'Dans son jus!'

I was absolutely stunned when a friend of mine sent me a link to an article a few months back about an apartment in Paris that had been abandoned by it's owner, Madame de Florian, since the German occupation during World War II.  As an antique dealer I dream of houses being left 'dans son jus', as the French so poetically say, but never before have I seen such a veritable time capsule with so many wonderful trucs.

Paradise for a lovers of interior design and antique trucs like me

We were lucky when we bought the last house we owned in France that the seller, Mme. Pasquet, failed to arrange to have all of the contents removed.  This house was a large house that dated from around the 17th century and was very much 'in it's juice' although sadly had suffered many "improvements" during the 1950's so it took a bit of work to uncover the true character of the place.  

The day of the completion of the sale the Notaire turned to dear old Mme. Pasquet and asked if the house was empty.  When she said that she hadn't managed to sort it out he was very reluctant to let the sale go through but with two wailing cats waiting in the car we quickly agreed to pay 500€ for the contents and with much relief all around we were the proud owners of a big old house with a big old leaky roof.

The house when we bought it (rather run down but I quite liked it like this)

After the renovation (we hope that although modernised it kept it's charm)

One of the most prized things that came with the house was a beautiful fruit wood armoire.  It was originally in one of the bedrooms and I'm sure if Mme. Pasquet's family had been able to get it out of the door and down the stairs we wouldn't have been so lucky.  As it was we only managed to get it downstairs by using the cherry picker from when they were redoing the roof to hoist it our of the bedroom. window.  It was worth all the trouble though as it really was a wonderful cupboard for keeping table linens, cutlery and crockery for our chambres d'hôtes business.

The beautiful armoire that we sold to the new owner of the house

Of course the armoire and other few bits of furniture were wonderful but once you agree to take all the contents of a house you are of course going to be faced with what I affectionately term as 'a pile of poop!'

Spike and his father, George, clearing the barn (guests beware!)

However, it was having moved from the big house to our present one that my career as a brocanteuse really began.  Not only did we have too much furniture, having downsized considerably, we also still had many remnants from Monsieur Pasquet's workshop knocking around the place and having agreed to clear the contents (I see Madame Pasquet's problem now) we had to take all these bits with us too.  

So it was with trepidation that we attended our first brocante loaded up with all the unwanted trucs from our previous home.  We have a large plastic crate filled with bits of old iron, old tools and other odds and sods that appear to have an irresistible draw to rustic country men of certain age.  This box has now been christened 'the old man box' and it never fails to pull these gentlemen in for a good old rummage!

I can only hope that the next house we buy will also be stuffed full of goodies and with any luck it will be very much 'dans son jus!'

Weird and Wonderful 'Trucs'

One of the many joys of dealing in vintage and antique items is that you never know what you are going to find so every now and then it isn't that surprising if you come across something so eccentric and frankly mind boggling that it reminds you what a vast, diverse and fascinating world we live in.

The item that prompted me to start thinking about the weird and wonderful was a very strange truc I found at a brocante in the Charentaise village of Hiersac.  As is often the way it was the box that first attracted me to the item.  Anyone who goes antiquing on a regular basis will know the lure of the closed box and this one with the highly recognisable name 'Christofle' clearly emblazoned on the lid was an obvious draw.  

It was only when I opened the box that the true mystery began.  The truc nestled inside was a silver plated dish with strange cut-outs on the top and another dish (like a plunger) inverted and fitting snugly inside the top one.  The stall holder informed me that it was a wedding present from his marriage in the 1960s.  He went on to explain that this enigmatic object was a butter curler and if you fill the underside of the top dish and insert and depress the plunger the butter comes deliciously oozing out of the top in curls.  This unusual butter dish would then be placed as a centrepiece on the table for everyone to take their portion and admire the owner's obvious sophistication and taste.    

Would you have guessed what it was?

I did overfill it a bit as you can probably see!

Woohoo... I can't tell you how satisfying it was to see the butter oozing out!

I find items like this truly irresistible and as far as I was concerned this truc was up there with muffin dishes. The fact that something as silly as a muffin dish once had a place in society really makes me smile so I have therefore made it my mission to one day own a particularly elaborate one.    

So here are a few more examples of my trucs that I feel fall into the category of the 'weird and wonderful':-

1930s Miniature Spy Camera - What home would be complete without one?

1920s set of china figures for bonsai tree landscaping... really, I kid you not!

A retractable chain for chandeliers - I wish I had ceilings high enough to need it! 

I hope you have enjoyed seeing these fascinating items (that you never knew you needed until now) as much I did when I found them.   Don't you agree that the world be a much sadder place without butter curlers and muffin dishes?

Beautiful Maison Charentaise for Sale

Well it's been a very busy week for us but not as far as dealing with antiques goes.  That is unless you count a very big antique.... our house!

Our beautiful home - well perhaps I'm biased but I think it's lovely

Some time ago we decided that we would like to make the move from the countryside to town, Cognac to be exact, and we are looking forward to adding an exciting new chapter to our lives in France so far.  The lure of being able to walk to a bistro, enjoy a cappuccino at a pavement café, visit the daily market for fresh produce or spend hours browsing in the numerous little boutiques has become too irresistible.

Café culture in Cognac calls (that's easy for me to say!)

