christmas | Crazy4Me - The Modern Bombshell Lifestyle by: Yasmina Greco

Collecting Vintage Christmas Year Round

December 31, 2020 By: Fan

Yasmina Greco Crazy4Me Vintage Christmas

Hello again my friends, I hope you all had a marvelous Christmas and that Santa was good to you all!! As I put the finishing touches on post number six, the final post of our Vintage Christmas Collecting series, it’s New Year’s Eve as I sit at my desk surrounded by my vintage treasures (vintage Santa’s, snowmen, shopper girls, bottle brush trees and my vintage candy cane holders) and want to thank you all for your lovely comments and questions along the way of the collecting series. I have truly enjoyed putting the series together and hope you’ve benefited from some of my tips and enjoyed seeing pictures of my collections. I wish you all a Happy New Year and hope that 2021 is good to us all!!

I collect vintage Christmas all year round. As you know from my previous posts, I am obsessed with vintage Christmas items and the hunt is really part of the fun. As our digital worlds keep moving forward, it actually makes searching for vintage Christmas items a little easier and simpler as we have access to wonderful resources that are available 24/7 and 365 days a year and spans the entire globe!!

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Have Yourself a Mid-Mod Christmas

December 23, 2020 By: Fan

Yasmina Greco Mid-Century Modern Christmas Philco Predicta Television

Holiday wishes and mistletoe kisses, Merry Christmas everyone!! Hope you all are staying safe and healthy. It’s Christmas time once again!!

I can’t believe the weeks have flown by; I tell my hubby Gary that ever since Thanksgiving it has all been a blur to me and it’s gone by so fast. So I really can’t believe that this is post five in our six-part Vintage Christmas Collecting Series and, I think one of my favorite posts because not only are we talking about the key elements of a mid-century modern Christmas but also sharing holiday fashions from the 1950s-1960s with me as your festive model.

Retro Aluminum Christmas Trees:

Yasmina Greco Retro Christmas Aluminum Tree

You really can’t have a mid-mod Christmas without an aluminum tree. These are artificial trees that were made in the late 1950s to the mid 1960s and came in a variety of sizes with aluminum branches and needles. Some trees even have pom poms on the ends of their branches like my darling little aluminum tree in these photos. True vintage aluminum trees from the 50s-60s are a very hot collectible (and seem to be getting hotter every year) so prices are up there and you can pick up a vintage aluminum tree run from around $175 to over a thousand dollars, especially if they are colored aluminum like teal or green trees. There are companies today making reproduction aluminum trees in multi colors as well as kitschy pink trees at reasonable prices if a true vintage tree is out of reach.

Vintage Color Wheels:

Yasmina Greco Mid-Century Modern Christmas

Retro aluminum trees are lighted up by a color wheel. I have one sitting on the floor right behind me in the above photo. The color wheel turns and shines colored light onto the tree and it really is lovely with the way the colors reflect off of the tinsel branches. You can find true vintage color wheels at antique shops and on Etsy and eBay for around $50-$300 with their original boxes and in working condition. Sometimes the cords/plugs need to be rewired for today’s standards so proceed with caution when you plugin a true vintage color wheel.

Vintage Shiny Brite Ornaments:

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Collecting 1950s Vintage Spaghetti Poodle Figurines

December 19, 2020 By: Fan

Today I am sharing one of my passions with you all and it has to do with collecting vintage spaghetti Poodles. The poodles in these pictures are all part of my personal collection and I adore their kitschy cuteness and how they make me smile. These vintage poodles also fit my Pinup and Mid-Century Modern vibe perfectly. My favorite spaghetti poodles are the three on the tray that have glasses and bows and are made by Norcrest in Japan in the 1950s and the little Christmas poodles that spell out ‘NOEL’ made by Lipper & Mann in the 50s. My collection includes poodle lipstick holders, poodle planters and vases.

UPDATE: You can ready about my collections on a recently published piece in the Antique Trader

This post is all about going back to the 1950s of yesteryear when kitschy cute Poodles were all the rage. Poodle motifs came in a variety of items from poodle skirts and sweaters to table linens and decorative collectible figurines like the spaghetti poodle. Ceramic artists in the late 40s-50s came up with a new technique to mimic the poodle’s fur known as “spaghetti art ware” and it ignited a frenzy for spaghetti poodles.

Spaghetti art wear is made from clay, porcelain, and ceramic which is applied as “fur” to form various textures of a poodle’s hairdo. To accomplish the spaghetti look, ceramicists and designers would have different techniques like using tea strainers to push the material through to form strands that were then attached to the poodle giving it a pom-pom look or they would swirl it onto to the poodle for a curly look. The spaghetti is very fragile and tends to break or chip over the years.

