Repurposing

I love to repurpose vintage items. By that I mean to use them for a purpose for which they were not originally intended. A lot of times I buy vintage items without knowing what I want to do with them and sometimes I buy with an idea in mind and never get around to using them. Right now, I have a lot of those copper or bronzed baby shoes in my Etsy shop.



There are a total of seventeen shoes, seven pairs and three singles. Some of the shoes are very old - maybe even victorian. I originally bought these because I was going to use them as little planters on my deck and porch. I never got around to doing that because for one thing, I'm not sure it would be good for them to be out in the weather. So, that is why they're now in my shop.

I can see lots of other uses for them. I think they would be adorable as part of a baby mobile. Use some of the shoes and some wooden blocks spelling BABY or the baby's name - or add some vintage toys to the mobile such as rattles. I also think they would be adorable to make centerpieces for a baby shower. They could have flowers or rattles or candy or whatever else matches the theme and be given away as prizes for games. Of course, I still think about the planter idea for an indoor area.

I've posted this before, but an idea I borrowed from someone at a flea market is to use a vintage string of Christmas lights as a bouquet in an enamelware container. It's a great way to repurpose those lights since I personally think they're a fire hazard and a way to display some of your vintage items at Christmas. I have added one of those "bouquets" to my Etsy store in case you're looking for one.

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A Christmas light bowl

I borrowed this idea from something I saw in a magazine.  The difference is that the magazine used a basket.

I purchased a large bowl made by Gail Pittman, a Mississippi pottery artist.  I have the bowl filled with ornaments, some vintage and some newer.  Underneath the ornaments is one of those large white light balls.  When the light ball is lit, the ornaments reflect the light.  The light bowl provides a lovely Christmas glow.

I prefer to use ornaments which are thin so that the light can shine through them rather than reflect off them.  The vintage ornaments that I've used are perfect for that because much of the outer layer has worn off and the ornaments have become transparent.

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And so I begin . . .

Not only do I display vintage decorations during the holidays, but I try to incorporate some of my other vintage items into my holiday decor.

DINING TABLE CENTERPIECE

As I was thinking about a centerpiece for my dining room table this year, I had the idea of using one of my flow blue pieces as the base. The piece is a planter that I normally use in my living room.

I have a vintage Coby tree cluster. It is a tree made of ornaments that slide onto a center support. Because of its size, it makes a perfect centerpiece. It sits perfectly on top of the flow blue planter that I wanted to use as the base of my centerpiece.

USING VINTAGE LINENS

I also wanted to incorporate some vintage linens into my centerpiece. I could have just covered my table with the linens but I decided to take it a step further and use some vintage doilies tucked into the planter at the base of the cluster tree.

I tried a couple of different variations. The first is using a white and a blue doily tucked into the planter.

In the second variation, I've tucked the golden yellow doily into the planter at the base of the tree and I've added a red striped tablecloth below the topper.

Using vintage items in such a fashion allows me to better coordinate my holiday decor and it also means that I don't have to store so many items after the holidays are over.

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