The covered market in Cognac brimming with fresh produce

We have been renovating the house on and off for about three years now and we are scarily close to completion so someone I know with a lovely large gîte complex in the nearby town of Saint Jean d'Angély suggested that I type up some details tout de suite because they often have lots of people staying with them that are house hunting. 

So I took the decision to take a week off from antiquing and to get weeding, painting and deep cleaning so that I could get a verdict from a local estate agent as to the value of our labour of love.   And we do love our house, it's elegant and surrounded by beautiful countryside with vineyards, sunflowers and golden wheat and if we could pick up it up and move it to town we would.

We've heard all the nightmare stories of houses taking five or more years to sell but I have accepted that if it takes five years then so be it.  All that means is that our dreams of a new lifestyle and a little café/brocante in the old quarter of Cognac will have to wait. It's not like me at all to be so philosophical about things - I must be mellowing (it had to happen even to an ageing flibbertigibbet like me!)

So here is a link to one of the many adverts I have taken out online in an attempt to cut out the estate agent and the massive percentage they get in France (6%-10%!)

We'll have to get used to another kind of view in town

So if we are very lucky and our home does manage to break the current five year trend and sell quickly I will be sad because there are so many things I will miss about country living.  I will just have to console myself with the thought that it will be possible to just pop out of my front door and cheer myself up by heading off to a little pavement café where I can drown my sorrows in a fragrant frothy cappuccino.

La Vie Fleurie

I was inspired to right this post because every day and I am out in the beautiful countryside that surrounds our home on my bike with the dogs and at long last the beautiful sunflower fields in our area are beginning to come into bloom.  

A field of sunflowers just coming out over to a typical walled cemetery

We are very lucky to be in a protected area for flora and fauna so as well as being able to enjoy the stunning spectacle of sunflower fields in the summer, in the spring we have lovely wild flowers including rambling roses that clamber through the hedgerows and stunning native orchids that grow in the verges along the little country roads.

Right now is the time for hollyhocks and these prolific blooms can be found lining stones walls and lanes in many a village and garden in the Charente Maritime.

Hollyhocks lining the lane of a local hamlet

I couldn't resist picking some flowers including a few mini rogue sunflowers

So this week I have decided to get back to nature and share with you some of the trucs I have in stock in my Etsy shop that have a floral or organic theme.

A beautiful Art Nouveau Copper Picture Frame with Lily Design

Vintage 1950s Flower Brooch

Art Nouveau Style Silver and Onyx Pendant and Earrings

Pretty 1950s Biscuit Tin depicting Roses in a Vase

Hand Painted Flowers on a Lovely Russian Brooch

Four Porcelain Napkins Rings with Intricate Roses

Beautiful Silver Art Nouveau Brooch with Organic Flower and Foliage

A Set of Six Espresso Cups with Rose Design

Modern life can be so busy and hectic that it's very easy sometimes to forget the importance of getting out into a park or the countryside and taking time to wonder at the gifts that mother nature has to offer.

And, if it's not possible to grab some time to enjoy nature why not bring the outside in by arranging some flowers or adding some floral patterns and motifs to perk up the interior of your home?

The flowers I picked earlier arranged in a lovely porcelain floral jug

From the Sublime to the Ridiculous

It's been a fairly uneventful week this week as far as antiquing goes.  Lots of hard work on the house, Spike feeding the hoards at the Cognac Blues Passions Festival and for me some part-time seasonal work at a lovely local gite complex (more spending money for trucs... hooray!) so as a consequence I've not had a moment spare to buy any new stock this week or concentrate on my Etsy shop.

However, I knew that a week like this would come one day so I've been saving this post for a situation just like this.

A couple of months back in the beginning of May we stumbled across a truly magical place after visiting a flea market in a little village called Plassay.

A bit of a small brocante but good to get out and about all the same

It wasn't the best market ever but we bought a couple of trucs and on the way had earmarked a lovely little restaurant with a pretty courtyard in the charming village of Port d'Envaux for lunch.  We decided to sit outside and the sun came out for us - it was one of the first really sunny days we had had this year and I decided to try some locally produced goats cheese... it was yummy!  

Spike insists that I use the "fuzzy" setting on my camera for all food shots!

I digress.  The thing I really wanted to share was the amazing place I mentioned earlier. As we left Port-d'Envaux we caught sight of a couple of stone sculptures and being intrigued pulled over to investigate. There was a distinct lack of signs or obvious publicity but the unassuming car park led to a place where artists from all over the world have visited and carved some awe inspiring sculptures into the natural rock face of the area.  I later found out that that this curious centre of art is called Les Lapidiales.

I can't really describe just how impressive these carvings were especially as they were found so unexpectedly on a quiet little road -  I just hope that my photographs of just a handful of them go some way to doing them justice.

It never ceases to amaze me the wondrous things we come across just driving around our area and this place appears to be one of its best kept secrets.  

As we set off for home Spike spotted a little sign indicating that a roman aqueduct was to be found down a small lane.  Well we couldn't miss out on that and with visions of towering archways built out of stone carrying water at a great height I have to admit that we were a little disappointed at what we found!

Not quite what we had hoped for but the mosquitoes seemed to like it!

Oh well you can't win them all!