinestone center and glass beads

sterling silver and seed pearl crescent moon pin