San Francisco Treats
While we were limited by available funds and luggage space, we still found the time to peruse the thrift shops of San Francsico and (thanks to Linda) Napa Valley. Here are my favourite finds.
First of all, Out of The Closet in the Castro is one of the best Thrift shops I’ve ever been to in my life! Everything was clean, the prices were good and the quality and selection was amaze-balls! I am sad that I don’t have good photos of the two 1960s coats I found (but didn’t bring back — we limited our luggage to carry ons). They may have been vintage but they really had the Spring 2013 zeitgeist. I do have one fantastic prize from Out of the Closet — the Elsa Peretti for Tiffany Open Heart Pendant pictured above. Twenty bucks, people. Twenty bucks.
Since we were in California, I also had my sights set on acquiring a Mexican embroidered tunic dress. I found this emerald green number for myself at Clothes Contact — a buy the pound store in the Mission. They had tons of white cotton huipl dresses, but most had a stain. If I was more entrepreneurial, I’d have shipped them back to Toronto, cleaned them up and sold them at the Junction Flea as I think this look will be huge this summer..
Still in the Mission, there’s the huge and chaotic Community Thrift Store. This is where I found the Sharky brooch I wrote about on Sunday as well as the assortment of random portraits pictured above (at $1 a piece, I couldn’t resist).
And finally, we spent a lovely morning thrifting and antiquing with our friend Linda in Napa Valley. I bought this cool, eye-shaped gold-filled and cultured pearl pin for $2 at a huge place called Community Projects (sorry, no website). While thrift shops in California are completely picked over when it comes to 1950s, ’60s and ’70s stuff, you can still find some great deals on hand-embroidered linens, California pottery and other, more rustic-type items. Again, if I had had any room in my luggage, I would have loaded up on painted candy tins, tea towels and ceramics. There was a shop called Alice’s Consignment which was not open, but looked like a wonderland of cool vintage everything. I guess I am just going to have to go back.