After finding out about the opening of Vintage Revivals, as I mentioned in
part one, my wife and I drove down to have a look see. What a wonderful place. It's full of... well... it's full of all kinds of quirky originality. As I said last time, it's full of found art.
Some of it makes my fingers itch to make it my own.
But most of it just makes me think, "Cool!"
And, "I want that!"
The above piece is called "Merlin's Muse," and it's pretty cool. And here is another view of my favorite piece, "Nightwatch":
But it's not all birds:
Wait, no! No, really, it's not all birds:
No, stop looking at the bird. Look at the green liquid. Not to mention this stuff:
And the earrings! Last time, I showed you the earring that I bought my wife, but this is the pair I almost bought:
They had a whole wall of earrings made from old typewriter keys, which is just a cool idea. I would have bought them if the keys had been on the dangly end. I was, however, ambivalent, because I wasn't 100% sure my wife would agree with me (I was probably 87% sure), but she did, so, at some point (as soon as I get a chance to go back), we going to custom order a pair with the keys at the bottom, because, yes, they do requests. And, really, how cool is that?
Local places like this are really cool. I encourage all of you to go out and find some local artists and shops to support. I mean, what chain store can you walk into and request custom-made earrings? Or custom-made anything? Wal-Mart? Target? Macy's? Not a single one of them. In fact, the only thing you'll find at a chain store is the same thing that someone on the other side of the country will find. Something... homogeneous. If you want cool and unique, you have to go to cool and unique. And these kinds of places always have cool and unique people, too. People with great stories about what they're doing and why.
And, well, in a lot of ways it's like being an independent author. It's making something that's not quite like everything else already out there and having the courage to stand behind it. I respect that. I hope you do, too.
(And those birds are just too cool!)
