Posted by As I slowly dig through the remaining piles of things I’ve bought over the months (and years!) for my Etsy store, I pulled out a small storage tub that had some serious loveliness in it. Can’t believe I waited so long to list these! I mean why?? But the good news is that they are listed now.
To be honest I can’t even remember when I bought this scarce boxed set of Bunde & Upmeyer (Milwaukee, WI) dinner knives. They have mother-of-pearl handles, pretty sterling ferrules and are in darn good shape for being from the late 1800s!
I bought this stunning reproduction religious icon came from a nun’s estate several years ago. It has a silver-plated cloisonné front and was made by Metaloplastyka in Poland. (Here’s an interesting story about the guy who makes these.)
I’m fond of sterling silver bowls (well, sterling silver anything really!) and finally listed this little antique Woodside Sterling Co. bowl with a grape motif. I thought it might be used to hold a wine bottle, but the bottom is a little too small.
And hiding in cupboard I found this vintage Ken Edward Mexican pottery vase.
This is the kind of vase that is pretty all on its own on a mantel or bookcase. It would also look quite fetching with a branch of fall leaves.
And I finally tackled this huge, nine-pound brass ashtray, circa 1950s-1970s. (I mean honestly, nine pounds, what were they thinking??) It had some corrosion spots which I first scrubbed at with lemon juice and baking soda and made great progress. Then I switched to Simichrome polish and got it looking even better. It still has light spots, but I decided to let the future owner finish the work.
September sales are still sluggish but I’m happy to be making listing progress and, thankfully, Q4 is around the corner. 🙂
And I’m even happier to be spending some time as a family before my youngest heads back to college in a few days. We’ve been playing Balderdash at night (it’s a surprisingly fun word game) and Friday we headed out for some delish Mediterranean food. Tonight will be movie night.
So I’m feeling blessed. Hope you’re enjoying September too!
As always, happy hunting,
Karen
Hunting for Vintage 
Lovely items! just saw them the other day short after they were listed.
My wee collection of silver is also growing, but I think it’s time to stop buying now 🙂 it’s silly to deplete one’s budget and not have a place to display them. How do you keep your silver beauties? Do you have an allocated display space or are they stored away?
Well done for keeping up the listing work and good luck with the sales!
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Hi Gabriella. Most of the silver items I’m selling I wrap in tissue paper and store. But a few of them are cute and small and perfect for displaying in my curio cubby thingy.
But of course my own personal silver items I display/use around the house. Every once in a while I use a Weiman silver wipe to remove tarnish, but otherwise don’t polish them. I don’t like my silver to be super shiny.
Hope your store is doing well!!
Karen
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Hello Karen,
Thanks for your reply!
The store is a bit slow, but I think it’s just the time of the year?
I have a few silver pieces for my own “collection” but don’t know how to store or display them – is being exposed to light and air going to make them worse off? Probably I’m overthinking this, lol, it’s not like they’re each worth £££!
Have a nice Sunday,
Gabriella
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I think has been changing its search and results ranking algorithms this year.
I suspect it may have something to do with the sluggish biz. For example now locality is s factor so bye bye to getting seen (for me) by US or AU buyers… also they have changed how other factors affect how the listing is shown. This may have negatively affected some listings. There are a few good articles/blog posts about this.
Better not relying on Etsy too much and also use other sale channels 😉
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I agree. I’ve already been looking at other sales channels!!!
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Gabriella, silver will tarnish when exposed to the air, particularly if it’s not used often, but it’s easy to clean a few times a year with silver wipes. Definitely display your beauties! Karen
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Thank you for the advise!
I think I got infected with the silver bug 😉
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Is that actually a Ken Edwards vase? Is it signed? Because it doesn’t look like Ken Edwards. There’s tons of Tonala pottery out there, all very lovely, but Ken Edwards is a very specific type of Tonala, and this doesn’t look like Ken Edwards to me.
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Hi LK. I know what you mean about the “Ken Edwards look.” I have other pieces by him that are stylistically different. The bottom of this vase appears to have the KE initials, though the K is not as distinct. – Karen
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