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🎄Christmas 2020 Collection Crazy4Me Style🎄

December 15, 2020 By: Fan

We have been very busy over at Crazy4MeStyle and are so excited to share our NEW Holiday 2020 designs!! We’ve updated our customer favorite tee with a kitschy pink Christmas tree for our Rockin Around the Pink Christmas Tree tee and we have a brand new design, our Winter Wonderland holiday tee featuring the prettiest scene of trees, a lovely lady in a vintage holiday crimson red ensemble hugging her precious puppy dog, and there is a fancy sleigh filled with presents.

How adorable is our Retro Gingerbread Cuties tee with mid-century starbursts, gingerbread boy and girl full of joy as they decorate their tree and I love the mid-century details on the Christmas tree stand and the stool the gingerbread boy is on with hairpin legs. Sugar and spice really do make everything so nice!!

We are very happy to offer these holiday styles in sizes small-4X while they last. Shop Now!!

Pretty Ladies – Collecting Vintage Christmas Head Vases and Planters

December 10, 2020 By: Fan

Welcome to blog post three in our six-part series on collecting vintage Christmas. Today I am sharing some of my favorite Christmas head vases and planters from the 1950s-1960s along with some tips towards the end of this post on collecting head vases and cleaning your precious items.

Vintage Christmas Rubens Skater Girl Planter

If you’ve been reading my blog and following me for some time then you know I am obsessed and you can say addicted to vintage kitschy mid-century goodies but, I am especially crazy4 vintage Christmas!! I started collecting vintage Christmas head vases and planters with this adorable little skater girl (above) wearing a bright red skater outfit, gold antlers on her head and a sleigh filled with presents and candy cane runners. This planter was made by Rubens in the 1950s and most likely in Japan as that is where the majority of ceramic production was taking place. I found this planter so adorable and charming and so a collection started.

Vintage Christmas Inarco Head Vase Glamour Girl

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Collecting Kitschy Christmas: Noel Sets

November 27, 2020 By: Fan

Yasmina Greco with her Vintage Christmas NOEL Collection

You may have noticed that Christmas is in the air. That feeling of festivity and joy that comes with this time of year can be attributed to many things, but one of them surely has to be all the vintage kitschy decorations. For me, one of my favorite things to do is pull out the vintage NOEL sets that I have been collecting for years and display these treasures as I get my home ready for Christmas. If you love a touch of nostalgia with some Mid-Century flair then you’ll want to curl up with your cocoa and read our new blog post on Collecting Vintage Christmas: Noel Sets for tips on buying, selling, and searching for these treasures.

Yasmina Greco’s Vintage Christmas NOEL Collection Kitschy Mid-Mod Decorations

Today’s blog post features some of my vintage Noel collection that dates from the 1950s-1960s and features Noel candle holders, Noel bells, and Noel figurines. When it comes to vintage Noel collectibles there are so many varieties and themes from Santa Claus, Elves, Poodles, Snowmen, Angels, Candy Canes, and even Clowns, that there really is something for everyone and you can easily have a theme each year for your holiday decorating too!!

WARNING!! Blog has a lot of photos.

One sure way to any collector’s heart is items that come with their original boxes. For me, the box can also be used as part of your vintage holiday decor as they usually have timeless graphics that add so much charm to your displays. Since these vintage items are usually 70 yrs old, if you do find an original box it will probably have some wear and tear or even water damage from being stored in basements and attics and that is completely okay and in my opinion, adds that much more to the story and history of the item.

Here are five of my very favorite Noel sets from my personal collection and I think they are just dynamite. Each set is so unique and has loads and loads of vintage Christmas charm. I actually have them up year-round in my cabinet and they always make me smile when I stop and admire them.

1950s Grimco Japan NOEL Bells Vintage Christmas

This 4 Piece Noel bells set of boys and girls made by World Creations by Grimco Japan 1950s. This set is hard to find and very delicate, made from very fine ceramic so there may be light hairline cracks if you do come across a set. The facial expressions on these kids are so darling. In today’s market expect to pay $275-$325.

2. Christmas Cowboy Santa Noel Candle Holders set by Menschik Goldman in the 1950s. Santa is wearing his western hat with green and red holiday flair, his red suit complete with holster and pistol and his body spells out NOEL. This set is very rare, I have only come across it one time and in today’s market expect to pay $299-$350.

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